Japanese aircraft were behind in timing to Allied aircraft.

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Yes, confirming a 'pattern' that you already believed in. People often confuse that for finding the truth. It's not the same.

H3K flying boat, first flight, 1930, introduced 1936
H6K flying boat, first flight 1936, introduced 1938 (equivalent to the PBY)
H8K was far, far superior to the PBY or any other US flying boat produced during the war.
Ki-15 recon plane (300 mph, 1,500 mile range) first flight, 1936, introduced 1937
 
Wild_Bill_Kelso said:
H3K flying boat, first flight, 1930, introduced 1936
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The H3K was designed and first prototype built by Shorts.
Shipped to Japan in 1930 and a license agreement worked out and production started using drawings, documents and imported components from Shorts.
Yup, another example of Japanese advanced aircraft engineering and design
Wild_Bill_Kelso said:
H6K flying boat, first flight 1936, introduced 1938 (equivalent to the PBY)
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Goal of the Japanese was to beat the performance of the Sikorsky S-42 which first flew in 1934.

And the first 2 entered commercial service in 1934
The Japanese team did a very good job, Some of their personnel had also payed a visit to Short Brothers.
US Commercial flying boats were not always reflected in Military contracts.
Martin M-130

All three flying before the first H6K1 took off.
Should we mention the Boeing 314?

"Yes, confirming a 'pattern' that you already believed in. People often confuse that for finding the truth. It's not the same."
 
Thumpalumpacus said:
Again, numbers built?
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I mean, about 150 H8K. ~200 H6Ks. Which I'm sure you already looked up yourself. But we aren't debating production capacity are we? By that criteria the US wins out in every category as we all know.

Aside from the quite ubiquitous PBY, flying boats were not necessarily built in very large numbers. They only built about 650 Sunderlands. They built about 350 Z.506. They only built about 200 of those Bv 138, the famous German BV 222 had 13 models, they only made one BV 238.
 

I know you think you are making a point... but none of those civilian flying boats are even close to comparable to the H8K in performance or capability and I think you know that.
 
Seeing as the Sikorsky S-42 had a top speed of ~ 180 mph and a range of 1200 miles, with no armament whatsoever, whereas the H8K had a top speed of 290 mph, a range of over 2,000 miles, 5 x 20mm cannon and 5 7.7 mm machine guns, two torpedoes or 4,000 lbs of bombs, I'd say they succeeded in making a superior design to that plane, and to every other flying boat in the world.

And I don't think it counts against that even one iota that they only made a hundred and fifty of them.

If you go back far enough, the Japanese were definitely borrowing designs from all over. So, by the way, were the Americans. In the 1880s when the Americans and British were driving around in iron trains the Japanese were just starting to put down the samurai swords and think seriously about industrializing. By 1905 they were defeating the Russian navy. By the start of WW2 they put the British and Americans to shame, and that is just a fact.

You can smirk and giggle and equivocate and lawyer up all you want, it's just a repeat of a bunch of wartime racist tropes about the supposedly inferior enemy, which dissolves when you really put the microscope on it, just like most bullshit does.
 
Well, its little consolation for various reasons, but the Boeing 314 could, at the very least, reliably transport 36 passengers overnight, or 68 day passengers, and presumably more cargo (~4.5kg), with a crew of 11. The H8K2-L, with a crew of 9, could apparently transport "29 passengers or 64 troops", though the figure varies. Haven't found anything about its cargo capacity, if it was ever used in a freight role.
 

They did, quite a few stripped down, unarmed H6K and H8K got shot down in the late war while flying people (presumably military and industry VIPs) as part of Nippon airways.
 
Wild_Bill_Kelso said:
They did, quite a few stripped down, unarmed H6K and H8K got shot down in the late war while flying people (presumably military and industry VIPs) as part of Nippon airways.
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I was referring to cargo as opposed to passengers.

The Emily was indeed the best four-engined seaplane of the period, and, from all accounts, an indigenous effort. But what of Japanese jet planes?

The Japanese were anywhere from 2 years (RAF efforts) to ≥4 years (German/Italian efforts) behind, and missile technology. I mean, the V-2 was built with slave labor, but the missile itself did not rely on slaves for propulsion or guidance, did it? The Japanese experienced issues with developing rocket aircraft, and for that matter, they had never approached successful development of any jet or rocket prototype prior to 1944, and not without German technology. The former two technologies were becoming increasingly relevant to military aviation, and jet technology for even civilian / non-military aviation and are thus germane to this discussion. Furthermore, obsolete Japanese aircraft were to engage these fast-climbing, rapidly accelerating, and overwhelmingly faster jet aircraft, in the event that the militarists had their way.

This issue is particularly important, as jet technology would become increasingly decisive with the advent of more manoeuvrable designs like the Mig-15 and P-86. The smaller Italian economy had made some tangible progress earlier on, even if it looked somewhat pitiful. Japanese interest in ramjet technology had progressed little before consideration of German turbojets. What of this?
 


First flight 23 June 1942 (?) after an engine fire in ground test. Launched Nov 8th 1941.

The version of the H8K that had the 5 20mm guns didn't fly until 1944
The 290mph versions didn't fly until 1943.

The H8K was the fastest flying boat in the world in WW II

Twisting time lines is getting more than tiresome and accusations of racism and bullshit when the facts don't back you up is also getting old.
 
Wild_Bill_Kelso said:
I mean, about 150 H8K. ~200 H6Ks. Which I'm sure you already looked up yourself. But we aren't debating production capacity are we? By that criteria the US wins out in every category as we all know.
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My point is that if your tech in the factory cannot pump them out faster, quality of design doesn't matter.

Now get that nice, high-tech machine tool to cottage-industry subcontractors building the parts for these airplanes. Isn't all that much easier in a big plant? But wait, there's more. You also have to get the materials for manufacture out to these smaller shops. That, too, requires tech -- rails? Ships? And so on.


Ah. And no doubt 350 or so Japanese flying boats made as big a difference as 2700 American-built in a theater as large as the Pacific. Those superior flying boats really got it done.

No, they got shot down by fighters.

Japan was technologically behind the Allies by 1943-44. They had some good designs, and their late war carrier bomber was great, on paper. But if you look at it year-by-year, you see the tide turn -- and not only in airplanes, but ships as well.

The difference between science and technology is that science can make great designs, but technology is required to produce it in numbers.
 
Thumpalumpacus said:
The difference between science and technology is that science can make great designs, but technology is required to produce it in numbers.
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That is the crux of the matter. It doesn't matter if your design is the best ever when the structures required to put it into operation
are either not in place, or require too much in time and physical resources to make it in viable amounts.

Smartphones the size and type of the iPhone (2007) including touch screen could have been made in the early nineties. The problem
was it would have been a low production scenario with a cost in the millions per phone.

Germany looked seriously at manufacturing the G.55 but again, production requirements were too much to be worth the change.

Betamax was actually superior to VHS and so on.

As the war went on Japan didn't have the capability to change to newer equipment in usable numbers and so fell behind.

Both Germany and Japan ended up with projects which were never going to happen.
 

A lot of people don't understand the difference between scientific knowledge and applied science. It's one thing to know how to do something, but it's another thing to know how to do it in a meaningful manner. And it varies. Even when American BBs were updated in the 80s, they retained the older analog fire-control computers, because the digital programming of the time, wonderful as it was, simply couldn't do better.

Getting something that was both effective and easy to produce is -- wait for it -- a technological matter.
 

Let me be clear, I am not claiming, nor have I ever, that the Japanese equaled, let alone surpassed US industrial production in WW2. They did fairly well in production by world standards, but they (nor anyone else) were not in the same league as the US.

But when looking at WW2, that is kind of the equivalent of 'when your only tool is a hammer, everything looks like a nail'. If you want the US to look great, emphasize quantity of production and wax poetic about how important all those busy factories, mines, refineries and manufacturing plants are. Sure the US was great at production. That is not necessarily what the thread is about.

My contention at any rate is that the Japanese aircraft designs, with production significant enough to play some role in the war, was equal to that of Europe and the US. I mean designs that saw action I'm not just talking about theoretical x-weapons or whatever. I think once you get into 1944 though the effects of US Strategic warfare, both bombing of Japan and (I think maybe even more) the destruction of their merchant fleet meant that they fell behind sharply in production.

I think the ratio you are emphasizing here of 2700 PBYs to 300 H6 and H8 flying boats is a bit misleading. This was a matter more of priorities rather than purportedly feeble production capabilities. They had types we never even bothered with, for example 300 of those A6M2-N seaplane fighters, I'm not sure how many of the 1,500 N1k1 were the seaplane type, but some of those were. They built 10,000 A6Ms in all variants. That isn't trivial.

I believe that the Japanese didn't produce as many flying boats because they did not prioritize all the missions those were really used for - i.e. a lot of search and rescue and crew recovery, as well as recon and ASW. The fairly antiquated PBYs were starting to be used less for daytime recon and more for ASW and search and rescue (and some night time anti-shipping strikes) in the later years of the war.

The Japanese produced over 70,000 aircraft during the war. That's fourth in the world, but lets keep in mind that their production was severely impacted in the last two years of the conflict (which was when ours was in high gear).

Let's also remember that the IJN produced 18-20 aircraft carriers during or before the war. (13 fleet carriers, 7 light carriers). The US produced far more than that (over 100, mostly late in the war), but Japan was second with (I think) more than Britain. Germans had none. Italians had one partially constructed. Soviets had none. French had maybe one in production.

The Japanese were also keeping up with the US until the mid war, in terms of carriers in the battle areas.
 
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