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Pre Nylon CWU Flight Jacket?

Maverickson

Well-Known Member
I purchased this jacket jacket recently on eBay. It has no lablel. The material is an oiled light canvas. The reason for me purchasing this jacket was that I recognized it as one that my father used as a flight jacket just prior to 1970 and beyond. It is a large sized jacket with very little wear and fits me perfectly.


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While opening it out of the box it was shipped to me in it's oily smell struck me as I pulled it out of the shipping box. It was like just like deja vu. Does anyone here have the skinny of this jacket?

Thanks, Dave
 

watchmanjimg

Well-Known Member
That's a Jacket, Flyer's, Lightweight and probably dates from the late 1970s or more recently. It is made of fire-retardant Nomex aramid fiber and was typically worn on US Army helicopters as well as fixed-wing aircraft.

I've seen a very rare 1969-dated prototype example of a lightweight flight jacket of similar design. It lacks the pocket flaps of your jacket and uses a different lining material, but the outer fabric and overall appearance are much the same. Could this be the jacket your father wore?

In any case, congrats on a nice find. I have several of these myself.
 

Atticus

Well-Known Member
Jim, not to disagree, but it looks to me like a type of light-weight nomex jacket that was issued in the 1970s to Army helicopter crews and perhaps others. I have a "mint" one that came from Brooks. It has no insulation, no handle on the back, is made from nomex and is a "flyer's jacket". The nomex of this jacket is unlike the nomex of the CWU series jackets. It is indeed like poplin and is very comfortable.

To me, this has always been a very underrated and undercollected type of flight jacket.

AF
 

watchmanjimg

Well-Known Member
Geoff, check out my edited post and you'll see we're on precisely the same page. Maverickson originally posted a picture of the cold-weather version, which threw me off course. He and I just finished clearing up the confusion. :lol:

We are also in agreement that these are great jackets. I have at least 5 in my collection, as well as one of the cold-weather CVC types.
 

Maverickson

Well-Known Member
Althought these jackets are similar when looking at it they resemble one another the skin is different. Watchmanjim was refereing to this jacket and it is Nomex aramad fiber.

4f5c_1.jpg


But on closer inspection of the jacket in queston you can see that this one is canvas.

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The oil in the canvas comes through the photo and it appears darker green. I believe that this dates back to what was once called a slicker. As I recall this jacket is exactly what my father was wearing in late 1969.

Dave
 

watchmanjimg

Well-Known Member
Dave, I think your jacket was somehow impregnated with oil or some other fluid but that's not how it began life. I'm certain it's aramid just like all the others of this type. As Geoff points out, this type of Nomex has a vastly different feel than that used in CWUs--it's more like a cotton texture, hence your comparison to canvas. The oil probably makes it feel stiffer than it would otherwise.
 

watchmanjimg

Well-Known Member
The jacket with the elbow patches appears to be the typical cold-weather CVC version, while the other is the lightweight flyer's jacket.
 
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