AP 118 · No. 10 Section II · Aircraft Plate 49 / 77

Plate 49 of 77 · Early jet age · Multi-engine crew trainer

Vickers Valetta & Varsity

Varsity T.1, painted as WF372, Brooklands Museum’s Vickers Varsity T.1 (c/n 531), one of the first production Varsities, delivered to the RAF in the early 1950s to train pilots, navigators and bomb aimers, retired from No. 6 Flying Training School at Finningley in 1976, flown to Sibson that March and kept there by the Nene Valley Aviation Society until Brooklands bought it in 1988, with its two Bristol Hercules 264 sleeve-valve radials, painted in the Training Command scheme it carries today: white upper fuselage with a crimson-red band through the cabin windows and a black anti-glare panel ahead of the windscreen, light grey undersides and nacelles, a Type D fuselage roundel with a black ‘WF 372’ below it, a red fin and dorsal fillet with a large white ‘T’, a red, white and blue fin flash, faded red-orange tailplane and outer under-wing panels, red spinners and black four-blade propellers with red and white tips, and the ventral bomb-aimer’s pannier under the fuselage.

3D model

Turn it over

A procedural model built in Blender from published dimensions, drawings and photographs, painted as WF372, Brooklands Museum’s Vickers Varsity T.1 (c/n 531), one of the first production Varsities, delivered to the RAF in the early 1950s to train pilots, navigators and bomb aimers, retired from No. 6 Flying Training School at Finningley in 1976, flown to Sibson that March and kept there by the Nene Valley Aviation Society until Brooklands bought it in 1988, with its two Bristol Hercules 264 sleeve-valve radials, painted in the Training Command scheme it carries today: white upper fuselage with a crimson-red band through the cabin windows and a black anti-glare panel ahead of the windscreen, light grey undersides and nacelles, a Type D fuselage roundel with a black ‘WF 372’ below it, a red fin and dorsal fillet with a large white ‘T’, a red, white and blue fin flash, faded red-orange tailplane and outer under-wing panels, red spinners and black four-blade propellers with red and white tips, and the ventral bomb-aimer’s pannier under the fuselage. Drag to orbit, scroll or pinch to zoom · download .glb (1.1 MB)

Data plate

Specification

First flight, number built and top speed are for the whole family (); engine, crew and dimensions are for the Varsity T.1 modelled here.

History

The Varsity

After the war the RAF was still teaching its bomber pilots, navigators and bomb aimers on worn-out Wellingtons. Specification T.13/48 asked for a modern replacement, and Vickers answered by stretching its Viking airliner and Valetta transport. The Type 668 Varsity had a longer fuselage, a wing of greater span and, unlike the tail-down Valetta, a tricycle undercarriage, which made it easier for a student to land. Under the fuselage it carried a long pannier in which a trainee bomb aimer lay prone behind a flat glass panel, with a small bomb bay for practice bombs. The prototype, VX828, first flew from Wisley on 17 July 1949 in the hands of Mutt Summers and Jock Bryce.

The first production Varsities went to No. 201 Advanced Flying School at Swinderby in 1951, where pilots moving on to multi-engined aircraft learned their trade, and in 1952 the type reached the air navigation schools. Inside, the cabin was a flying classroom: rows of navigators’ tables with their own instruments, an astrodome on top for star sights, and room for a staff navigator to look over each student’s shoulder. The Bomber Command Bombing School used Varsities to train the bomb aimers of the V-force, and the type also served signallers’ schools and the Central Flying School. Vickers built 163 in all, including the prototypes, and one went to Sweden, where the air force flew it as the Tp 82 from 1953 to 1973.

The Varsity was a steady, forgiving aircraft and it stayed in RAF service for a quarter of a century. Its last unit was No. 6 Flying Training School at Finningley, which retired its Varsities in May 1976, and the Royal Aircraft Establishment flew the last one, WL679, until 1992. Six survive in Britain, complete or in part: WF372 at Brooklands Museum, WF369 at Newark Air Museum, WL679 at RAF Museum Midlands, WL626 at the East Midlands Aeropark, WJ945 at the South Wales Aviation Museum in Barry and the nose of WJ903 in Doncaster.

This airframe

Varsity T.1 WF372

WF372The airframe modelled

WF372, construction number 531, was one of the early production Varsities and joined the RAF at the start of the 1950s. It spent its career in the training schools and was among the last Varsities in service, retiring from No. 6 Flying Training School at Finningley in 1976. On 25 March that year it was flown to Sibson airfield, near Peterborough, where it stood for twelve years in the care of the Nene Valley Aviation Society. Brooklands Museum bought it in September 1988 and brought it back to Weybridge, where Vickers designed the type, and it stands outside there today. The model shows it as photographed in 2025, in the Training Command scheme: a white upper fuselage with a crimson-red band through the cabin windows and a black anti-glare panel ahead of the windscreen, light grey undersides and nacelles, a Type D fuselage roundel with a black “WF 372” below it, a red fin and dorsal fillet with a large white “T”, a red, white and blue fin flash, faded red-orange tailplane and outer under-wing panels, red spinners and black four-blade propellers with red and white tips.

See it at Brooklands Museum

Where to see one

In the gazetteer

The gazetteer records the Varsity in 4 UK collections. The airframe modelled here is marked.

Every airframe and serial All 77 plates

Profiles and models are procedural interpretations built in Blender from published dimensions, three-view drawings and photographs of each airframe. Treat the museum aircraft as the reference.