Kawasaki-type oiler

The Kawasaki-type oiler (川崎型油槽船,) was a type of oiler from Japan, serving during the 1930s and World War II. They do not have an official class name. Therefore, this article uses common class names. And, this type has some variants. This article handles them collectively.

Background

 * The London Naval Treaty forced shrinkage of a budget to the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN). And it meant the cooling of the Japanese shipbuilding industry worlds. The Great Depression accelerated it more. The IJN wanted to update their Notoro-class oilers and Ondo-class oilers, because these oilers were not able to chase the aircraft carrier.
 * In 1929, the IJN decided their combat ship (battleship, aircraft carrier, cruiser, destroyer, submarine and torpedo boat) fuel only to heavy crude oil. And, the IJN was paid a grant to newly build large/high-speed tankers.
 * In 1931, two marine transportation companies built the tankers which the IJN wanted. One was the 9,900 tons/17.5 knot Teiyō Maru, the other the 9,500 tons/18.8 knots Fujisan Maru.
 * The IJN was satisfied by Fujisan Maru. The IJN recommended building of the improved Fujisan Maru class tanker.

Construction

 * In 1932, the Iino Kaiun Kaisha (飯野海運,) ordered two tankers Tōa Maru and Kyokutō Maru to the Kawasaki Shipbuilding Corporation. In total 17 tankers were built with the same basic drawings, until 1943.
 * All sisters participated to World War II. However, they were not able to survive at all.

Tōa Maru class

 * This is the first production model of the Kawasaki-type tankers. Their success gave courage to other steamship companies.

Tatekawa Maru class

 * The second production model. They were built according to the same Tōa Maru class drawings. However, their details were different by the steamship company which they placed an order with (example: Nippon Maru removed one dry cargo hold). Narrow sense of the Kawasaki-type tanker was until the Kyūei Maru. Kyūei Maru was equipped for surplus stocks of the Argentina Maru machinery.

Nisshō Maru class

 * One of the variants of the Kawasaki-type tankers. Mitsubishi used many curves to reduce her air friction strength.

Kuroshio Maru class

 * One of the variants of the Kawasaki-type tankers. Kuroshio Maru was equipped with a La-Mont boiler. Her design was used for the Type 1TL wartime standard ship.

Akatsuki Maru class

 * One of the variants of the Kawasaki-type tankers. The Harima Zōsen used the Sulzer diesel.