Description
"Shiden Kai" is an aircraft developed from the surface fighter "Gyukaze".
The land fighter Shiden , equipped with wheels instead of floats for strong winds and
equipped with a small and powerful Nakajima Homare engine,
went into mass production in 1944 and was officially adopted in October 1945.
As there were many parts that were incomplete as a land fighter,
the fuselage was redesigned, the main wing position was changed from the Shiden mid-wing to the low wing, and the
automatic air combat flaps were perfected to create a full-fledged land-based
local combat aircraft. The machine "Shiden Kai" (N1K2-J) was prototyped and
adopted in January 1945.
In addition, the area of the vertical stabilizer of the late production machine of Shiden Kai (N1K2-J)
was reduced compared to the early production machine.
A famous unit that systematically equipped and operated the Shiden Kai was the
343rd Naval Air Squadron, which
used the Shiden Kai to attack
F6F, F4U, and SB2C U.S. Navy carrier-based aircraft over Matsuyama, Shikoku on March 19, 1945. 54 aircraft
intercepted them together with 7 Shiden aircraft in the upper air superiority,
and achieved the result of shooting down 52 aircraft, demonstrating the superiority of Shiden Kai.
[Data]
Crew: 1 person
Overall width: 11.99m
Overall length: 9.346m
Overall height: 3.96m
Complete weight: 4,200kg
Engine: Homare 21
Takeoff output: 2,000 horsepower
Maximum speed: 594km/h (altitude 5,600m)
Armament: 20mm machine gun ×4
