Ki43 Wreck

[kaki3152]

Picture of a Ki-43-II with interesting fuselage markings.
Any ideas as to identity?

[taly01]

White fuselage combat stripe near tail is standard. The two "red?" fuselage stripes infront of Hinomaru roundel signify leader of 2nd Chutai/Squadron.

It actually looks like the rear half of a 59th Sentai (often solid green) added to the front half of a later Ki-43! From the assorted wrecks in the photo that is a possibility!

Front half appears to have underwing racks so is probably a late Ki-43-IIb that means ~March 1944 production. Appears to be in New Guinea, my first guess is 248th Sentai as some of their planes had part unpainted fuselages and were there at that time.

[Dan History]

Originally Posted by taly01

Front half appears to have underwing racks so is probably a late Ki-43-IIb that means ~March 1944 production. Appears to be in New Guinea, my first guess is 248th Sentai as some of their planes had part unpainted fuselages and were there at that time.

Michael, welcome to the forum!

Using your forum nickname, I found your excellent website and a full summary of A6M Zero production which I have never seen before. A very good piece of research:
https://mysimtech.wordpress.com/ww2aircraft/11000zero/

May I follow up the sources for your review of USAAF aircraft strength in the Pacific? I am referring to the following link, of course:
https://mysimtech.wordpress.com/ww2aircraft/ww2-usaaf/

You will not yet be able to use the forum's private message function, so you contact me by e-mail, my address is available at the following link, courtesy of Michael Holm - http://www.ww2.dk/Luftwaffe%20Research.html

Kind regards,

Dan

P.S. I have copied Michael's summary of Ki-43 specifications here for those who have not seen it before:

[taly01]

Thanks,
I forgot to add website in signature, some of my data is pure, other such as the comparison table of Ki-43 needed some "interpretations" of actual data as airplane test condition etc are hard to compare not knowing all variables of test day and plane.

Here is the original photocopy of the US government record of USAAF planes in Asia in WW2. It definately appears authentic.
https://mysimtech.files.wordpress.co...c_vs_japan.pdf

It "knocked my socks off" to see the actual truth of USAAF deployment strength by type in Pacific from 1941-45.

Here I found the full document "AAF Stat Digest 1945 WW2" https://www.afhistory.af.mil/USAF-STATISTICS/. It has Pacific, Mediterranean and Europe USAAF data, enjoy!

[Stig Jarlevik]

Taly01 (Michael)

Don't know if you have the French book Les Avions de l'Armée Imperial Japonaise by Bernard Baeza

If yes, I am curious why your production details do not fit his data? I notice you don't count prototypes and pre-production aircraft so I leave them out.

Just taking the Ki-43-I as an example he lists, beside monthly deliveries, the Nakajima c/n as 114 - 849 which tallies with the monthly/total production listed and the Rikugun c/n as 1001 - 1049 making a grand total of 765.

Are the tallies that much up for interpretation or what else could be behind such discrepancies.
He also in general seems to have found more aircraft produced than you have.

Cheers
Stig

[taly01]

Don't know if you have the French book Les Avions de l'Armée Imperial Japonaise by Bernard Baeza

No, It may be better than English laguage books which are poor and few for Ki-43, especially if he used Japanese sources. The differing information from published books (and internet) is a real headache.

Yes I did leave out prototypes, it just made things one step more complicated. My Ki-43 table is a simplified summary sheet of Ki-43 developments.