Nakajima G10N

"Fugaku" redirects here. For the mountain, see Mount Fuji.

G10N Fugaku
Role	ultra-long-range Heavy bomber
Manufacturer	Nakajima Aircraft Company
Status	Project (cancelled)
Primary user	IJN Air Service

The Nakajima G10N Fugaku (Japanese: 富岳 or 富嶽, "Mount Fuji"), was a planned Japanese ultra-long-range heavy bomber designed during World War II. It was conceived as a method for mounting aerial attacks from Japan against industrial targets along America's West Coast. Japan's worsening war situation, however, resulted in the project's cancelation and no prototype was ever built.

Design and development

See also: Project Z

The Fugaku had its origins in "Project Z",^[1][2] a 1942 specification for an intercontinental bomber which could take off from the Kuril Islands, bomb the continental United States, then continue onward to land in German-occupied France. Once there, it would be refitted and make another return sortie.

Project Z called for three variations on the airframe^{[citation needed]}: 4,000 bombers, 5,000 transports (capable of carrying 600 troops), and 2,000 gunships, which would carry 400 downward-firing machine guns in the fuselage, for intense ground attacks at the rate of 6,400 rounds per second^{[citation needed]}.

While the project was conceived by Nakajima head Chikuhei Nakajima, Kawanishi and Mitsubishi also made proposals for the Fugaku^{[citation needed]}. The Nakajima design had straight wings and contra-rotating four-blade propellers; the Kawanishi design had elliptical wings and single four-blade propellers^{[citation needed]}. To save weight, some of the landing gear was to be jettisoned after takeoff (being unnecessary on landing with an empty bombload), as had been planned on some late-war German very long range bomber designs^{[citation needed]}. Both designs used six engines.

Development started in 1943, with a design and manufacturing facility built in Mitaka, Tokyo. While Nakajima's 4-row 36-cylinder 5,000 hp Ha-54 (Ha-505) engine was abandoned as too complex, Mitsubishi successfully built the 2-row 22-cylinder Ha-50 engine for the Kawanishi design, testing three units in May 1944. An example of this engine was unearthed in 1979 during expansion of Haneda Airport and is on display at the Narita Aerospace Museum.

Project Z was cancelled in July 1944, and the Fugaku was never built.

Operators (planned)

 Japan

• Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service

Specifications (projected)

Data from Japanese Aircraft of the Pacific War^[1]

General characteristics

• Crew: 6 or more
• Length: 46 m (150 ft 11 in)
• Wingspan: 63 m (206 ft 8 in)
• Height: 8.8 m (28 ft 10 in)
• Wing area: 330 m² (3,552 ft²)
• Empty weight: 42,000 kg (92,594 lb)
• Loaded weight: 122,000 kg (268,964 lb)
• Powerplant: 6 × Nakajima Ha-54 4-row 36-cylinder air-cooled radial, 3,730 kW (5,000 hp) each

Performance

• Maximum speed: 780 km/h at 10,000 m (421 kn, 485 mph at 32,808 ft)
• Range: 19,400 km (10,475 nmi, 12,055 mi)
• Service ceiling: 15,000 m (49,213 ft)

Armament

• 4× 20 mm cannon
• 20,000 kg (44,000 lb) of bombs

See also

Aircraft of comparable role, configuration and era

• Nakajima G8N
• Heinkel He 277
• Messerschmitt Me 264
• Junkers Ju 390
• Focke-Wulf Ta 400
• Victory Bomber
• Northrop XB-35
• Amerika Bomber
  

References

Notes

1. ^ ^{a b} Francillon 1979, p. 493.
2. ^ Horn 2005, p. 265.

Bibliography

• Dyer, Edwin M. Japanese Secret Projects: Experimental Aircraft of the IJA and IJN 1939-1945. Midland Publishing, 2009. ISBN 978-1857803-174.
• Francillon, Ph.D., René J. Japanese Aircraft of the Pacific War. London: Putnam & Company Ltd., 2nd edition 1979. ISBN 0-37-030251-6.
• Horn, Steve. The Second Attack on Pearl Harbor: Operation K and Other Japanese Attempts to Bomb America in World War II. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2005. ISBN 978-1-59114-388-8.
• Idei, Tadaaki. Hikōki Mechanism Zukan. Tokyo: Guranpuri Shuppan, 1985.
• Ogawa, Toshihiko. Nihon Kōkūki Daizukan, 1910-1945. Tokyo: Kokushokankōkai, 1993.

External links

• The Nakajima G10N1 Fugaku
• Nakajima G10N "Fugaku" (in Polish)