How good was Japanese aviation?

I find it at best dubious. The Ki-43-I Hayabusa was, at best, armed with one Ho-103 12.7mm with ~300 rounds, and one 7.7mm mg with ~500 rounds. Given the description, there just doesn't seem to be enough ammo to support it. B-24's could generally take a lot of 12.7 mm hits, and a tremendous number of 7.7mm hits.

I'd have to see confirmation of the losses on that date to believe it. The Japanese were notorious for false kill claims.

And just what angle would he be "safe" from the B-24 return fire? There isn't one!

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Lunatic

[CharlesBronson]

Guncam of unknow japanese hidroplane under attack, maybe by F4U.

I think it's a hellcat, judging from the other plane you can see half way through the film. The wings are not gulled enough to be a Corsair.

[GT]

Update.

LOL - hardly.

Look at the data for the Ki-84. It was good, but it was not that good.

And the US post-war tests involved a Frank with a US re-designed fuel delivery system running hi-octane fuel the Japanese did not have. Even so it was slower than the US fighters you've mentioned.

BTW: the F4U-4 made 20,000 feet in under 5 minutes - the Frank could not come close to this climb rate.

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Lunatic

[GT]

Update.

[cheddar cheese]

But being Japanese it wasnt exactly hard to take out.

[Chocks away!]

Originally Posted by Chiron

By the way, I heard that during the last stage of war, Japan was acutally developing their own nuclear bomb. Americans actually destoryed a ship that carried enriched nuclear materials.

Really? I would like to learn more about that

[Chocks away!]

Originally Posted by cheddar cheese

But being Japanese it wasnt exactly hard to take out.

Actually it was armoured

[mosquitoman]

Doesn't look bad in flight, nice pic

[Chocks away!]

Originally Posted by RG_Lunatic

I find it at best dubious. The Ki-43-I Hayabusa was, at best, armed with one Ho-103 12.7mm with ~300 rounds, and one 7.7mm mg with ~500 rounds. Given the description, there just doesn't seem to be enough ammo to support it. B-24's could generally take a lot of 12.7 mm hits, and a tremendous number of 7.7mm hits.

I'd have to see confirmation of the losses on that date to believe it. The Japanese were notorious for false kill claims.

And just what angle would he be "safe" from the B-24 return fire? There isn't one!

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Lunatic

Well i agree that it seems unlikely because of his lack of armament, but the man claims he actually saw them crash! not just smoke. And i have respect for Japanese aces

[Chocks away!]

Originally Posted by DaveB.inVa

This bad boy was supposed to be under development at the end of the war!
Its the Nakajima G10N1 Fugaku (Mount Fuji). It never got off the drawing board though.

The Japanese did have at least one 4 engined heavy bomber during the whole war! It was the Nakajima G5N1 Shinzan (Mountain Recess). There were 6 built in the 40 or 41. They were configured to be heavy bombers but served the entire time as transports!!

They also ended up building the Nakajima G8N Renzan (Mountain Range) ... Yep they liked to name stuff after mountains!!! There were four built and the first flight was in 1944.

Mountain recess lol

[GT]

Update.

Originally Posted by GT

I disagree, Ki 84was extremely fast, it could outstrip the Mustang at low altitudes and Ki 84s tremendous speed at low altitudes made it even more effective.The 2 20mm cannons and 2 heavy-machine guns gave it a good punch and the rate of fire with the 20 mm cannon gave it one of the best hitting power of all a/c armed with double 20mm. Hayate had also excellent maneuverability and the captured Ki-u84-1a could out climb and outmaneuver the P-47 and P-51 tested against.

Again I have to point out the Ki-84 tested by the USAAF was rebuilt using an American fuel system and other modifications and using high-grade US fuel. It was a design test of the airframe, not the engine.

The Ho-5 was one of the weakest 20mm's of WWII. It's initial velocity was a low 730 m/s, and its ballistic qualities were poor. By 300 meters it had lost over 35% of its velocity, taking a half second to get that far. By 500 meters it had lost 50% of its velocity, taking a full second to reach that range. It also fired a rather small round, 79 grams for the HEI shell, meaning it only packed about 5-6 grams of payload. The Ho-5 was just a .50 BMG necked up to 20mm with a slightly smaller case. Because of this it is generally recorded as having the same RoF but this is dubious as the gun has less relative working energy. This gun was not nearly as good as you are making it out to be - at 1000 foot range its rounds would quite likely bounce off Hellcats, Corsairs, or P-47's (all of which had double thick skins). Japanese fusing was also the worst of any nation, so bad that they often used unfused HE rounds packed with PETN which is so unstable it detonated on contact. It was not uncommon for these rounds to detonate in the gun.

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Lunatic

Originally Posted by Chocks away!

Really? I would like to learn more about that

That's a negative. Two u-boats were dispatched carrying barrels of un-enriched uranium-oxide powder heading for Japan at the very end of the war. When the Germans surrendered the u-boats were still en-route - one chose to surrender (there is even a movie about it, the sub happened to be named U-235), and the other was sunk before it reached Japan.

The uranium was carried was not enriched.

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Lunatic