Rheintochter from Bronco

More good news from Bronco this September: Rheintochter missile and missile launcher set is about to be released on the market very soon. The kit will be numbered 35050, and it will feature Photo-etch parts as well as many small details for that interesting missile.

Rheintochter is a German surface-to-air missile from the Second World War. The name comes from Wagner’s opera series Der Ring des Nibelungen and resembles the aggression in all its detail. It looks scary and very ahead of its time. The rocket was more than 6m long and for its time was a huge achievement in aerodynamics and rocket science. The project started in late 1942 and continued throughout the war, with more than 80 launches made from test sites. That include several variations of the weapon. None of them made it to the front, but it showed the potential of such weapons.

Bronco made a promising announcement with this kit. Not only because this is a new molding but because it is a different set compared to the unstopping flow of tanks and airplanes that all the scale model manufacturers supply us with. I personally know quite a few rocket enthusiasts who begged for V-1 and V-2 models, so you can imagine how much joy that new Rheintochter will bring into their lives and collections.

The kit will be of decent size, and can be made in several variations as seen on the Bronco’s box. The final boxart is not yet announced, but there will be no let downs there. The only thing that I am a bit afraid of, is the fact that Bronco’s plastic is a bit soft-ish and their kits are little over-engineered. The geometry of a rocket by itself is not a complex one, but Rheintochter has small wings/stabilizers in two stages which requires nice, Tamiya-like engineering so to achieve the perfect geometry of the model. This is my concern so far regarding this kit, but it might be only because I tend not to be over-excited when a new kit comes around.

I truly hope, that Bronco /and hopefully other manufacturers/ will release similar models like the Rheintochter. There are many weird looking rockets from the Soviet era as well, so this side of the modeling is not to be forgotten or put aside. Job well done Bronco!