Joe>The Japanese operated several Maurice Farman floatplanes from a converted
Joe>merchant ship during the seige of Tsingtao.
The ship name is "Wakamiya-maru".
She carried 3 Farman floatplane/type1912(called type-Mo small float plane)
and 1 Farman float plane/Type 1914(called "type-Mo big float plane", later,
"type-Ro otsu float plane).
They operated reconnaissance and bombing.
The first bombing operated in 1914-9-5, used fin added cannonball.
The "bomb" had 2 type, 8cm and 12cm diameter both IJA(Imperial Japanese Army)
and IJN(Imperial Japanese Navy) used. Each shapes differed a little.
Farman could carry 10th 8cm bomb, or 6th 12cm bomb. At first, they carried bomb
both outside of fuserage with ropes and shot by cutting rope.
In no time, they used shooting pipe for bombing.
Farman float plane operated 49th mission, flight time was 71hour, shot bomb
199th, and no loss during 2months.
During the operation, suppried 2 aircrafts each "small" and "big".
Japanese aircrafts color is "clear doped". Fabric part is beige, wooden part is
brown(burnish, or natural), until 1921.
Rare case, nose and peripheral cockpit is painted matt black, for anti-glare.
(ex. Type Yokosuka arsenal Ro-gou kou float plane, prototype made in 1917).
The "hinomaru", Japanese national insignia(red solid disk), was not applied
until 1921(case of IJN. IJA, I do not remember).
IJN aircraft marking was only a Japanese "katakana"character with figures
(indicated by Chinese character) on each outboard of radder.
A "katakana" indicated aircraft type, and figure as like as S/N.
Hmmmmm... Probably this can not indicate your terminal display.
For example, a Falman that used in Tsingtao carried "i14" on outboard of rudders. The "i" indicated by "katakana" and "14" indicated by Chinese character.
If you have resources of Japanese aircraft, probably you can find characters as above in it.
Or Joe, you send me your mail address via email, I send you a copy of Japanese
Farman's illustration with characters I wrote.
Hope this help.
Regards, Hiro.
--Hirohisa Ozaki