Hermes A-1 Missile &
Wasserfall Launch Base

Brengun, 1/72 scale

Reviewed by Mark Davies

Sword's 1/72 scale Ki 44 Shoki is available online from Squadron.com

The Hermes project began in Late 1944 and ran for 10 years. It was a US Army Ordnance Corps missile programme contracted to the General Electric Company to study and exploit German missile technology following WWII.

The Hermes A-1 was General Electric’s version of the German Wasserfall. The Wasserfall was a late-WW2 guided ground-to-air anti-aircraft missile, and is generally regarded as being the first of its kind. It never progressed beyond the developmental stage, and it seems fair to say that rocket technology was ahead of guidance technology at the time. After all, a Manual Command to Line Of Sight (MCLOS) system might be fine for 1-3 km anti-tank weapons, but it stretches things a bit to hit a bomber at 26,000 ft. The nighttime version was to again be manually steered, but using a radar screen.

Limitations aside, the Wasserfall was still a revelation to both the conquering Western Allies and the Soviet Union. It influenced many early US and Soviet anti-aircraft missiles, as well as missiles intended for other purposes.  Five A-1 missiles were successfully launched at White Sands between May 1950 and April 1951. A slightly larger Hermes A-3 was developed and tested as surface to surface missile, but failed to achieve its design range during tests. None of the Hermes A-series missiles entered production.

Contents

The kit comes in an end-opening box with artwork on its front and a painting and markings guide on its rear. The instructions have a parts map and use a diagrammatic format that is easy to follow.

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There are no written instructions, but then none are required, so simple is this kit. There is a brief history of the Hermes A-1in Czech and English. Generic paint colours are given in English. The parts come enclosed in a zip-lock bag, with the PE parts further enclosed in a small bag of their own.

This is a typical Czech limited run kit, and shares the same styrene and PE parts as Brengun’s earlier Wasserfall missile I reviewed here on HyperScale in December 2012. However, this kit does not have the resin parts to make a trestle to lay the missile on. It has quite cleanly moulded parts with fine surface detail. Parts break down is logical. The sprue gates are narrow, and the parts are virtually flash-free. The PE is also of good quality.

The Kit

Assembly of the kit is very straightforward. There are two missile fuselage halves to which the various fins and four cone-shaped fairings are attached. Possibly more work is involved with the launching trolley. This a cruciform base made of five parts to which four side rails are added.  It uses different fins to those of the Wasserfall, and these are clearly indentified in the parts map. The original Wasserfall fins remain, so the German missile can be made from this kit too.

There are four small railroad wheels to fit and a folded PE support ring that the missile sits on. The trolley rode on rails, and these are supplied as a separate base by Brengun.

The base is a simple one-piece resin casting provided in a cellophane bag with card header, and should add some interest when displaying the finished model.

Overall, I think this should be a simple and enjoyable kit to build.

Marking Options

The kit offers three colour scheme options with decals for each.

All are essentially the same, and cover a museum example, plus the fourth and fifth test missiles.

This type of kit is rare in any scale, although Planet Models offer a 1/72-scale resin kit Wasserfall that costs about four times injected kit’s price, so SAM aficionados are sure to welcome this one by Brengun.

I happily recommend it.

Thanks to Brengun for the review sample.

Review Text & Blue Background Images Copyright © 2013 by Mark Davies
Page Created 22 August, 2013
Last updated 22 August, 2013

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