Mitsubishi A6M Zero
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Zeke
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Sources:
Bill Gunston's "Combat Aircraft of World War II"
and "Jane's War at Sea 1897 - 1997 Centennial Edition"
Mitsubishi A6M Zero
By far the most famous of all Japanese aircraft dominated the first six months of the air war in the Pacific, and continued in service until the end of hostilities. The Zero, allied code name "Zeke" was remarkable in being the first carrier fighter to outperform its land based equivalents. It had been designed by Mitsubishi to meet the severe demands of the 1937 Imperial Navy specification for a shipborne fighter demands which included a speed of 500 km/h (311 mph) and a (heavy for the time) armament of two cannon and two machine guns. The result was a small, lightly built aircraft with outstanding maneuverability. The first production version received a more powerful engine than the prototype and was designated the "A6M2". As it was first produced in 1940 the Japanese year 5,700 it became popularly known as the - ZeroSen, Type 00 Fighter. Two squadrons with 15 planes were sent to China in July 1940 for trials under operational conditions, and quickly eliminated all opposition. The effectiveness of the Zero was emphatically reported to Washington by General Chennault, commanding officer of the Flying Tigers, but the report appears to have gone unnoticed.
More than 400 A6M2 and A6M3 (clipped-wing) Zeros had been delivered by the time of the attack on Pearl Harbor. They had unprecedented range for a small aircraft, and their unrivalled maneuverability and powerful armament gave them superiority over every opponent. This was startlingly demonstrated in the Japanese carrier raid on Ceylon, in which they easily out turned opposing Hawker Hurricanes of the British Royal Air Force aircraft which until then had been regarded as outstandingly maneuverable.
Hiryu
In the great carrier battles of Coral Sea and Midway in mid 1942, in which the Zero encountered Grumman F4F Wildcats flown by some of the US Navy's most able pilots, the weaknesses of the Japanese fighter began to show. The A6M's lack of selfsealing fuel tanks and armour, combined with the general lightness of its contruction, made it unusually vulnerable to combat damage. At Midway many pilots were lost aboard the Japanese carriers, all four of which were set ablaze by the American divebombers. In the protracted and bitter Guadalcanal campaign losses of aircrew mounted, and as the quality of Japanese pilots correspondingly declined Allied aircraft achieved increasing success against the Zero. When more modern US aircraft, notably the F6F Hellcat and F4U Corsair, appeared in the combat areas in 1943, the A6M found itself outclassed.
Mitsubishi desperately tried to design more effective versions, but improvements were generally modest and the Zero was never again, after 1943, able to fight on equal terms with the best Allied aircraft. However, the A6M6c equipped with the combat-boosted Sakae 31 engine, and the A6M8c equipped with 1,560 hp Kinsei 62 engine, were in 1945 able to give considerable trouble to the F4F and FM Wildcats still operating from US escort carriers.
At the Battle of the Philippine Sea 220 or so of the Japanese Mobile Fleet's 430 carrier aircraft were Zeros many of them operating as bombers. A6Ms were again in action at Leyte Gulf, mainly as attack aircraft, and from October 1944 until the end of the War A6Ms were employed in hundreds of kamikaze attacks on American shipping.
A6MB
Data:
Origin: Mitsubishi Jukogyo KK
Type: Single seat shipborne fighter and fighter bomber
Dimensions: Span (A6M1, A6M2) 39' 4" (Other versions) 36' 1" - length 29' 9" - height 9' 8 - 9' 9"
Weight: (A6M3) 3,984 lb empty, 5,828 lb loaded
(A6M5) 3,920 lb empty, 6,050 lb loaded
Engine: (A6M3 & A6M5) One 1,030 hp Sakae 21 radial (A6M5 having individual exhaust stacks as in the illustration above, giving slight boost).
Armament: 2 x 20 mm Type 99 cannon in outer wings 2 x 7.7 mm or 13.2 mm machine-guns above forward fuselage or in wings
Wing racks for 2 x 66 lb (or in some aircraft 132 lb) bombs
Maximum speed: (A6M3) 336 mph; (A6M5) 354 mph; (A6M8c) 360 mph.
Sources:
Bill Gunston's "Combat Aircraft of World War II"
and "Jane's War at Sea 1897 - 1997 Centennial Edition"