Lockheed Vega
The Lockheed Vega was a wooden high-wing monoplane introduced in 1927 as the first product of the Lockheed Aircraft Company. Designed by Jack Northrop, its molded plywood monocoque fuselage and internally braced cantilever wing made it fast for its day, and it served as a small airliner and private transport. The type is remembered for its record flights: Amelia Earhart's solo crossings of the Atlantic and the United States in 1932, and Wiley Post's two flights around the world, the second of them solo, in 1931 and 1933. Lockheed built 131 Vegas, and the two most famous survivors are held by the National Air and Space Museum.
Why It Mattered
The Vega was the first product of Allan Loughead's Lockheed Aircraft Company, and it was designed by Jack Northrop. Pilots who chased speed and distance records chose it over its contemporaries, drawn by its strength and its clean, unbraced lines. In the early 1930s its pilots made some of the decade's defining flights: Amelia Earhart flew one alone across the Atlantic, and Wiley Post flew one alone around the world. Only 131 Vegas were built, a small run for an aircraft with so large a reputation.
Design Notes
Northrop built the fuselage as a molded plywood monocoque. Spruce strips, soaked with glue, were laid in a semi-circular concrete mold and pressed into half-shells; two halves joined around wooden hoops formed a smooth shell that needed no internal bracing. The wing was a single piece of spruce, cantilevered and braced from within, so nothing outside disturbed the airflow. The Vega was also the first aircraft to carry the NACA cowling, which smoothed the airflow around and through the radial engine, reducing drag and improving cooling, and wheel pants cleaned up the fixed landing gear. Later variants such as the 5C carried a pilot and six passengers, powered by a 450-horsepower Pratt & Whitney Wasp radial that gave a top speed of 185 mph.
Operational History
The Vega first flew on 4 July 1927, from Rogers Airport in Los Angeles, with test pilot Edward Bellande at the controls. In ordinary service it was a small airliner and private transport, seating up to seven. In August 1930 Wiley Post flew the Vega Winnie Mae from Los Angeles to Chicago in 9 hours 9 minutes, the first of that aircraft's records. In 1931 Post and navigator Harold Gatty flew the Winnie Mae around the world in 8 days, 15 hours and 51 minutes. In May 1932 Amelia Earhart flew her red Vega 5B nonstop and alone across the Atlantic, the first woman and only the second person to do so; that August she flew the same aircraft nonstop across the United States, another first for a woman. In July 1933 Post flew around the world alone in the Winnie Mae, covering 15,596 miles in 7 days, 18 hours and 49 minutes. Post then used the Vega for high-altitude research, wearing the first practical pressure suit and, cruising in the jet stream, reaching ground speeds of 340 mph. In January 1935 Earhart flew a Vega 5C alone from Hawaii to the U.S. mainland, the first person to make that flight solo.
Afterlife
Only 131 Vegas were built, and just a few survive. The two most famous are both in the National Air and Space Museum. Earhart's 5B, which she sold to Philadelphia's Franklin Institute in 1933, was acquired by the Smithsonian in 1966 and is held by the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C. The Smithsonian acquired the Winnie Mae from Post's widow in 1936, together with the jettisonable landing gear and pressure suit from its high-altitude flights. Elsewhere, at least one other Vega is under restoration to airworthy condition, a reminder that the type's working life is not entirely over.