Board Thread:Questions and Answers/@comment-73.220.89.40-20150318192417/@comment-21356142-20160119091605

Im not using wikipedia, Im using actually sourced books on the technical specifications of the ships themselves. So yes, as I mentioned the Enterprise in the later stages of the war when carrying additional stowage bolted along the side has a maximum capacity of 82 + 28 replacement. This much I have already established.

Again, you are ignoring that this is because American aircraft HAD FOLDABLE WINGS, whereas only the Aichi D3A had foldable wings (and only the wingtips at that). So the supposed greater capacity of the USS Enterprise is due to the aircraft itself fitting in smaller spaces.

In addition, US doctrine had the aircraft park ON THE CARRIER DECK, rather then within the hangar. The IJN stored their aircraft within the hangar and kept the flight deck clear.

Now, in the event that say, Hiryuu received Hellcats and Avengers, and decided to store them on the flight deck and only use the hangar for maintenance and service in the same manner as the US Navy, you will find her "aircraft capacity" to be in the 80 range as well.

Again, the US capacity for aircraft is due to different doctrine in aircraft servicing and more compact aircraft NOT DUE TO ANY ADVANTAGE IN CAPACITY CONFFERRED BY THE SHIP ITSELF.

Also due to the fact that the US crammed their carrier decks with carriers, yes recon aircraft had to be launched via the HIVA catapult. This actually greatly unbalanced the ships and had to be reworked to solve this issue by changing their positioning.

The flight deck catapult was never used, not because steam catapults were unreliable (if they were they wouldnt have been used to launch floatplanes) but because they were incredibly slow to launch aircraft and the air capsule required recharging after every 30 launchers which could take hours.

And yes, the entire combat capacity for aircraft carriers comes from their aircraft. The US won the skies in the pacific thanks to their great aircraft, not their great carriers (well, their number of carriers in the later stages helped).

Now, in KC, Japanese carriers have their aircraft numbers "boosted", in order to reflect the change in Japanese doctrine that allowed for a small deckpark of aircraft to be maintained. This may appear ahistorical since Akagi, Kaga, Souryu, and Hirryu sank prior to these changes but are perfectly realistic numbers, particularily considering there is no differentiation between replacement and service aircraft.

In addition, in KC, aircraft is interchangable, radar is interchangable, guns and aa is interchangable.

This means every single advantage possessed by the Enterprise can be ripped off and put on a superior chassis. The Enterprise itself possess no advantage over the Hiryuu when devoid of these elements.