COD in the fog ( Gasuden KR-2 / Hitachi LXG1)
There are claims that there was a Japanese transport aircraft that worked with IJN carriers, carrying people and cargo between ships and the shore. With time more details on this matter were published, yet the story still is at least unconvincing. More probably, it is a fake.
The aircraft in question is ether Gasuden KR-2 or its military variant Hitachi LXG1, both being Japanese-built versions of De Havilland DH-83 Fox Moth. The main points of the story are:
1) Gasuden KR-2 was in serial production for IJN.
2) Naval aircraft were different from civil KR-2s.
3) Naval KR-2s / LXG1s were used for transport and liason duty onboard IJN carriers.
To back it all up, there is one photo, attributed as the LXG1 onboard an IJN carrier.
Studying published information on Gasuden KR aircraft, I tried to prove or discard each element of the story, and made such conclusions:
On point 1.
There is no trustworthy info on any Gasuden KR production for the IJN. There is, indeed, a discrepancy between stated KR-2 total production run of 12 and data in published version of the Japanese civil aviation register, but it is unclear whence this figure of 12 came from, and Register could be incomplete and its entries sometimes contain errors. Using this and some unmentioned sources, some authors tell us about 6 KR-2s for the IJN, some - about 3 plus another 3 KR-2s impressed during the WW2. Yet Register tells us about 8 or 9 civil KR-2, and only one of them was impressed into IJN in 1944.
If production for IJN ever took place, especially if aircraft was designed specially for IJN, there should be a least a “short” name for the aircraft in the IJN nomenclature. LXG1 could not be such a name, for X in it stated that aircraft with this name was one of a kind in IJN inventory.
The photo shows us an aircraft with no other markings but wing hinomarus. This is definitely not a naval aircraft, or at least not an aircraft produced for the IJN, as IJN ones always carried fuselage hinomarus. Absence of any tail or fuselage markings suggests that this is a test aircraft.
Yet there are some traces of truth in the story of “naval production”. Gasuden's Haneda factory, were KR-2s were produced, since summer 1939 was under IJN control but continued to produce aircraft for civil customers until October of the same year. So, at least two KR-2 were built at IJN-controlled factory busy in making K2Y aircraft for IJN.
On point 2.
Indeed, photo, claimed to be the only of LXG1, shows aircraft with redesigned tail section and empennange. It also have beefed-up main landing gear legs and small wheel instead of usual tail skid. Yet these improvements are not unique for this aircraft. There is a photo, although of poor quality, of penultimate civil KR-2 J-BACP with a similar tail unit, so the later is by no means a specific IJN feature. Strenghtened landing gear could have been installed on aircraft on photo for flying off paved runways, and it is seen on one. It is interesting that these changes to landing gear were never mentioned by previous authors, and the nature of alterations to the tail unit was described by them vaguely or totally wrong.
Hinomarus on aircraft on the photo doesn't exclude the possibility of its civil nature. In the end of 1930s hinomarus quite often were seen on civil Japanese aircraft, but only on wings, as the place on the fuselage sides were occupied by registration code. So aircraft on the photo could be a civil one, not yet registered but already with hinomarus.
View of Tamagawa airfield with J-BACP in background.
J-BACP magnified
Tails of J-BACP and alleged LXG1
Civil Mitsubishi Hinazuru - licence-built Airspeed Envoy - at Haneda airport before WW2. You can see Hinomarus on wings, but not on the fuselage.
On point 3
In the 1930s IJN had no production light transport and/or liason aircraft but 8-place L1N, although they tested some foreign designs. Yet all these aircraft were substantially bigger than Gasuden KR, smaller aircraft were of no interest to IJN, for they had training and combat aircraft with the same carrying abilities but with better flying characteristics. So it is highly unlikely that IJN initiated production of such aircraft in 1939 even for strictly land use. Peculiarities of KR design such as aft position of pilot's cockpit with extremely poor forward visibility make Gasuden KR at least highly unlikely candidate for use on a carrier. There are no trustworthy info on alleged carrier use of LXG1, the stories of using it as a personal aircraft of admiral Nagumo in 1941, or their work with 1st Air Fleet during final preparations to Hawaiian operation, when “due to radio silence, for some time they were the only mean of communication between ships and command ashore”, are proved as later and clumsy inventions. The photo, considered by many as undeniable proof of KR-2 / LXG1 use on carriers, in fact was taken ashore, most probably on the concrete runway of Haneda airport, near which situated the only Gasuden's aircraft factory. So the aircraft on this photo probably is the first KR-2 with redesigned tail during its factory testing.
Alleged LXG1 on something that looks more like concrete runway than carrier deck
British-built Airspeed Envoy at Haneda, note the runway slabs.
Aerial view of Haneda airport at 1930s.
So far no positive indications both of serial production of Gasuden KRs for IJN and of any use of Gasuden KR onboard carriers are found, but there are numerous evidences that deny both such possibilities. Authors of expanded versions of the story, like Eugeny Aranov with his big article at airwar.ru, combined data from Mikesh&Abe 1990 book Japanese Aircraft 1910-1941 with bunch of textual “facts” that unproven, contradictory to each other or completely wrong. Full version of my study published in Russian is here, but you can read it using internet translation services, English translation is more or less passable.
As of LXG1, there are two possibilities:
a) one KR was tested by IJN in late 1930s under this designation and then have been sold to other user, as it had happened with LXM1 - Airspeed Envoy tested by IJN.
b) one KR-2 is known to have been transferred to IJN in 1944, so it could get LXG1 designation.
Arawasi magazine promised to publish big article on Gasuden biplanes in their Issue 15, yet for now only Issue 13 is out of print. Would this article resolve all the questions around KR / LXG1?