Analysis
Early F-16A aircraft near completion on the first European F-16 assembly line at SABCA in
Belgium.
F-16 production is split over 5 different production lines in as many different countries: Fokker in The
Netherlands, Sabca in
Belgium, Samsung in Korea, Turkish Aircraft Industries in
Turkey and the Forth Worth production line in the US. The Forth Worth production line has changed name twice over the years as General Dynamics was acquired by Lockheed, which then merged with Martin into Lockheed Martin Aero. A total of 4428 F-16s have been produced at the time of writing (February 2010), the vast majority of which on the Fort Worth production line: 3501 airframes, or roughly 79%).
Construction of the
YF-16 prototypes and the Full Scale Development aircraft was done on the Fort Worth production line. When volume production started for the first customers (USAF and the European Participating Air Forces), two European production lines were involved as well, as part of a compensation package. Both SABCA in Belgium and Fokker in the
Netherlands produced parts (both for European and USAF airframes), and were responsible for the assembly of the European F-16s: SABCA for Belgian and Danish F-16s, Fokker for Dutch and Norwegian F-16s. Sabca produced a total of 222 airframes (covering roughly 5%) and Fokker produced 300 airframes (covering 7%).
In 1988, Turkish Aircraft Industries started building F-16s for the Turkish Air Force, and later TAI also produced F-16s for the Egyptian Air Force. A total of 277 F-16s have been built by TAI so far, representing 6% of the total fleet.
In 1995, a fifth and final production line started building F-16s: Samsung in
South Korea produced a total of 128 F-16aircraft for the
RoKAF. Samsung accounts for 3% of total F-16 production.
At the time of writing, only the Fort Worth line remains open, and with the current order back log is schedule to remain active until 2012-2013.
