YF-16 Questions

[KJ_Lesnick]

I can't seem to get any information on the YF-16... moreover, I get conflicting information regarding the following

• What was the YF-16A's wingspan?
  
• What was the YF-16A's operational empty weight?
  
• What was the YF-16A's gross-weight (operational empty weight plus fuel, no armament)?
  
• What air-to-ground load was the YF-16's pylons rated for?
  
• Was the YF-16A to carry 2 or 4 AIM-9?
  
• Was the YF-16A to carry drop-tanks, or did that come with the F-16A
  

Oh, and what was the drop-tanks did the early F-16A's have (gallons)

[TsrJoe]

All of the above is avaliable online with a 5 minute search, at a cursory glance, quite a few of the books covering the early development of the F.16 have pieces of same too 

Cheers, joe

[tahsin]

Or was it really Boeing that was supposed to get the demonstrator programme with USAf happily content to keep buying the all dancing all conquering F-15? The Boeing F-16 then presumably having all kinds different stats?

[KJ_Lesnick]

tahsin

1. I haven't been able to find the wingspan for the YF-16, merely that it's wing area was 280 instead of 300: I heard several figures for span
2. I was able to guesstimate the empty weight, (6500 lbs / 0.315), however I got different numbers from different sources that gave conflicting figures ranging from 19,500 to 22,000 or so
3. I remember finding a figure of 33,000 pounds, but that would give it a similar bomb-load to the F-16A, and I was told it was increased
4. I thought the F-16 had an air to ground load of 14,000 pounds; yet I'm hearing a figure of 10,000 for the F-16A, and the only added one more hardpoint: It seems like it'd be 6,000 to 8,000 pounds but I don't have concrete figures
5. It would appear it could carry 4 AIM-9, but in practice, it was 2 x AIM-9 plus wing-tanks: In many pictures though it was just carrying wing-tanks -- this required an extensive image search.
6. The last one I don't know

[Captain Canada]

My bro had a big ( 32nd scale maybe ? ) F-16 prototype model when we were kids. He never built it, and one day we came home from school and it was sitting there on the kitchen table, immaculate in red. white and blue ! My dad had secretly built it, and painted it with rattle cans. That was cool.