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MikeD I hate to correct you but approximately 30% of the F-16's are equipped with GE F110. Also realize the F110 has a larger fan diameter which allows for more flow giving more thrust. GE was able to convince LM to redesign the inlet and certify the airframe. GE has more power because of the larger fan not its FPR.
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When I say that there's more GE equipped F-16s in the active-duty, I'm talking all the 30, 40 and 50 models with the F110 and GE 129 engines. Now not being an F-16 pilot, I can only go by what my F-16 bretheren have told me; but there's not as many Block 32/42 series (Pratt equipped) F-16s as there are Block 30/40 (GE equipped) in the active-duty USAF. And the Pratt 100-200/220s, by nature of their manufacture process, have been far more prone to AB augmentor duct loss than the GEs.
"Unhappy with the accident rate due to stagnation stalls in both the F-15 and F-16, in 1979, the USAF placed a contract with General Electric to develop an alternative engine for both fighters. General Electric combined the core of the Rockwell B-1's F101 engine with a scaled-up version of the F404 low-pressure system and augmentor. This engine was ultimately to emerge as the F110.
In order to remain competitive, Pratt and Whitney continued to work on improvements to their F100 engine. Nevertheless, even after several years of work on the part of Pratt & Whitney, the Air Force was still unhappy with the rate at which stagnation stalls were occurring, and in early 1984 the Air Force officially launched an Alternative Fighter Engine (AFE) program to look for an alternative engine for both the F-15 and the F-16. As originally planned, there would be a competition every fiscal year between General Electric and Pratt & Whitney for engine orders for both F-15 and F-16 aircraft. Competition between these two companies would, it was hoped, keep prices down, and having a second source would help to ensure a steady supply of engines. There could even be a mixed buy each year, with engines being purchased from both companies.
The two USAF candidates were the General Electric F101 DFE (now redesignated F110) and a revised Pratt & Whitney F100. In February 1984, the USAF announced that General Electric had been awarded 75 percent of the total engine contracts for the FY 1985 run of F-16 fighters. The remaining FY 85 F-16s would use the upgraded Pratt & Whitney F100, known as the F100-PW-220. The F110 was to be phased into the General Dynamics production line as soon as production engines became available, but it was agreed that individual USAF F-16 units should never operate a mix of engine types, the choice of engine being made at the wing level.
And most wings prefer the GE engines as do most of the pilots I've talked to.
I personally don't fly the Lawn Dart, so I could care less either way. But it seems that the smaller Pratts have their share of problems.
Now so far as the PW-229 goes on the Block 52 F-16s, I've heard that's one heck of a powerful engine, with not a lot of difference, reliability-wise, from the GE-129 engine of the same rated thrust in the Block 50 F-16s.