JoblinTheGoblin
Airman
- 59
- May 13, 2023
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I was inspired to make this post, having heard of the exemplary record of the Ki-43, and claims that the Ki-100 had similar characteristics to more advanced aircraft like the P-51B+ in nearly all aspects of manoeuvrability except, oddly enough, level flight speed, and maybe some other metric I haven't mentioned here.
- Soviet union, Italy?- Smaller, weaker, but simpler and lighter engines.
-- Adding to this, simpler designs that workers of lower skill or experience can produce more efficiently.
- Emphasis on range and/or slow(er) speed manoeuvrability, for example, larger, wider wings.
- Heavier aircraft armament, such as cannons on aircraft, 20mm or greater.
- Slower, more gradual evolution of aircraft, such as prolonging the production of obsolete or tried and true designs.
- Bombers with excessively long ranges but generally smaller bomb loads.
- Oddly advanced dive/torpedo bombers that have the ability to come close to or exceed the maximum level speeds of foreign counterparts.
- "Laminar flow", balloons, or some other similarly quirky side interest.
- Continuously issuing aircraft requirements that can't, or won't, be met, especially maximum level speed.
- Specifying the top speed of an aircraft to be that achieved at military power or similar, as opposed to take-off power at altitude, WEP or equivalent.
We often focus on displacement of the engines, which the aircraft designers could care less about.- Smaller, weaker, but simpler and lighter engines.
In engine land the US invented machines/processes that hugely speeded up production for the same amount of man hours. Now the cost of the machines and the man hours to produce the machines was very expensive compared to just adding lower skilled workers but for large production it paid off. Using large numbers of semi-skilled workers to finish grind/polish air cooled cylinder head fins when you need thousands of cylinder heads per month (14 cylinder heads per engine) ?-- Adding to this, simpler designs that workers of lower skill or experience can produce more efficiently.
Range equals weight, and longer, wider wings equals drag. Every thing is a compromise.- Emphasis on range and/or slow(er) speed manoeuvrability, for example, larger, wider wings.
Timing, it turns out that it took about 5-6 years to go from concept to actual large scale use of an aircraft gun (includes tooling up factory and training workers).- Heavier aircraft armament, such as cannons on aircraft, 20mm or greater.
US had the capacity to make a crap load of fighters. For the US there was a 2nd problem."Quantity has a quality all on its own" and "Showing up is half the fight"
- Continuously issuing aircraft requirements that can't, or won't, be met, especially maximum level speed.
My point is, that from everything I've read online, in forum discussions and online encyclopaedias, the Ki-100 was, in essence, a slow P-51. Basically, Japanese aircraft were, in a sense, like uniquely slower variants of aircraft of other nations, which were not as slow.There was probably nothing odd in P-51B+ having a much greater level flight speed than the Ki-100 - after all, Ki-100 was offering the level speed of the Spitfire I.
I maybe should have phrased it differently. It's that Japanese designs were simpler for the sake of less skilled workers, eschewing more intricate, and in some cases more sophisticated, technology in the process. Aircraft with liquid-cooled engines, such as the Ki-28 or the imported A7He, were rejected for their complex engines, among their other apparent deficiencies. Another example of a design rejected for its complexity was the Ki-94I.- The more machine tools one has, the less skillful the manpower can be - Japanese were not that efficient after all?
? They still had quite the fast warbirds.- Americans?
Yep.- Americans favored long range, although their bombers were also carrying good bombloads.
Until now, I was unaware as to the existence of the Henley. I had forgotten about the Pe-2, though variants of some Japanese aircraft, like the D4Y, did at least come close in terms of level speed to the twin-engined bomber. If the higher end estimates of, say, the Ki-84's performance are to believed, that aircraft would have been a comparable fighter-bomber to those other fighter-bombers you listed. For pure light bomber designs, the B7A, D4Y and B6N were comparable to the Firebrand, the Helldiver, and other examples.- A-36A, Pe-2, Henley - all of them started out as fighters, though. Also the Fw 190 and G.55S that were supposed to carry torpedoes, although I don't think that these were ever used in that role. Re.2002 was also supposed to carry a (small) torpedo.
True, though some quirky projects in particular, like jet aircraft, night vision and guided weapons, went somewhere.- Germans were the kings of quirky things.
How about maximum (achievable) engine power, dash power, boost(?) or some other term I may be forgetting here?- Take-off power at altitude was possible only with turbocharged engines. WEP and military power were American terms, perhaps not mix it with other countries?
The Japanese thought differently.If you are deliberately using low powered engines you may have to stay with less powerful armament to keep performance in an acceptable area.
Earlier on, the initial Ki-46 prototype failed to meet a 600kph requirement. The Ki-84, from all accounts, could not have achieved the 680kph the army required of it. The J5N failed to meet an Army "18-shi specification" for a 666(???) kph fighter. Neither the A7M1 or the A7M2 matched a ~639kph specified speed, a speed similar to that of a late model F6F, superceded by the formidable F8F.I do not think this point belongs in the description, but I am not sure as I do not have enough information on the many types of airframe the Japanese put in service vs the initial design requirements. I am only somewhat familiar with the original RFPs and design requirements for a few aircraft - given by the Japanese bureaus (Army and Navy?) responsible for laying out their wishlists.
In the cases of the Ki-43 and A6M, both airframes met or exceeded the wishlists in most or all areas. I think the H8K did also, but am not sure.
You'll have to step further into the world of Japanese animation for such things...The authors clearly kept their imagination restrained. Where's the kamikaze orbital bomber? Where are the manned anti-aircraft missiles ramming into the helpless B-29? The spirit of samurai self-sacrifice is poorly conveyed. The enemy is not completely destroyed. Seems, that the tradition of composing fairy tales is going away...
I always suspected there are gateways between parallel worlds. And Japan won in one of them.You'll have to step further into the world of Japanese animation for such things...
View: https://youtu.be/X5vIGnk3XJ8
Earlier on, the initial Ki-46 prototype failed to meet a 600kph requirement. The Ki-84, from all accounts, could not have achieved the 680kph the army required of it. The J5N failed to meet an Army "18-shi specification" for a 666(???) kph fighter. Neither the A7M1 or the A7M2 matched a ~639kph specified speed, a speed similar to that of a late model F6F, superceded by the formidable F8F.
Already, with the advent of later Spitfires and Merlin-powered P-51s, Ki-43 pilots were beginning to hurt for faster planes that could fly well. Where was the Japanese Mustang?
I guess my question is, if another country faced a situation similar to Japan's, similar to what you've laid out, particularly a European or American country, how would it fare? Could the factors that influenced Japan's preference for certain aspects of performance like turn-times have occurred in another country, making it's aviation industry go down a similar path?When you add in Japan's substantially smaller population base, substantially smaller industrial base, and substantial lack of access to natural resources (relativel to the Allies), I find it amazing that the Japanese did as well as they did. Also, don't forget that when comparing the combatants population base industrial base, and access to natural resources, you need to kind of add the US and UK together.
The former scenario would not change my lack of enthusiasm regarding the A7M's performance (though I will admit, the A7M3-J Kai's looks pique my interest). I would only see it as yet another conservative design in the Japanese inventory. As for the latter scenario, it would only slightly dampen my outlook on American aircraft, as they would still have such venerable designs as the P-47, P-51, P-38 and the F4U. The F6F would have still been an effective aircraft, not to mention faster than any Japanese carrier-borne aircraft with the possible exception of the C6N Flying Limousine.If they had asked for 619 km/hr how would that modify your statements and how would that affect the A7M's value? Or if the US had asked for 649 km/hr of the F6F design?
To summarise my original enquiry, what made Japan's aircraft different, and what would it take for said factors to emerge in another country?