There were plans to improve the Ki-15 and, therefore, in September 1939, the Mitsubishi Ki-15-II was sent into production. It was an improved variant powered by a Mitsubishi Ha-26-1 which yielded 900hp of power. Thanks to the smaller diameter of the new engine, drag was reduced and forward field of view was increased, which was one of the problems of the first version.
Its performance atracted the attention of the Imperial Japanese Navy, which ordered 20 examples of the Ki-15-II, under the official designation of "Navy Type 98 Reconnaissance Plane Model 1", or, as Mitsubishi named it, Mitsubishi C5M1, even before the navy named it.
The Imperial Japanese Navy adquired, subsequently, thirty examples of C5M2, which was a more improved version powered by a 949hp Nakajima Sakae 12 engine. In the Imperial Japanese Navy, they were used for reconnaissance duties. A experimental version powered by a 1050hp Mitsubishi 102 radial engine was also tested by Mitsubishi, and received the designation of Mitsubishi Ki-15-III but it never went into production.
In total, around 500 exemplars of every variant were manufactured and most of them were still in first line duties when the Pacific War began. One year later, in 1943 they have already been relegated to second line duties, but late in the war, some of them were used in Kamikaze attacks.
The Mitsubishi Ki-15-I did also set a new record back in 1937 when the second prototype was bought by the Japanese newspaper Asahi thanks to its reputation of being a very fast aircraft. It was given the designation of Karigane (Wild Goose) and received the nickname of Kamikaze with the registration of J-BAAI. It became the first Japanese aircraft to fly to Europe in a Tokyo-to-London flight for the coronation of King George VI between 6th April and 9th April 1937 in a flight time of 51 hours, 17 minutes and 23 seconds, setting a new record for the time. Following that success, a small number were sold to civilian customers with the newspaper Asahi, buying another one, nicknamed Asakaze, with the registration J-BAAL. Other number of aircraft were used as mail planes by various civilian operators.
Sources:
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitsubishi_Ki-15
2. https://www.militaryfactory.com/aircraft/detail.asp?aircraft_id=890
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