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Interestingly enough Wikipedia says that the request for proposals for the F16 happened in January 1972 and the first completed fighter was accepted in January

Interestingly enough Wikipedia says that the request for proposals for the F16 happened in January 1972 and the first completed fighter was accepted in January 1979. That’s 7 years, without the use of computers.

madhadron 6y ago
The F-16 is as very interesting case and it's worth reading about it. It was intentionally built to be a single role aircraft and the people who wanted an effective airplane in that role effectively bypassed most of the politics that would have diluted it. So, yes, the F-16 is one of the great success stories of fighter plane development.
- rootusrootus 6y ago
  I have an interesting old book (which is falling apart, sadly) about the F-16 and it's an interesting comparison with the main competitor at the time, the YF-17, which ultimately became the basis on which the F/A-18 was developed. Both very successful designs.
  - madhadron 6y ago
    Title and author? Sounds really interesting.
    - rootusrootus 6y ago
      It is this one: https://smile.amazon.com/General-Dynamics-F-16-Aero-26/dp/0816805962 https://smile.amazon.com/General-Dynamics-F-16-Aero-26/dp/08...
      - madhadron 6y ago
        Thanks!
- GekkePrutser 6y ago
  The funny thing though is that the F-16 evolved into a multi-role fighter and became quite good at it :)
- hindsightbias 6y ago
  I'll have to disagree there. It's regarded as successful because it was all that was available. Pierre Sprey, John Boyd and Harry Hillaker envisioned a light weight, day only, radarless aircraft with no bomb hard points. Yet the single-role F-16 was morphed into a bomb truck and was considered successful by block 70 or whatever in the late eighties. Hillaker said "if I had realized at the time that the airplane would have been used as a multimission, primarily an air-to-surface airplane as it is used now, I would have designed it differently". So as a square in a round hole, it was made to work but it wasn't brilliant foresight or (early) development. http://www.codeonemagazine.com/article.html?item_id=37 http://www.codeonemagazine.com/article.html?item_id=37
  - greedo 6y ago
    And it's arguable that the original vision for the LWF was mistaken. Its goal was to be able to counter the Warsaw Pact airforces, airframe for airframe in a quantitative battle. But the Soviets were in the process of introducing the Fulcrum that would have outclassed such a simple fighter. A radar-less aircraft would have relied upon GCI, which the Soviets would have been quite successful in jamming/spoofing.
cwwc 6y ago
similar to the AR-15 platform -- it was proto'd, built, and adopted FAST. But in the decades following ... the US has floundered while troops use a 70 year old rifle (albeit with scopes and rails)

madhadron 6y ago

The F-16 is as very interesting case and it's worth reading about it. It was intentionally built to be a single role aircraft and the people who wanted an effective airplane in that role effectively bypassed most of the politics that would have diluted it. So, yes, the F-16 is one of the great success stories of fighter plane development.

rootusrootus 6y ago
I have an interesting old book (which is falling apart, sadly) about the F-16 and it's an interesting comparison with the main competitor at the time, the YF-17, which ultimately became the basis on which the F/A-18 was developed. Both very successful designs.
- madhadron 6y ago
  Title and author? Sounds really interesting.
  - rootusrootus 6y ago
    It is this one: https://smile.amazon.com/General-Dynamics-F-16-Aero-26/dp/0816805962 https://smile.amazon.com/General-Dynamics-F-16-Aero-26/dp/08...
    - madhadron 6y ago
      Thanks!
GekkePrutser 6y ago
The funny thing though is that the F-16 evolved into a multi-role fighter and became quite good at it :)
hindsightbias 6y ago
I'll have to disagree there. It's regarded as successful because it was all that was available. Pierre Sprey, John Boyd and Harry Hillaker envisioned a light weight, day only, radarless aircraft with no bomb hard points. Yet the single-role F-16 was morphed into a bomb truck and was considered successful by block 70 or whatever in the late eighties. Hillaker said "if I had realized at the time that the airplane would have been used as a multimission, primarily an air-to-surface airplane as it is used now, I would have designed it differently". So as a square in a round hole, it was made to work but it wasn't brilliant foresight or (early) development. http://www.codeonemagazine.com/article.html?item_id=37 http://www.codeonemagazine.com/article.html?item_id=37
- greedo 6y ago
  And it's arguable that the original vision for the LWF was mistaken. Its goal was to be able to counter the Warsaw Pact airforces, airframe for airframe in a quantitative battle. But the Soviets were in the process of introducing the Fulcrum that would have outclassed such a simple fighter. A radar-less aircraft would have relied upon GCI, which the Soviets would have been quite successful in jamming/spoofing.

cwwc 6y ago

similar to the AR-15 platform -- it was proto'd, built, and adopted FAST. But in the decades following ... the US has floundered while troops use a 70 year old rifle (albeit with scopes and rails)