This fully illustrated guide offers historical context and step-by-step instruction for building and modifying Japanese battleship models. This volume in the ShipCraft series covers the two related classes of Japanese 14in-gunned battleships, originally built during the First World War but subsequently reconstructed. These ships are famous for their towering forward superstructure, usually described as a pagoda bridge, that they featured when rebuilt. The Ise-class ships underwent further reconstruction during the Second World War to emerge as a unique hybrid of battleship and aircraft carrier to compensate for fleet carriers sunk earlier in the war. This lavishly illustrated guide takes readers through a brief history of the Fuso-class and Ise-class ships, highlighting differences between sisterships and changes in their appearance over their careers. It features color profiles of paint schemes as well as detailed line drawings and scale plans. The modelling section reviews the strengths and weaknesses of available kits, lists commercial accessory sets for super-detailing, and provides hints on modifying and improving the basic kit. This volume also includes a photographic survey of selected high-quality models in a variety of scales and a section on further research references
Intended to be glorious symbols of Japanese power, the Yamato class suffered from the disadvantage of being designed at a crossroads in naval strategy in which advances in aviation technology began to shift the focus of sea power from the battleship to the aircraft carrier. The story of the Yamato class illustrates the closing of one chapter in the history of naval warfare while at the same time the opening of another.
Ise (whose name comes from an ancient Japanese province on Honshu, now part of Mie Prefecture) was the lead ship of the two-vessel Ise-class battleships of the Imperial Japanese Navy, which saw combat service during the Pacific War. Ise was laid down as battleship 5 at the Kawasaki Heavy Industries shipyard in Kobe on 10 May 1915, launched on 12 November 1916, completed on 15 December 1917, and assigned to the Kure Naval District. Completed too late for service in World War I, Ise patrolled off the Siberian coast and in northern waters in support of Japan's Siberian Intervention against the Bolshevik Red Army. From the mid-1920s through the late 1930s, Ise patrolled mostly off of the China coast. On 12 April 1922, she hosted a delegation which included Prince of Wales, the future King Edward VIII of the United Kingdom, and the future Lord Mountbatten. Ise-class battleships were fascinating ships and their story began in 1906 with the completion of HMS Dreanought. The appearance of the all-big-gun turbine-powered Dreadnought rendered all existing battleships obsolete overnight, and in response the rest of the world's navies initiated massive construction programs. The world's major navies had gained an insurmountable lead in the number of dreadnoughts in service or under construction. Recognizing the futility of trying to compete in sheer numbers, the Japanese Navy adopted a quality before quantity approach, building fewer ships each of much greater capability than foreign designs. In 1911 the Japanese government passed the Emergency Naval Expansion bill which authorized the building of four battlecruisers and one battleship. The battleship was to be designed and built in Japan; this ship became the Fuso. There were a number of foreign designs to take into consideration when it came time to decide the main armament for the new ships. Britain Royal Navy's Orion class was armed with the 13.5 in. gun; the US Wyoming class with 12-12 in. guns; and the succeeding New York class with 10-14 in. weapons. Japan decided to leap over the competition and fit the new ships with the 14 in. gun so Fuso-class would carry 12-14 in. weapons. Armament was not the only area where the Japanese battleship was intended to be superior to foreign designs: it was also to be at least 2 knots faster. Fuso was laid down on 11 March 1912 and she was the first battleship built in Japan using Japanese manufactured materials and weapons. Three sister ships were authorized, one of them laid down in November 1913, but financial difficulties prevented the laying down of the next two ships until 1915, which allowed time for some design improvements. The forecastle deck was shortened, the amidships turrets were grouped together and placed aft of the second funnel and the hull length was increased by 10 ft. to give more machinery space. The changes resulted in the two ships becoming known as the "Improved Fuso" or Ise class.
Nagato, named for Nagato Province, was a super-dreadnought battleship built for the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) during the 1910s. The lead ship of her class, she carried supplies for the survivors of the Great Kantō earthquake in 1923. The ship was modernized in 1934-36 with improvements to her armor and machinery and a rebuilt superstructure in the pagoda mast style. Nagato briefly participated in the Second Sino-Japanese War in 1937 and was the flagship of Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto during the attack on Pearl Harbor. She covered the withdrawal of the attacking ships and did not participate in the attack itself.
The Imperial Japanese Navy of World War II surpassed the Allied and Axis fleets in innovation and technology. This title covers the 12 Japanese battleships that saw service between 1941 and 1945, including the mighty Yamato. Each class is considered in light of its design and construction, its armament and wartime modifications. The author, Mark Stille, uses primary sources and dramatic photographs to tell the story of these mighty battleships at war, including their major engagements during the raid at Pearl Harbor and the battle of Midway. The first English language book to include photographs from the prestigious Fukui Collection, this investigation will fascinate any naval enthusiast.
From the moment when the launching of HMS Dreadnought made every capital ship in the world obsolete overnight, we have been fascinated with these powerful surface combatants. Here Robert M. Farley looks at the history and folklore that makes these ships enduring symbols of national power—and sometimes national futility. From Arizona to Yamato, here are more than sixty lavishly illustrated accounts of battleships from the most well-known to the most unusual, including at least one ship from every nation that ever owned a modern battleship. Separate essays and sidebars look at events and lore that greatly affected battleships.
During World War I, the navies of the opposing forces discovered the value of aerial reconnaissance and many experiments were made to allow larger warships to carry one or sometimes two aircraft aboard. In the early days these were float planes that were lowered by crane into the sea and then lifted back aboard upon their return. This was a lengthy affair and when a speedy departure was necessary, time was of the essence. A new system was devised so that a powerful catapult system and a short ramp could, with the added speed of the ship, get an aircraft airborne in a fraction of the time previously required. Thus was born a highly specialised type of aircraft. This book includes all the major designs that went to war in the First and Second World Wars and includes aircraft used by all the combatants. It looks at how the aircraft evolved and how the warships were modified to accommodate the aircraft and the catapult system. The use of these fixed-wing aircraft was abandoned when the invention of the helicopter was made in the early post WW II years.
