The ''Akizuki'' class of

destroyer In naval terminology, a destroyer is a fast, manoeuvrable, long-endurance warship intended to escort larger vessels in a fleet, convoy or battle group and defend them against powerful short range attackers. They were originally developed in ...

s of the

Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force , abbreviated , also simply known as the Japanese Navy, is the maritime warfare branch of the Japan Self-Defense Forces, tasked with the naval defense of Japan. The JMSDF was formed following the dissolution of the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) ...

is intended to escort the and helicopter destroyers, and safeguard the other

Aegis The aegis ( ; grc, αἰγίς ''aigís''), as stated in the ''Iliad'', is a device carried by Athena and Zeus, variously interpreted as an animal skin or a shield and sometimes featuring the head of a Gorgon. There may be a connection with a d ...

-capable warships such as the and . The destroyer provides defense against surface, airborne and undersea threats. The class was initially designated as "19DD", referring to a date on the

Japanese calendar Japanese calendar types have included a range of official and unofficial systems. At present, Japan uses the Gregorian calendar together with year designations stating the year of the reign of the current Emperor. The written form starts with t ...

, specifically the 19th fiscal year of the

Heisei period The is the period of Japanese history corresponding to the reign of Emperor Emeritus Akihito from 8 January 1989 until his abdication on 30 April 2019. The Heisei era started on 8 January 1989, the day after the death of the Emperor Hirohito, ...

(2007).

Design

The hull structure was based on the one of the

Takanami-class destroyer The is a class of destroyer serving with the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF). This warship is the slightly modified class of second-generation, general-purpose destroyers of the JMSDF. Background Since FY1991, the JMSDF started cons ...

s. There are many small improvements, such as cleaner lines to reduce the radar signature and decoys for torpedoes; but the principal changes can be summed up as more powerful engines, sensors, sonar and the indigenous ATECS battle management system that has been called the ''Japanese AEGIS''. The main gas turbine engines are standardized on a higher-powered version of the

Rolls-Royce Spey The Rolls-Royce Spey (company designations RB.163 and RB.168 and RB.183) is a low-bypass turbofan engine originally designed and manufactured by Rolls-Royce that has been in widespread service for over 40 years. A co-development version of the ...

SM1C, in contrast to the combination of Rolls-Royce SM1C and

General Electric LM2500 The General Electric LM2500 is an industrial and marine gas turbine produced by GE Aviation. The LM2500 is a derivative of the General Electric CF6 aircraft engine. As of 2004, the U.S. Navy and at least 29 other navies had used a total of mor ...

turbines used in the ''Takanami'' class.

Equipment

The purpose of this class is to shield the from air, surface and subsurface threats. Main features of the class include enhanced C4ISR and Anti-Aircraft Warfare (AAW) capability, with an OYQ-11 advanced Combat Direction Sub-system (CDS) and FCS-3A AAW weapon sub-system. ;OYQ-11 :This is the first CDS adopting a fully

distributed computing A distributed system is a system whose components are located on different computer network, networked computers, which communicate and coordinate their actions by message passing, passing messages to one another from any system. Distributed com ...

architecture to be implemented in general-purpose destroyers of the JMSDF. AN/UYQ-70 workstations form the basic computing platform, with

Link 16 Link 16 is a military tactical data link network used by NATO and nations allowed by the MIDS International Program Office (IPO). Its specification is part of the family of Tactical Data Links. With Link 16, military aircraft as well as ship ...

datalinks. In addition to the CDS, this class is equipped with SATCOM terminals linked to Superbird satellites, part of the Maritime Operation Force (MOF) system. The MOF system is the operational C4I system used in the fleet of the JMSDF, based on the

ILOG ILOG S.A. was an international software company purchased and incorporated into IBM announced in January, 2009. It created enterprise software products for supply chain, business rule management, visualization and optimization. The main product ...

architecture and interoperable with other

JSDF The Japan Self-Defense Forces ( ja, 自衛隊, Jieitai; abbreviated JSDF), also informally known as the Japanese Armed Forces, are the unified ''de facto''Since Article 9 of the Japanese Constitution outlaws the formation of armed forces, the ...

forces. There are also USC-42 DAMA terminals for GCCS-M, the American counterpart of the MOF system. ;FCS-3A :This is a domestically developed AAW combat system. It consists of two main components, one is a dual-band and multimode

active electronically scanned array An active electronically scanned array (AESA) is a type of phased array antenna, which is a computer-controlled array antenna in which the beam of radio waves can be electronically steered to point in different directions without moving the an ...

radar, and the other is the

fire-control system A fire-control system (FCS) is a number of components working together, usually a gun data computer, a director, and radar, which is designed to assist a ranged weapon system to target, track, and hit a target. It performs the same task as a ...

. The FCS-3A is the derivative of the

FCS-3 FCS-3 is an integrated naval weapons system developed by the Ministry of Defense (Japan), Japanese Defense Ministry for the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force. This system is composed of fire-control system, weapon-direction and fire-control subsys ...

of the , changing material of its transmitter-receiver modules from

gallium arsenide Gallium arsenide (GaAs) is a III-V direct band gap semiconductor with a Zincblende (crystal structure), zinc blende crystal structure. Gallium arsenide is used in the manufacture of devices such as microwave frequency integrated circuits, monoli ...

gallium nitride Gallium nitride () is a binary III/ V direct bandgap semiconductor commonly used in blue light-emitting diodes since the 1990s. The compound is a very hard material that has a Wurtzite crystal structure. Its wide band gap of 3.4 eV affords it ...

and introducing additional Local Area Defense (LAD) capability. An

ESSM The RIM-162 Evolved SeaSparrow Missile (ESSM) is a development of the RIM-7 Sea Sparrow missile used to protect ships from attacking missiles and aircraft. ESSM is designed to counter supersonic maneuvering anti-ship missiles. ESSM also has the ab ...

SAM VLS is integrated with the FCS-3A. Anti-submarine and Electronic Warfare (EW) capabilities of the ''Akizuki'' class have been enhanced, with a new OQQ-22 integrated sonar suite sub-system (hull-sonar and OQR-3

towed array A towed array sonar is a system of hydrophones towed behind a submarine or a surface ship on a cable. Trailing the hydrophones behind the vessel, on a cable that can be kilometers long, keeps the array's sensors away from the ship's own noise sou ...

; - a Japanese equivalent of the American

AN/SQQ-89 The AN/SQQ-89 Undersea Warfare Combat System is a naval anti-submarine warfare (ASW) system for surface warships developed by Lockheed Martin for the United States Navy. The system presents an integrated picture of the tactical situation by receiv ...

), and the NOLQ-3D digitalized EW suite sub-system. These sub-systems communicate across a NOYQ-1B

wide area network A wide area network (WAN) is a telecommunications network that extends over a large geographic area. Wide area networks are often established with leased telecommunication circuits. Businesses, as well as schools and government entities, us ...

. These systems are comparable to those of the .

Gallery

File:JS_Akizuki_(DD-115)_-_starboard_view.jpg, Starboard view JS ''Akizuki'' File:JS_Akizuki_(DD-115)_-_bow_view.jpg, Bow view File:DD115.JPG, Bridge detail with 2

AESA Aesa or Aisa ( grc, Αἶσα) was a town of ancient Macedonia. Aesa belonged to the Delian League since it appears on a tribute list to Athens in 434/3 BCE. The editors of the Barrington Atlas of the Greek and Roman World identify Aesa wi ...

arrays File:Teruzuki (DD-116), Sawayuki (DD-125) en Asuka (ASE-6102) aan de Yoshikura Pier, -2 Jun. 2013 b.jpg, JS ''Teruzuki'' at Yokosuka naval base, 2013 File:DD-116Teruduki&DD117Suzutuki.JPG, JS ''Teruzuki'' (DD-116) and JS ''Suzutuki'' (DD-117) at Nagasaki shipyard

Ships in the class

References

External links

Ministry of Defense {{unsourced, date=February 2021 A ministry of defence or defense (see spelling differences), also known as a department of defence or defense, is an often-used name for the part of a government responsible for matters of defence, found in states ...

(2006 Prior enterprise evaluation) (Japanese)
Summary

Reference

Prior evaluation note
{{Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Destroyer classes Ships built by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Articles containing video clips