British Aircrew Mk4A Life Jacket Restoration

I was kindly given this jacket during the 2018 CockpitFest event at Newark Air Museum, and since then have given it a bit of attention.

It arrived with no survival items in the pockets, but did include a 1970's era stole. This project is basically about cleaning it up and making the pockets look like they contain the right kit.

Stole

Being a 70's era stole, it was the later material which was a blessing. Earlier 50's / 60's stoles were rubber, and go hard / perish with age.

Waistcoat

The material was quie filthy, so a few washes in the bath with detergent cleaned it up nicely.

It is missing the sea marker dye pocket, which I'll have to replicate one day to complete the look, if I can find suitable materials.

Co2 bottle

I had some old alumimium tubes from broom handles, so cut a piece to fit inside the M-Type release head, and another larger diameter tube to replicate teh diameter of the CO2 bottle. By wrapping self-amalgamating tape around the inner tube, I was able to snugly slot the bigger tube over it. Once zippe dup inside the popcket and attached to the stole, it looked fine.

Pocket contents

I had a whistle of the correct type, again donated by a friend, so that went into the whistle pocket.

I also ahd a Heliograph and code card in my colelction, although the wrong era, it made the pocket look right from the outside.

SARAH beacon

The SARAH beacon fills pockets on both sides of the waistcoat. Ont he right is the transmitter / receiver unit, and below this sits the battery. On the left s the microphone / speaker unit. A cable runs round the back of the stole to conenct the two sides, and a furtherr cable conencts the battery to the transmitter / receiver unit. Teh cables are on show, so have to look right, but I filled the pockets with foam cut to roughly the right shapes.

Nylon draw-rods

These rods pass through the beckets of certain pockets of the Mk4A life jacket to keep them closed. They are almost impossible to find, so an alternative has to be used.

A friend gave me the tip that a temporary solution for these is to use white nylon cable ties. They are functional for holding the pocket together, and from a distance they look acceptable. As the proper draw rods have a loop at one end, this can be mimicked by creating a loop using the cable tie.

British Aircrew