Shipbucket

Ok I've promised a CVL, but, you know.. it was a bit easier to draw this:


Gyoraitei 1 Class Torpedo Boat:

After having recieved from Germany the two sail corvettes Moriya and Yamada, and having signed the contract for a three-ship class of unprotected cruisers Koko no Kaigun turned again to the Germans for an order of eight to ten torpedo boats for coastal operations and short-ranged escort duties. A first batch of three was ordered at Kiel by late June of 1883. The germans based the project on the torpedoboot Tapfer, drafting a ship 34,8m long (33,8m at the waterline), 3,9m abeam and with a hull draft of 1,4m (total, taking into account the prop and rudder guard was 2,3m). This very small vessel displaced only 86 Tons and was propelled by a single screw for a top speed of 17 knots. They had manual rudder, a crew of only 13 men and were armed with a single 37mm cannon. The main torpedo armament was made of two fixed torpedo launchers at the bow housing two 350mm torpedoes, with two more spares carried on the deck as reloads.
The three units were built in Germany, disassembled and shipped to Koko were they were assembled again. Named G-1 to G-3 they entered service between 1884 and 1886. They were painted in the standard black as all Kaiserliche Marine torpedoboots.

The three Gyoraiteis however did not met the approval of the Naval Staff and that of the crews manning them. While probably perfect to operate close to shore in the North Sea, they were too small and fragile for the unsheltered waters of the Kokoan archipelago. The second and third batch were thus canceled and reordered to a new design more suited to the north Pacific Environment,, later seeing light as the Gyoraitei 4 Class.
The three Gyoraitei 1 units had an average service life of ten years. G-2 was wrecked in Toumachi Bay during a gale on January 1891. G-1 was removed from active service in 1894 and soilered as a training vessel until 1897, wen she was decommissioned and scrapped. G-3 lasted one year less, leaving the fleet for the scrapyard in 1896.


Ships in class: (laid down-launched-commissioned - fate)

Gyoraitei 1 1883-1884-1884 - Training ship 1894, Decommissioned 1897
Gyoraitei 2 1884-1885-1885 - Wrecked 1891
Gyoraitei 3 1885-1886-1886 - Decommissioned 1896

Very nice work. I love seeing these small vessels!

Nice!

Gyoraitei 4 Class Torpedo Boat:

Planned to supplement the lacking G-1 class, the Gyoraitei-4 units were built in Germany for Koko no Kaigun like their predecessors. The design was vastly enlarged, resulting in avessel 64,7m long, 6,2m abeam and with a hull draft of 1,4m (2,6m to the propeller and rudder guard). Displacement, at 288 tons, was nearly three and a half times larger than thet of the previous class. the larger hull and displacement allowed for fititng more powerful engines, resulting in a top speed of 26,5knots. armament was composed by a single 88mm cannon and to 37mm ones. Two 450mm trainable torpedo tubes fitted on centerline completed the set.
The first ship, Gyoraitei 4, or G-4, was deliviered to Koko no Kaigun in 1889. Despite lacking her torpedo equipment -which was fitted only two years later- the naval staff was much more satisfied with the new vessel, quickly extending the order to ten vessels. Gyoraitei 5 was the first to be delivered fully fitted, in 1891. Like the previous Gyoraitei 1 class, the new ships were also painted in the standard black paint that was common on German Torpedoboots at the time.

The folowing units were deliviered with a pace of one ship each year up to 1898. The last one, G-13, was delayed until 1900 for bureaucratic reasons following the Kokoan switch from German to British built ships as a consequence of the toumachi treaty of 1897. Gyoraitei 13 was repainted into Kure grey upon delivery, with the other units already in service following shortly thereafter.

The first three units were decommissioned between 1903 and 1905 while the larger Kuchikukan 1 units were entering service. The other seven sisters were refitted during the same timeframe, losing the 76mm and 37mm cannons in lieu of one 76mm 12-punder gun and two 6,5mm rapid fire guns. The torpedo tubes were also switched to newer units, compatible with the Japanese built 450mm torpedoes. Finally a compass platform was fitted between the funnels.

Initially planned to be retired around the mid 1910s, G-7 through G-13 had their service life extended when WWI started. With the more recent, and advanced, units leaving port to join the naval blockade off Tsingtao or for patrols around the Pacific, the older ships served for coastal patrol duties until the end of the conflict. Starting in 1919 the last seven units began to leave the fleet, the last gone by 1922. The last four however had their service life further extended when the Naval Staff decided to convert them into Minesweepers.


Ships in class: (laid down-launched-commissioned - fate)

Gyoraitei 4 1888-1889-1889 - Decommissioned 1903
Gyoraitei 5 1890-1891-1891 - Decommissioned 1904
Gyoraitei 6 1891-1892-1892 - Decommissioned 1905
Gyoraitei 7 1892-1893-1893 - Decommissioned 1919
Gyoraitei 8 1893-1894-1894 - Decommissioned 1920
Gyoraitei 9 1894-1895-1895 - Decommissioned 1921
Gyoraitei 10 1895-1896-1896 - Decommissioned 1922 (converted to Minesweeper)
Gyoraitei 11 1896-1897-1897 - Decommissioned 1922 (converted to Minesweeper)
Gyoraitei 12 1896-1897-1898 - Decommissioned 1922 (converted to Minesweeper)
Gyoraitei 13 1897-1898-1900 - Decommissioned 1922 (converted to Minesweeper)

Awesome!

Great work on the Gyoraitei 4 Class Torpedo Boat, BB1987.

Fantastic additions!

Hello BB1987

Very nice early TBDs. Always a joy to see what's possible in SB scale when drawing little ships.

Greetings
GD

Excellent additions.

Foreword.

Giving Koko no Kaigun two extra decades of history has obviously it's consequences, as it is not just as simple as adding earlier ships, I also have to look the blend the gap between the original earlier ships and the newer ones, which now predates them. For this reason I've checked again my excel spreadsheet containing datas for my various Koko no kaigun ships and I've thus noticed a lull in naval construction during spanning roughly from 1908 to 1914 (and to some extent up to 1916) during which, with the exception of the two Goryo class units and four DDs, most of Koko yards basically sat empty and unused. While this could be somewhat acceptable for when Koko was just a newborn Navy it now looks completely off for a 30+year-old Navy that's making it's debut in the dreadnought race. Other than creating an inconsistent gap between past and future naval constructions.
For this reason I've also added some more 1910s ships to the fleet. This will not be a big issue since I've made a good use of the WNT and LNT to get rid of them when necessary, or by planning their background history around the timeline I had already set. The "largest" task will be only adjusting the pennants of some of the older DDs, I'll so eventually fix other minor inconsitencies that might emerge in some older ships backgrounds. Some of them had already been fixed in the first page of the thread, mainly by lenghtening the flagships list back to 1876.

In all, the German styled era (1876-1897) will feature:
-thirteen Torpedo Boats (in two classes) - which have already been drawn.
-two Sail Corvettes
-three Avisos/Unprotected Cruisers
-seven Protected Cruisers (in three different classes)

In addition, the early Japanese styled era (1897-1925) will feature some new ships too:
-fourteen Destroyers (in two classes)
-four protected cruisers (in two classes)
-eight Minesweepers (mainly older, former, TBDs and DDs converted to this new role)
-one Battlecruiser.

Now on with another ship to close the gap. And I will start by going big.