Maya-class gunboat

The Maya class (摩耶型砲艦) was a four-ship class of gunboats of the early Imperial Japanese Navy.

Design and description
The Maya vessels were Japan’s first iron-hulled gunboats, although only JAPANESE GUNBOAT Maya and JAPANESE GUNBOAT Chōkai had true iron hulls. JAPANESE GUNBOAT Atago had a composite hull construction, whereas JAPANESE GUNBOAT Akagi has a steel hull. All four vessels had auxiliary schooner-rigged sails. The Maya-class ships had an overall length of 47.0 m, a beam of 8.2 m, and a normal draught of 2.95 m. They displaced 614 LT at normal load. The crew numbered about 104 officers and enlisted men.

Propulsion was by a coal-fired horizontal double-expansion reciprocating steam engine with two cylindrical boilers driving a double screw. The engines were rated at 614 ihp, and designed to reach a top speed of 10.25 kn.

The Maya-class ships were initially intended to be armed with one Krupp 210 mm Krupp L/22 breech-loading gun, and one Krupp 120 mm L/22 breech-loading gun, with two quadruple 1-inch Nordenfelt guns as secondary armament. However, each ship later modified to carry different armament in 1906.

Two of the three vessels (Maya and Akagi) were built by the private-contractor, Onohama Shipyards in Kobe (a predecessor of Hitachi Zosen Corporation), and one (Chōkai ) was by built by the private-contractor Ishikawajima-Hirano Shipyards. Atago was built by the government’s Yokosuka Naval Arsenal

All four ships served in the First Sino-Japanese War of 1894-1895. In 1898, the ships were reclassified as second-class gunboats. Atago was lost in combat during the Russo-Japanese War in 1904. Maya and Chōkai were removed from the navy list in 1908 and were subsequently broken up in 1913. Akagi was removed from the navy list in 1911, but survived under civilian ownership until 1953.