Hiro Naval Arsenal - The Forgotten Pioneer of Japanese Flying Boats 

F.A.Q Section Q: Do you take aircraft requests? A: I have a list of aircraft I plan to cover, but feel free to add to it with suggestions:) Q: Why do you use imperial measurements for some videos, and metric for others? A: I do this based on country of manufacture. Imperial measurements for Britain and the U.S, metric for the rest of the world, but I include text in my videos that convert it for both. Q: Will you include video footage in your videos, or just photos? A: Video footage is very expensive to licence, if I can find footage in the public domain I will try to use it, but a lot of it is hoarded by licencing studies (British Pathe, Periscope films etc). In the future I may be able to afford clips :) Q: Why do you sometimes feature images/screenshots from flight simulators? A: Sometimes there are not a lot of photos available for certain aircraft, so I substitute this with digital images that are as accurate as possible. Feel free to leave you questions below - I may not be able to answer all of them, but I will keep my eyes open :)

Inside Kure's Yamato Museum, Hiro is part of Kure, there is a wall of models depicting all the aircraft produced by the factory and the factory history is also shared. If you want to see a depiction of the arsenal, the animated movie In This Corner of the World features it throughout as the protagonist's father in law is an employee. It even accurately depicts some of the arsenal bomb raids and Kure's colorful flak bursts, which are something that made it into B-29 bomber crew logs.

[fully typed out multiparagraph comment responding to the video before it's even been public for 2 minutes]

Could you also cover dutch airplanes from WW2, because the Koolhovens and Fokkers from the dutch airforce were quite advanced and inflicted quite heavy casualties on the germans, but they are largely forgotten

I've loved boats my entire life, add wings...I mean come on, you had me at boat. Great content mate!

Some beautiful designs here. I love flying boats. Thank You, Rex.

Anything about IJN flying boats is a must see for me!

Very interesting. Aircraft evolved so quickly between the wars that I'm surprised any designs managed to be produced in numbers.

I know this has been the "Jet Age" since 1945 but the old prop planes, they're just beautiful works of art. Today's planes are almost without art. Function now rules the air.

I love airplane blueprints. As a kid it just blew my mind that all these different military planes from this book I had just started as drawings. Same with their engines, and the angles of the airframe, etc.... it was all some guy with a pencil and paper, and maybe some simple mathematical knowledge... there is always help from technicians, of course, but at that point you're manufacturing the thing.

It seems that the following led to Japan's best flying boats. Kawanishi design team leader. " We shall build an excellent flying boat. Check out all of Hiro's innovations. We shall adopt none of these. To ensure our success!" Thanks for another great video.

Resemblance of Pan Am Clippers of that Era. Gotta love them Sea Planes. TY, again for the Educational & Entertaining peeks.

Thank you for shining a light into the corners of aviation history .

Looking at the Hiro's , the Kawanishi's did away with lumps n bumps and put in flow to their Designs ..Good one Rex..please do the Shitei Recon..

Finally flying boats... go on, don't stop.

Excellent content on Japanese flying boats! The Kawanishi was always a favorite of mine.

Amazing work. I never would have thought I would find the subject of interwar era Japanese flying boats to be the least bit interesting, and I found your video to be quite fascinating. Bravo!

Like for the "Holding out for a hero" reference.

I wish I understand why I love flying boats and seaplanes so much, this is completely useless information but i absolutely love it.

A very very interesting video about a little known topic. Thank you!

Brilliant as ever. Love watching the rapid evolution of these planes. Can really see what was being learned with each iteration.

Well done Rex!

Wonderful video. Thank you

I’ve got quite addicted to your videos, being an aircraft fan myself I find your videos well presented, well researched and highly entertaining. I love how your focusing on the stranger side of aviation. I’ve just found your video on the Buffalo…a plane i utterly adore! Keep up the great work

Thanks for sharing 👍

My paternal grandmother was Jenny Short. Yes, of the Short family. I'm not sure who she was the daughter of, just some 'trivia' from my father from eons ago. Sadly, he's passed away, so I can't find out. My grandfather was RNVR, Lt.Comm, & served on corvettes in WW2, got sunk twice, & wound up inspecting Liberty ships being built on the US West Coast.

I think it's crazy to think Japan still makes flying boats. To some degree.

Another great vid! I do love me some interesting flying boat history. I know you get lots of requests.. I would KILL for your take on the interesting, colorful, checkered history on the Lockheed F-104 Starfighter (my favorite unforgiving little wasp of a plane!) I know it's a bit newer than most planes on this channel, but I'm hoping it's right in that sweet spot of cold war history that you'd be willing to cover?

Really interesting video there. Fascinating to see how the designs of other countries were taken and tweaked.

Awesome as always. I've always loved flying boat's!

GREAT video, Rex...👍👍

beautiful development story

yesterday i discovered your channel "The flying tea rex" simply by listening. Your voice is simply authentic. Please do more tutorials on the t.rex channel. I just bought IL-2 BOS and would appreciate more help from a knowing player. Thx in advance from the "Ruhrpott" in germany. keep up the good work and always remember to include players and viewers , that do not use VR 🤘

Another good one

Thank you.

Your vids are outstanding.

Good show.

Excellent topic, and cudos for listening and being moderate with the ads, integrity matters a lot for such otherwise high quality channels, the money will come with the viewership.

Thank you for a look at a less-common aspect!

Thanks!

Excellent videos Rex, the more obscure the aircraft you feature the more interesting they are to the average, reasonably well informed aircraft buff. Probably more work to put together though right ?

Looks super similar to the modern design!

Fascinating peer into a little studied chapter of aviation.

Great 👍 grandad 👏 love these Japanese aircraft from WW2.

3:00 Japanese written horizontally was generally written right to left before 1946. This is written with the classic old characters as used at that time in China as well, but the characters were simplified after the war. It says: 霞ヶ浦湖上F5號飛行艇. A model F5 flying boat ("hikoutei") on Kasumigaura Lake. (Since 1948 or so, 號 is now written 号.) 4:00 This was written left to right, which I honestly haven't seen in pre-war postcards, and I wonder if it was re-captioned as the printing looks modern. The photo is labelled Roorubahha ("Rolbach") R-1 flying boat at the bottom, and in white is labelled "Feb 1973 issue of Airplane Maniacs," I assume a magazine. Since it's not called a Hiro I assume it's an actual German-made plane. 5:04 This is credited Roorubahha/Hiro model R-3 flying boat. 8:02 一五式飛行艇改一: Type 15 flying boat (modified) 9:25 I can't guess where this might be from current maps, due to continued land reclamation all along the Japanese coast. If this shot is somewhere near the factory it might be the Muko river in Amagasaki, but who knows. 19:35 no idea why カモヰ (kamowi) is written on it but Google shows a model of a different flying boat with this registration. (Several other aircraft pictured have registration ヨ-60 so whatever this number is it's clearly reused.)

I would love to see you do a follow on series of Kawanishi flying boats.

Thumbnail title win. 💯

What is a bench- vs horn-type aileron balances?

Your best video yet perhaps . So little pre ww II info on Japanese efforts

Great... I was about to go to sleep and now I will have Bonnie Taylor singing in made head all night... Look what you done, look what you done, Mr. Hangar.

Read the title and ... it suddenly dawned on me. Had to actually laugh so hard, I needed to pause and write this comment at 0:03

I'm going to like this just for the title.

I'd love to see you cover the supermarine walrus

Not all Hiros wear capes

I think I'd have subbed on the strength of this video's cheeky title, if I hadn't already...

Yo-KO-ska. SAS-eh-bo. Keep up the good work.

Loving your videos! This one was especially interesting. One small note on pronunciation: Yokosuka is not pronounced phonetically. It is properly 'Yo-ku-ska'.

I'll have you know I had a proper groan at the thumbnail. Good job.

That thumbnail got me lol

fascinatingly obscure. Obviously the experience influenced Japan's later continuation of the concept. Flying boats are obviously well-suited to Japan's configuration and scarcity of flat places not required for rice-growing.

11:06 Where exactly does the fuselage meet the hull?

I can see how development took forever in Japan, what with them constantly nodding and bowing over to their perceived superiors.

Going from hero to zero usually revolves around lack of...Dinero

Liked... And added to watch later... Because I'M too busy now😅

Yup! WAY to much Kawanishi ♥ these days...wait...me too 😲

_Hiro factory, we build Hiros!_

Something tells me the Catalina flying boat hull design is inspired by the Japanese flying boats. Or at least the NC Curtiss.

Every time when I hear the engine start in the intro I think that there will a rap music video start :D

Mmm I wonder how much “input” the 19th Lord Sempill gave as well….

2:50 this one's very cute :)

Hmm? I wonder where the PBY Catalina came from?

SKY BANANA-WHALES! :D

who are you that is so knowledgeable in the ways of things?

0:45 Rex's Hangar: (talks about using Japanese source to talk about the Hiro Naval Arsenal) Also Rex's Hanger: (shows a biplane made by Mitsubishi, a different manufacturer) LOL

Oh yes the Japanese Air Navy

did they not examine the pby?

Was it wood or bamboo ?

That H1H1 shows up in Porco Rosso.

Did any of the experience in pre-war Japanese flying boats get carried over to the post-war Shin-Meiwa US-1A design of the early 1950s?

i wonder if they ever built an H3H3

Was this "friendly" competition as friendly as the "friendly" rivalry between the army and navy?

spending the first half of this video hoping there's an H3H3 so I can make a joke about how everyone claimed to start hating it when it started flying left but it hasn't really hurt the viewing numbers and honestly yesterday's episode with Tana Mongeau, Jeff Wittek, and Mike Majlak was _surprisingly_ good.

広 Japanese version of 广 pronounced as HIRO means WIDESPREAD， BROAD

Similar to Catalina

We don’t need another Hiro. Or do we?

I guess still flying boat are needed for japan

Recall Boeing started out in a boat shop

Did not Japan recently reintroduce flying boats into naval & civil service?

Shout out to everyone else who was really hoping for the intro to be set to Bonnie Tyler

The title made me listen to Bonnie Tyler and i have no regrets

who does the translations.......................

liking and commenting (so there, tube of you. suck on that)

Yes, the Europeans put in a great effort to help backward tribal Japan, to turn on their helpers ... yeah! There's a lesson there.....

ヨ is a japanese letter, sounds like yo. not a kanji.

Who knew that the IJN was supported by female songstresses from Wales?!

PLEASE CONSIDER EXPANDING THIS ANALYSIS BY CONTINUING UP TO , THRU WWII , AND BEYOND , WITH SPECIAL ATTENTION TO THE " EMILY "

this is a comment

how exactly can you be a pioneer when the bulk of your designs are a ripoff of other successful designs! the company didn’t innovate, it stole ideas and altered them then passed them off as new

Boring. I did not like this one.

Another excellent video, especially given the paucity of information. Thank you!