COBI Kettenkrad Set 2681

COBI's Kettenkrad is a 1:28 model of the German half-track motorcycle with its trailer, built from 239 blocks, with a Luftwaffe ground crew figure. The trailer comes loaded with backpacks, shovels, barrels and Mauser 98K rifles. Markings are printed onto the blocks rather than applied as stickers.

Made for airfields, kept on for farms

The Sd.Kfz. 2 is a motorcycle at the front and a tracked tractor behind, and the combination looks like a compromise nobody asked for. It was in fact a specification: NSU had to build a light prime mover small and light enough to fit inside a Junkers Ju 52, so that airborne units could have something to haul guns once they landed.

The airborne role barely happened. What the Kettenkrad ended up doing, in numbers, was working airfields — towing aircraft between dispersal and runway. Late in the war that became a necessity rather than a convenience, because the new jets drank too much fuel to be taxied under their own power.

Around 8,000 were built during the war. The interesting part is what happened afterwards: NSU restarted production in 1946 and kept going until 1949, selling them to farmers and forestry workers who wanted something that could climb a muddy slope with a trailer behind it. The front wheel could be removed entirely for the worst ground.

In the COBI range

Set 2680 is the Goliath, the remote-controlled demolition vehicle, at the same scale. Set 2672 is the Panzer III Ausf. H and 2676 the StuG III Ausf. G.

Specifications

Pieces: 239 · Figures: 1 · Scale: 1:28 · Trailer with accessories · No stickers