Canet developed a 38 cal naval gun, an extremely powerful weapon for its time, specifically for the export market. The gun was first selected by the
Spanish Navy in 1884 as part of a large naval expansion program which called for six new
battleships. The Spanish armaments firm
Hontoria obtained a manufacturing license to produce the weapon, but due to budgetary reasons, only one vessel, the , was completed. Canet was more successful in sales to the
Empire of Japan, when the gun was selected by the
French military advisor and
naval architect Louis-Émile Bertin as the
main battery of the , new type of cruiser he had designed in 1887. The usage was consistent with the
Jeune École philosophy, which advocated placing overwhelming firepower (strong guns,
torpedoes) on relatively small ships. This philosophy was of great interest to the
Imperial Japanese Navy, which lacked the resources at the time to purchase modern
pre-dreadnought battleships. The guns supplied to Japan equipped the cruisers , , and . Each gun weighed 67 tons, and had a barrel long, firing a long projectile with weight of (or high explosive) for an effective range of . The guns proved only marginally successful during the
First Sino-Japanese War, due to a slow rate of fire, and numerous mechanical problems. The guns could not be aimed abeam, as their weight would cause the ship to roll over when fired. In combat, gunners were able to fire only around one shot per hour due to the time it took to reload. ==Other guns==