The Nakajima E2N was a Japanese reconnaissance aircraft of the inter-war years. It was a single-engine, two-seat, sesquiplane

seaplane A seaplane is a powered fixed-wing aircraft capable of taking off and landing (alighting) on water.Gunston, "The Cambridge Aerospace Dictionary", 2009. Seaplanes are usually divided into two categories based on their technological characteri ...

with twin main floats.

Design and development

The E2N was developed in the 1920s for the

Imperial Japanese Navy The Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN; Kyūjitai: Shinjitai: ' 'Navy of the Greater Japanese Empire', or ''Nippon Kaigun'', 'Japanese Navy') was the navy of the Empire of Japan from 1868 to 1945, when it was dissolved following Japan's surrend ...

as a short range reconnaissance floatplane suitable for catapult launch from cruisers and battleships. It was a wooden twin-float sesquiplane, carrying a crew of two in open cockpits and having

folding wing A folding wing is a wing configuration design feature of aircraft to save space and is typical of carrier-based aircraft that operate from the limited deck space of aircraft carriers. The folding allows the aircraft to occupy less space in a con ...

s. This layout gave better downwards view than the

monoplane A monoplane is a fixed-wing aircraft configuration with a single mainplane, in contrast to a biplane or other types of multiplanes, which have multiple planes. A monoplane has inherently the highest efficiency and lowest drag of any wing con ...

s proposed by

Aichi is a prefecture of Japan located in the Chūbu region of Honshū. Aichi Prefecture has a population of 7,552,873 () and a geographic area of with a population density of . Aichi Prefecture borders Mie Prefecture to the west, Gifu Prefecture ...

and

Yokosuka is a city in Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan. , the city has a population of 409,478, and a population density of . The total area is . Yokosuka is the 11th most populous city in the Greater Tokyo Area, and the 12th in the Kantō region. The city ...

, and the design was selected becoming Japan's first locally designed shipboard

reconnaissance seaplane Observation seaplanes are military aircraft with flotation devices allowing them to land on and take off from water. Their primary purpose was to observe and report enemy movements or to spot the fall of shot from naval artillery Naval artill ...

Operational history

The E2N served with the Navy as the Nakajima Navy Type 15 Reconnaissance Floatplane (一五式水上偵察機). 80 examples were produced between 1927 and 1929 by Nakajima and Kawanishi; of these, two were bought for civil fishery patrol duties. The Navy machines were withdrawn from front-line units in the 1930s, being replaced by the

Nakajima E4N The Nakajima E4N was a Japanese shipboard reconnaissance aircraft of the 1930s. It was a two-seat, single-engine, equal-span biplane seaplane used primarily by the Imperial Japanese Navy. Development The first prototype of the Type 90-2 Reconna ...

, and either being reassigned to

training Training is teaching, or developing in oneself or others, any skills and knowledge or fitness that relate to specific useful competencies. Training has specific goals of improving one's capability, capacity, productivity and performance. I ...

duties or sold to civil buyers.

Variants

;E2N1 (Type 15-1 Reconnaissance Seaplane) :Short-range reconnaissance aircraft. ;E2N2 (Type 15-2 Reconnaissance Seaplane) : Trainer version with dual controls.

Operators

; *

Specifications (E2N)

References

Notes

Bibliography

{{DEFAULTSORT:Nakajima E2n E02N, Nakajima E02N Sesquiplanes Single-engined tractor aircraft Aircraft first flown in 1927