Hi all i was bought this along with the Tamiya KG5 for my birthday upon opening the boxes i wondered if the Bismark must be a rerelease of an older kit as there is a battery box moulded in the bottom of the hull and 2 propshafts with propellers but no mention of any of this in the instructions.
I imagine this was like the Airfix 1/12 Bentley 4.5 supercharged which was originally sold to be motorised but they have removed it on the new release but you can still see the remnants of it in the kit.


Incidentally the props looks really good quality.

Hi Ken,

Yes, the Tamiya Bismarck dates back to the 1970s, a time when working models were the norm, especially in Japan. The original release did come with a motor and running gear.

I remember building Hasegawa's motorized 1/450 scale Akagi back then. It was fun, and the model was incredibly fast... although running these things in the local lake with other kids tended to be hard on fragile deails!

Thanks I did wonder. I will probably do it as waterline, not entirely sure yet.