MA-1 - orange lining and oxygen tab?

[MeachamLake]

Hi all,

I recently won an auction for a tall sized Alpha MA-1 - pretty rare as I cannot find these too often in my size. Glad I got it pretty cheap too! It's obviously based on the later MA-1 models, like most Alpha jackets, as it has a reversible orange liner, dark grey-ish knits and a sage green nylon shell.

I'm thinking about adding a matching sage green oxygen tab to the jacket from MASH Japan -just to make it stand out a little from my other nylons, and to add a little visual interest to an otherwise plain jacket.

My question is this - was there ever a period where orange lined MA-1s were fitted with oxygen tabs on the chest? I'm not too fussed about historical accuracy on a relatively inexpensive jacket, but I was intrigued to know if this was ever a thing. I'm guessing the answer is no, but I just wanted an expert to confirm...

Thanks!

 

[oose]

The short answer is no, not in the MA-1, the oxygen tab was dropped before the orange lining was introduced. There was a civilian flight jacket made by Fruhauf dating from 1956-7 that were reversible with an oxygen tab but these were cotton and not nylon, Land MFG also produced a similar cotton jacket a little later.

All the best
Stuart

 

[Cocker]

The short answer is no, not in the MA-1, the oxygen tab was dropped before the orange lining was introduced. There was a civilian flight jacket made by Fruhauf dating from 1956-7 that were reversible with an oxygen tab but these were cotton and not nylon, Land MFG also produced a similar cotton jacket a little later.

All the best
Stuart
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Oooooh I like this jacket a lot ! Almost looks like the top half of a flight suit.

Envoyé de mon SM-G950F en utilisant Tapatalk

 

[oose]

These jackets were ordered by Douglas/North American/Republic/Boeing etc and distributed to there test pilots around 1957. I've posted about them before, but I've done a lot more research since and may post an update at some time.

 

[MeachamLake]

Thank you! That's a cool looking jacket indeed. I'd love to learn more about them - test pilot jackets are quite interesting due to their rarity alone.