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ORIGINAL: TheElf
Ever hear of Burt Rutan...?

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ORIGINAL: Mike Scholl

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ORIGINAL: dtravel

From what I understand, much of Japanese industry was literally "cottage industry".  Everything was sub-contracted out to the zillionith degree, and much of the actual production work was literally done in the workers' living rooms by hand.  It was ridiculously inefficient and depended on an unbroken transport net to keep all the little bit supplied and move the various sub-sub-subassemblies up the chain.

Absolutely true, and a real problem for Japanese industrial expansion. In the US when the major suppliers needed to "sub-contract" there were thousands of small and medium-sized firms ready to pick up a share of the load. There was even a bit of a "scandal" as the medium-sized subcontractors picked up the lion's share of the contracts and some of the small ones hollared to their Congressmen. But Ford, GM, Westinghouse, DuPont and the rest of the "big boys" were able to win their arguement that only the larger sub-contractors had the size and capability to meet the ever-faster delivery deadlines. The War came first, and Congress and the "little guys" had to "suck it up" and do without.

In Japan, there were the major industrial combines (the Zaibatsu) and nothing but (very) little guys. Instead of one medium-sized subcontractor mass producing identical sub-assemblies, you had hundreds of converted garages and shops literally hand-making sub-assemblies. Raw materials supply, transportation, and quality control became a nightmare, and tons of parts had to be rejected at the final assembly phase. It was terribly inefficient and wasteful.

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I also seem to remember something about problems with the fuses of Japanese grenades. They had to be struck against a hard suface to trigger them and sometimes they detonated immediately when the soldier did so.  Since the only hard suface around was usually the soldier's helmet

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ORIGINAL: dtravel

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ORIGINAL: PzB

I agree to that Mike, but it should be possible to re-tool factories instead of creating new ones!

If A6M8 production was halted in early 45 to prepare for production of the Reppu, it wouldn't require more skilled labour.

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ORIGINAL: ctangus
As it stands right now I can produce several hundred A6M5s a month and then magically I'm producing several hundred A6M8s and then again magically several hundred Reppus. No cost at all for re-tooling.

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ORIGINAL: dtravel

If you're worried about Japanese over-production in PBEM games, the first thing you need to do is remove all the extra R&D factories put in for the AI.  Like AKs and APs, Japan has in game two to three times what they had IRL because it was "a better game design decision" than actually coming up with an AI routine that would be merely ten years obsolete instead of the decapitated thing we currently have.

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ORIGINAL: dtravel

If you're worried about Japanese over-production in PBEM games, the first thing you need to do is remove all the extra R&D factories put in for the AI. Like AKs and APs, Japan has in game two to three times what they had IRL because it was "a better game design decision" than actually coming up with an AI routine that would be merely ten years obsolete instead of the decapitated thing we currently have.

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ORIGINAL: ctangus

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ORIGINAL: dtravel

If you're worried about Japanese over-production in PBEM games, the first thing you need to do is remove all the extra R&D factories put in for the AI. Like AKs and APs, Japan has in game two to three times what they had IRL because it was "a better game design decision" than actually coming up with an AI routine that would be merely ten years obsolete instead of the decapitated thing we currently have.

I've never seen the extra R&D factories to be a big problem in the game. They still need 1000 points of supply each to be repaired.

For example - let's say I'm producing 100 A6M2s and want to increase that to 200. I could do that two ways:

1. Increase existing factories. Initial cost = 10K supply to expand & cost to repair = 100K. Total 110K supply.

2. Convert an R&D factory. Initial cost = 0 + cost to repair = 100K. Total 100K supply.

I doubt that 10% extra supply cost would mean much in most games. And it's balanced out slightly by the fact that there's now no chance to research the plane whose R&D factory was converted.

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ORIGINAL: bradfordkay
Yeah, that plane was built here in Washington state. A year or two ago there was a good article in one of the aviation magazines about the project to rebuild a few Me262s. IIRC, they had contracts for about four buyers...

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ORIGINAL: Mike Scholl
Excellent point! The decision to bring the production line to a halt even just to change to a new "model" of the same aircraft was always a major one, as it required a shutdown and retooling and installing new jigs and then trying to get the line back up to it's previous speed. Changing over to an entirely new aircraft design meant retooling and often re-designing the entire production line..., which could take months.

The ultimate example of the reluctance to shut down production was probably the B-29. Rather than dealing with the delay involved, the US actually flew brand new B-29's fresh off the lines in Wichita immediately to an "upgrade center" where they had brand new parts stripped off and replaced with newer equipment, parts, and instraments before being sent overseas. Rediculously wastefull and expensive, but it kept up high output, and the Americans (unlike everyone else) could afford it.

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ORIGINAL: dtravel

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ORIGINAL: ctangus

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ORIGINAL: dtravel

If you're worried about Japanese over-production in PBEM games, the first thing you need to do is remove all the extra R&D factories put in for the AI. Like AKs and APs, Japan has in game two to three times what they had IRL because it was "a better game design decision" than actually coming up with an AI routine that would be merely ten years obsolete instead of the decapitated thing we currently have.

I've never seen the extra R&D factories to be a big problem in the game. They still need 1000 points of supply each to be repaired.

For example - let's say I'm producing 100 A6M2s and want to increase that to 200. I could do that two ways:

1. Increase existing factories. Initial cost = 10K supply to expand & cost to repair = 100K. Total 110K supply.

2. Convert an R&D factory. Initial cost = 0 + cost to repair = 100K. Total 100K supply.

I doubt that 10% extra supply cost would mean much in most games. And it's balanced out slightly by the fact that there's now no chance to research the plane whose R&D factory was converted.

But what happens if you leave the factories alone and the new plane type enters production? All the factories producing the previous, now replaced, plane type automatically upgrade to the new type at no cost. So Japan is now instantly producing the new plane enmass for free, plus has all these formerly R&D factories now producing the aircraft.

The player doesn't have to do any factory conversions, he's production simply increases continuously throughout the war for free as those R&D factories come on line.

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ORIGINAL: Mike Scholl

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ORIGINAL: TheElf
Ever hear of Burt Rutan...?

Of course..., but that's decades of R & D from 1945. In 1945 you're talking "cutting edge" technology. And while the Japanese had some brilliant theorists and designers, their engineering and other developmental strength was lacking. The difference between an "experimental prototype" and a "combat-ready fighter" is pretty substantial.