The Vickers Varsity is a retired British twin-engined crew trainer operated by the

Royal Air Force The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the Air force, air and space force of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. It was formed towards the end of the World War I, First World War on 1 April 1918, on the merger of t ...

from 1951 to 1976.

Design and development

The Varsity was developed by

Vickers Vickers was a British engineering company that existed from 1828 until 1999. It was formed in Sheffield as a steel foundry by Edward Vickers and his father-in-law, and soon became famous for casting church bells. The company went public in 18 ...

and based on the

Viking Vikings were seafaring people originally from Scandinavia (present-day Denmark, Norway, and Sweden), who from the late 8th to the late 11th centuries raided, pirated, traded, and settled throughout parts of Europe.Roesdahl, pp. 9� ...

and Valetta to meet Air Ministry Specification T.13/48 for a twin-engined training aircraft to replace the Wellington T10 and the Valetta T3 and T4. The main differences were the wider-span wings, longer

fuselage The fuselage (; from the French language, French ''fuselé'' "spindle-shaped") is an aircraft's main body section. It holds Aircrew, crew, passengers, or cargo. In single-engine aircraft, it will usually contain an Aircraft engine, engine as wel ...

and

tricycle undercarriage Tricycle gear is a type of aircraft undercarriage, or ''landing gear'', that is arranged in a tricycle fashion. The tricycle arrangement has one or more nose wheels in a single front undercarriage and two or more main wheels slightly aft of th ...

. There was also a ventral pannier to allow a trainee bomb aimer to lie in a prone position and a bomb bay with a capacity for 24 x 25lb smoke & flash bombs. The first prototype Type 668 Varsity VX828 was first flown by J 'Mutt' Summers and G R 'Jock' Bryce from

Wisley Wisley is a village and civil parish in Surrey, England between Cobham and Woking, in the Borough of Guildford. It is the home of the Royal Horticultural Society's Wisley Garden. The River Wey runs through the village and Ockham and Wisley C ...

on 17 July 1949. A civil version the VC.3 was planned but with the success of the VC.2 Viscount the idea was abandoned.

Operational history

The Varsity was introduced to replace the

Wellington Wellington is the capital city of New Zealand. It is located at the south-western tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Remutaka Range. Wellington is the third-largest city in New Zealand (second largest in the North Island ...

T10 trainer. Following deliveries to trials units the first production aircraft were delivered for operational use in 1951 to No. 201 Advanced Flying School at RAF Swinderby, where they were used to train pilots to fly multi-engined aircraft. It also equipped two Air Navigator Schools in 1952, and the Bomber Command Bombing school, with the job of training crews for RAF Bomber-Command's V-bomber crews.Rawlings 1971, pp. 172–173. The

Swedish Air Force The Swedish Air Force ( or just ) is the air force Military branch, branch of the Swedish Armed Forces. History The Swedish Air Force was created on 1 July 1926 when the aircraft units of the Army and Navy were merged. Because of the escalatin ...

operated a single Varsity from January 1953 to 1973 mainly for

electronic intelligence Signals intelligence (SIGINT) is the act and field of intelligence-gathering by interception of ''signals'', whether communications between people (communications intelligence—abbreviated to COMINT) or from electronic signals not directly u ...

missions. The Swedish military designation was Tp 82. The Varsity was withdrawn from service with the RAF in May 1976, its role as a pilot trainer being taken over by the Scottish Aviation Jetstream T1, and as a navigation trainer by the Hawker Siddeley Dominie T1. The last flying example (Serial ''WL679'') was operated by the

Royal Aircraft Establishment The Royal Aircraft Establishment (RAE) was a British research establishment, known by several different names during its history, that eventually came under the aegis of the Ministry of Defence (United Kingdom), UK Ministry of Defence (MoD), bef ...

; it was retired into preservation at the

RAF Museum The Royal Air Force Museum is a museum dedicated to the Royal Air Force in the United Kingdom. The museum is a non-departmental public body and is a registered charity. It has two public sites, Royal Air Force Museum London and Royal Air Fo ...

in 1992.

Operators

; *

Royal Jordanian Air Force The Royal Jordanian Air Force (RJAF; Arabic: سلاح الجو الملكي الأردني, ''Silāḥ al-Jaww al-Malakī al-ʾUrdunī'') is the aerial warfare branch of the Jordanian Armed Forces. Founded in 1955, the RJAF serves as the primary ...

; *

Aeroplane and Armament Experimental Establishment The Aeroplane and Armament Experimental Establishment (A&AEE) was a research facility for British military aviation from 1918 to 1992. Established at Martlesham Heath, Suffolk, the unit moved in 1939 to Boscombe Down, Wiltshire, where its wo ...

** No. 51 Squadron RAF ** No. 97 Squadron RAF ** No. 115 Squadron RAF ** No. 116 Squadron RAF ** No. 151 Squadron RAF ** No. 173 Squadron RAF ** No. 187 Squadron RAF ** No. 192 Squadron RAF ** No. 204 Squadron RAF ** No. 527 Squadron RAF ** Bomber Command Bombing School RAF ** Central Navigation and Control School RAF **

Royal Air Force College Cranwell The Royal Air Force College (RAFC) is the Royal Air Force academy which provides initial training to all RAF personnel who are preparing to become commissioned officers. The College also provides initial training to aircrew cadets and is resp ...

Central Flying School The Central Flying School (CFS) is the Royal Air Force's primary institution for the training of military flying instructors. Established in 1912 at the Upavon Aerodrome, it is the longest existing flying training school in the world. The sch ...

** No. 4 Flying Training School RAF ** No. 5 Flying Training School RAF ** No. 6 Flying Training School RAF ** No. 201 Advanced Flying School RAF later named No. 11 Flying Training School RAF ** No. 1 Air Navigation School RAF ** No. 2 Air Navigation School RAF ** No. 3 Air Navigation School RAF ** No. 6 Air Navigation School RAF ** No. 1 Air Electronics School RAF ** No. 1 Radio School RAF *

* Empire Test Pilot's School

Aircraft on display

Germany

* WF382 – Varsity T.1 in storage at Berlin-Tegel Airport for the Allied Museum in

Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...

Sweden

* 82001 – Tp 82 on static display at the Swedish Air Force Museum in Linköping, Östergötland.

United Kingdom

* WF369 – Varsity T.1 on static display at the Newark Air Museum in Newark, Nottinghamshire. * WF372 – Varsity T.1 on static display at the

Brooklands Museum Brooklands Museum is a motoring and aviation museum occupying part of the former Brooklands Motor Course in Weybridge, Surrey, England. Formally opened in 1991, the museum is operated by the independent Brooklands Museum Trust Ltd, a private l ...

in Weybridge, Surrey. * WJ903 – Varsity T.1 nose section on static display at Aeroventure in

Doncaster, South Yorkshire Doncaster ( ) is a city in South Yorkshire, England. Named after the River Don, it is the administrative centre of the City of Doncaster metropolitan borough, and is the second largest settlement in South Yorkshire after Sheffield. Noted for i ...

. * WJ945 – Varsity T.1 on static display at the Classic Air Force in Newquay, Cornwall. * WL626 – Varsity T.1 on static display at the East Midlands Airport Aeropark in Castle Donington, Leicestershire. * WL679 – Varsity T.1 on static display at the Royal Air Force Museum Cosford in

Cosford, Shropshire Cosford is a village in Shropshire, England. It is located on the A41 road, which is itself just south of junction 3 on the M54 motorway. The village is very small and is mostly made up of dwellings that house Royal Air Force personnel who work ...

Specifications (T Mk 1)

References

Notes

Bibliography

* Andrews, C.F. and E.B. Morgan. ''Vickers Aircraft since 1908''. London: Putnam, 1988. . * Bagshaw, R. Deacon, R. Pollock, A. and Thomas, M. ''RAF Little Rissington: The Central Flying School years 1946 - 1976''. Pen & Sword, 2006 * Ellis, Ken. ''Wrecks & Relics''. Manchester, UK: Crécy Publishing, 21st edition, 2008. . * * Martin, Bernard. ''The Viking, Valetta and Varsity''. Tonbridge, Kent, UK:

Air-Britain Air-Britain, traditionally sub-titled 'The International Association of Aviation Enthusiasts', is a non-profit aviation society founded in July 1948. As from 2015, it is constituted as a British charitable trust and book publisher. History Air-Br ...

(Historians) Ltd., 1975. . * Rawlings, J.D.R. "Vickers Varsity". ''Air Pictorial'', Vol. 33, No. 5, May 1971, pp. 172–176. * Thetford, Owen. ''Aircraft of the Royal Aircraft 1918–57''. London: Putnam, 1st edition, 1957.

External links

"Aircrew Trainer," ''Flight'', 30 March 1950, pp. 406–410
{{Swedish military aircraft designations 1950s British military trainer aircraft Varsity Mid-wing aircraft Aircraft first flown in 1949 Twin piston-engined tractor aircraft Aircraft with retractable tricycle landing gear