Rebirth of the G5N (for Empire's Ablaze)

[el cid again]

After all the work to get the Me-264 running

Nemo does not like it in action!

Not that it isn't fantastic in effect -

buy you know Nemo - he wants to have them in masses - and the Japanese economy cannot feed em!

Pointing out that that was a real problem with German ultra long range bombers (the fuel for their missions
is properly simulated by supply point requirements in WITP) does not help. He wants a smaller bomber.

So I am back to the drawing board - reworking the G5N design - in four flavors:

the transport version, the only successful variant, which is already in all flavors of RHS: G5N2-L

a bomber version
a torpedo bomber version (possibly combined with the above)
a smart weapon version (using later engines I suppose)

A former computer engineer for a Boeing subcontractor called Harris Corporation, I was resident at Boeing Software Integration Laboratories when "superminicomputers" were less powerful than our present day micros. I know how to work this out - so I will. Looks like the transport version is fine as is - with the Ha-101 engine. The bomber variant can use the Ha-32. This is no more powerful than the engine used in the historical G5N1, but it is reliable, which the original was not. The up engined version can use the Ha-104. That means the improved version can date sometime in 1943. It also means an engine slot (Mansyu) is freed up.

[Mifune]

He is a reliable 4e with Japanese markings. [:D]

[m10bob]

ORIGINAL: Mifune

He is a reliable 4e with Japanese markings. [:D]

Yeah Mifune....Looks like it has promise!

[wdolson]

ORIGINAL: el cid again
A former computer engineer for a Boeing subcontractor called Harris Corporation, I was resident at Boeing Software Integration Laboratories when "superminicomputers" were less powerful than our present day micros.

When did you work there? I worked in Boeing's Flight Systems Labs from 1987 to 1994. We used a lot of Harris simulation computers. Though I was working further down stream on the interface with the LRUs being tested.

Bill

[el cid again]

A bit before you - early 1980s.

[el cid again]

I substituted a more reliable engine into the G5N1 design - but otherwise left it alone - so that the aircraft could fly as is early. But all four prototypes were kept in this form - so none are available for conversion to G5N2 transports. The two G5N2s are also to be built as was, but since they have not been completed by the time the war begins, this is under player control. All variants have a durability = 30. All but G5N4 maneuverability = 4. G5N4 maneuverability = 6. MaxLoad in all cases defined as 8818 pounds = 4 metric tons. I think that sets optimum airfield level to 5.

The G5N3 is a modified G5N1, more or less inspired by the G7 concept. It carries a 21 inch Long Lance Torpedo instead of the 18 inch used by other Japanese planes (in the same league as US 22 inch aerial torpedoes size wize). This gives a gigantic increase in weapon range and a significant increase in warhead. At the same time, it reduces the bomb load. The extra weight carried as fuel translates into a greater range for this variant. But it isn't available until mid-1942. By that time the 7.7 mm mg are replaced by 13mm HMG.

The G5N4 is an upengined G5 variant, but it trades internal bombs for external missiles. The more powerful engines cause it not to be available until 1943. The missiles are HS-293 variants. The defensive guns are increased by exchanging the ventral HMG for a ventral turret with a single 20mm and by twinning the tail turret (which was always a single before). In spite of this, the great power gives the plane exceptional maneuverability for a four engine aircraft. Its normal payload is still less than a G5N1, so it has somewhat better range.

G5N1 bomber Transfer Range = 37 Extended Range = 12 Normal Range = 9
G5N2-L transport Transfer = 40; Extended = 13; Normal = 10 [But de facto transport range = 20]
G5N3 torpedo bomber Transfer = 41; Extended = 13; Normal = 9
G5N4 missile bomber Transfer = 39; Extended = 13; Normal = 9

[msieving1]

ORIGINAL: el cid again

So I am back to the drawing board - reworking the G5N design - in four flavors:

the transport version, the only successful variant, which is already in all flavors of RHS: G5N2-L

"Successful" might be a relative term. The Japanese had six prototypes when they canceled the program. Since the prototypes were unacceptable as bombers, they made four of them transports. The plane never went into production, in any form.

Do you include the B-15 and B-19 for the Americans? They were similar projects, being heavy bomber prototypes that were rejected as bombers and converted to transports to make use of the existing aircraft.

[wdolson]

ORIGINAL: el cid again
I substituted a more reliable engine into the G5N1 design - but otherwise left it alone - so that the aircraft could fly as is early. But all four prototypes were kept in this form - so none are available for conversion to G5N2 transports. The two G5N2s are also to be built as was, but since they have not been completed by the time the war begins, this is under player control. All variants have a durability = 30. All but G5N4 maneuverability = 4. G5N4 maneuverability = 6. MaxLoad in all cases defined as 8818 pounds = 4 metric tons. I think that sets optimum airfield level to 5.

I'm surprised you haven't included the G8N. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nakajima_G8N

Maybe you did and I didn't notice.

Bill

[Mifune]

Actually the G8N1 was included in RHS a while back. But with it appearing 2/45 it would not have done the japanese too much good by then.

[el cid again]

ORIGINAL: msieving1

ORIGINAL: el cid again

So I am back to the drawing board - reworking the G5N design - in four flavors:

the transport version, the only successful variant, which is already in all flavors of RHS: G5N2-L

"Successful" might be a relative term. The Japanese had six prototypes when they canceled the program. Since the prototypes were unacceptable as bombers, they made four of them transports. The plane never went into production, in any form.

Do you include the B-15 and B-19 for the Americans? They were similar projects, being heavy bomber prototypes that were rejected as bombers and converted to transports to make use of the existing aircraft.

This is close to correct: there were 4 G5N1s and only 2 G5N2-Ls built as such. Two of the G5N1s were re-engined to G5N2-L standard, so only four planes served in the transport role. Those four, however, served well, and were successful as transports. There was one additional aircraft: the original DC-4 (redesignated DC-4E) which was disassembled, but which could have been reassembled - and was not. It would have been most difficult to service, and it was a passenger airliner, not a freighter like the G5N2-Ls were, nor a bomber, like the G5N1s were. It is true the aircraft was not put into production. It is also true that the aircraft was very complex (the DC-4E was in fact rejected for that reason) by the standards of the day. [For example, it introduced the idea of an auxiliary engine to generate on board power - SOP today but radical then] I don't think the G5N was a wonderful airplane design which would have earned for itself a spectacular operational record - except in wierd circumstances where the enemy was incompetently handled. But it has one great merit and might have been chosen for war service because of it: it was the ONLY four engine bomber or transport project in Japan in 1941. Its ONLY competition IRL was the FW-200 Condor, which in fact was modified into a maritime recon bomber for IJN (not the Kriegsmarine) and for which a proper production licence had been obtained. Like the DC-4E the Condor began as an airliner - it was the permier airliner of its day in fact - setting all sorts of records just before WWII began. Like the G5N, Condors were not structurally ideal as bombers - something they had not been designed to be. Like the G5N, the Condor lacks the truly spectacular range/payload performance of the Betty and Nell. Because both require four engines, they are very expensive aircraft with relatively poor maneuverability. Nevertheless, except for the Mavis Transport H6K2-L variant (and a couple of purchased aircraft which spent the war on the runway at Harbin), Japan has no other 4 engine transports. A strategic transport does not need to be great in durability or maneuverability. [Consider the DC-3. One web site says it was "probably the most vulnerable military aircraft of all time." While that is an exaggeration, it was not particularly durable.] I believe in air transport - and so did Japanese Prime Minister Tojo. [He was the first high Japanese official to regularly use air transport himself. He at one time had headed JAAF aircraft development.] So I think the G5N2-L is a reasonably likely option available for Japan - and available early. Players who don't want it (they start only with the 4 G5N1 prototypes, all converted to 2-L standard) don't have to produce it - and they will have a lot more engines available if they do not. NOT producing the G5N2-L is ALSO a reasonable and viable strategy. Both options are in all versions of RHS.

But this thread is not about RHS. It is about Empire's Ablaze - a derivitive of RHSEOS modified by Nemo. EA has no supply sinks, radically more ship construction, and a number of other changes. Nemo wants bomber options available early which are not as expensive operationally as the Me-264 would have been. [He finds PRODUCTION costs to be managable but OPERATIONAL costs in supply points prohibitive.] There are not a lot of candidates: essentially they are limited to the G5N and Condor if one is strictly historical, and perhaps one could throw in one or two German (or even Italian) bombers as historical possibilities. But all except the G5N would take longer to get into production - there was a Nakajima line already dedicated to them in 1941. There were difficulties with engine supply, but it really only required a shift in strategic allocation priorities and integration engineering to solve them. This thread offers the options I was able to work up with reasonable range/speed/payload specifications using the G5 airframe. I do not intend to use any of them in RHS unless there is a reason to do so (e.g. Mifune sees a role for a 4 engine bomber in 1942) - and then most likely only the historical G5N1. That aircraft is already part of CHS - and RHS merely exchanged it for the transport version - giving Japan the OPTION of producing heavy transports - something I think is more realistic for the G5N than a bomber version.

There are different theories about air power - and about bombers in particular. Nemo thinks a great deal more like Bomber Command than I do. Even if you accept that 4 engine bombers used for city bombing is a good idea (morally, legally, militarily and economically - all different questions) it is petty clear to me that no Axis power could afford to prosecute such operations on a significant scale. Germany never did produce any of the Me-264s - the most likely of all the might have been bombers - and it only tried to produce 60 of them (excluding prototypes). And Germany had a larger aircraft industry than Japan did. Nemo's idea that you can produce them in three figures EVERY MONTH is IMHO economic nonsense. And - as Nemo has learned - feeding them would be virtually impossible if they did find the aluminum and engines to build them. Any such effort must greatly reduce the number of fighters, two engine bombers, recon planes and transports built in Japan. But Nemo thinks you can substitute 4 engine bombers for twins, and use them for recon (so you don't need recon planes either), and if you are aggressive enough you won't need so many fighters - because they won't be able to attack so much. I do not require he agree with me to cooperate with him. I am working to his requirements here.

I have not included the B-15 or B-19 projects. These are not really comparable in any case - but belong to an earlier era. Nor has anyone requested them. The big limit in WITP is slots - and I don't have slots for them - or for 4 kinds of G5Ns either. But this isn't for my mod, and so making slots available isn't up to me.

[el cid again]

ORIGINAL: wdolson

ORIGINAL: el cid again
I substituted a more reliable engine into the G5N1 design - but otherwise left it alone - so that the aircraft could fly as is early. But all four prototypes were kept in this form - so none are available for conversion to G5N2 transports. The two G5N2s are also to be built as was, but since they have not been completed by the time the war begins, this is under player control. All variants have a durability = 30. All but G5N4 maneuverability = 4. G5N4 maneuverability = 6. MaxLoad in all cases defined as 8818 pounds = 4 metric tons. I think that sets optimum airfield level to 5.

I'm surprised you haven't included the G8N. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nakajima_G8N

Maybe you did and I didn't notice.

Bill

Yep. I did. But it is a 1945 vintage aircraft. RHS aircraft slot 30. I believe it is also CHS aircraft slot 30.

[msieving1]

ORIGINAL: el cid again

This is close to correct: there were 4 G5N1s and only 2 G5N2-Ls built as such. Two of the G5N1s were re-engined to G5N2-L standard, so only four planes served in the transport role. Those four, however, served well, and were successful as transports.

The sources I've consulted say the G5N2s were completed as bombers, with more reliable (but less powerful) engines than the G5N1s, before being converted to transports. But that's a quibble.

Do you have any operational histories of the G5Ns? I've looked, but haven't found anything. I did run across a claim that there's wreckage of one in the water off Saipan, but how it got there wasn't clear. I know at least one survived the war, but what happened to the others, I don't know.

[el cid again]

There are photographs. One was found more or less abandoned at Atsugi - but it isn't in awful shape and seems to have served into 1945. Another photograph exists of one in service - but the date is not given. It does seem they were used in singles as special freighters. It is hard to believe anyone thought a 71,000 pound aircraft would have significant performance with 1530 hp of engines after learning that 1870 hp only gave marginal preformance. I think the 2-L was designed as a transport. But politics may have caused that not to be admitted at first. Surely the designers knew - but maybe the project was justified as a way to get a bomber. Look at the Ki-68 (2 versions) and Ki-85 variations (proposals not proceeded with by two companies): all used larger engines. Anyone working on a bomber need to get into the 1900 to 2100 hp range for acceptable performance.