Hooben ZTZ-99A - Bought on a whim

[tankme]

I just pulled it back off the shelf to get back to painting it. Now I just have to remember what colors I was going to use...

[Herr Dr. Professor]

I don't know much of anything about the Chinese MBTs. I have only seen a few photos online of some ZTZ99-something-or-other, all spiffy, on display in just the colors of the old HengLong I've had for years.

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[tankme]

The ZTZ-99 has quite a few variants.

I have an older Heng Long ZTZ-99 that doesn't have the ERA panels on it. Although Heng Long calls it a ZTZ-99, the tank is actually a Type-98. The Type-98 was a prototype where only 18 tanks were produced. The tank is based on a lengthened T72 hull and a clone of the Leopard 2A6 power pack. The hull is lengthened to fit the western style power pack as the Russian engine is much shorter. It uses similar sprockets and tracks to the Leopard, but uses a russian type idler and road wheel setup. Basically it is a hybrid of Soviet and western designs. The Type-98 I have is painted in the schemes you included in your post. Heng Long no longer sells this tank. Mine is similar to this pattern:

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The ones you pictured are the regular ZTZ-99 which is a Type-98 with added ERA armor. It's identified by the pointed ERA on the front of the turret. Heng Long incorrectly sells this under the ZTZ-99A label. It should be sold as the non-A version. Heng Long currently sells this tank and recently did another production run of it including a new desert color.

The ZTZ-99A model which the Hooben kit is based on, uses a completely different hull and turret from the non-"A" version. It is correctly identified as an "A" model. The Chinese typically paint these tanks in either the digital desert or digital woodland camo. I have opted to paint it in a digital desert scheme which will probably be the bane of my existence. I had bought some Humbrol paints to use for the camo, but last night decided that some of the colors didn't look right. I then had to go on the hunt for some better colors in my stash. I'm hoping to make my A model look like this:

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