Difference between revisions of "Category:Unryuu Class"

The Unryū-class Aircraft carriers (雲龍型航空母艦) were built under the Maru Kyū Programme (Ship #302 in 1941) and the Kai-Maru 5 Programme The idea for the IJN was to build more fleet carriers as quickly as possible thus the design for these ships was based on the aircraft carrier Hiryuu Hiryū rather than the newer and more sophisticated Taihou Taihō or the Shōkaku-class.

The ships were lightly built, and the main difference from Hiryū was that the carriers' island was placed on the starboard side of the ships. The carriers were capable of carrying 63 aircraft in two hangars, and were fitted with two elevators. The Unryū class carried a smaller quantity of aviation fuel as Hiryū with fuel tanks protected by concrete. The ships were fitted with the same propulsion system used in the aircraft carrier Sōryū to reach 34 knots (63 km/h)

Originally, a total of 15 carriers were planned, but by the end of the Pacific War only three were built and another three were incomplete.