The Next Great Engine War Was Not What You Thought It Was
Discussion With the F100/F110 engine war in full force, the Air Force started developing its next fighter, the ATF. Looking to capitalize on the newly infused energy in the propulsion industrial base, the Air Force issued contracts to GE and P&W in 1983 for ATF engine development through ground tests. In bidding for the ATF’s engine demonstrator contract, GE and P&W were free to use whatever technical approach they felt best to achieve the performance goals. P&W had taken a technologically aggressive approach with its F100 engine, which, though they won the contract, earned them years of headaches in maturing that technology to the Air Force’s satisfaction. For the ATF, P&W instead emphasized “somewhat lower risk technology and high reliability” (Younossi et al., 2002). On the other hand, GE was burned by P&W’s higher performing engine, which cost the company 10 years of fighter engine contracts when it lost to the F100. It finally sold its F110 engine by “stressing the reliability and simplicity of its … engines” when the rival F100 suffered enough problems to force the Air Force to look at alternatives (Aronstein et al., 1998). To avoid a repeat of the ATF, GE adopted P&W’s previous high-risk approach by demonstrating high performance and advanced technology from the outset, leaving problem solving for later. Instead of a traditional turbofan engine like the F110, GE chose to push its higher performance but technologically unproven variable cycle engine.
P&W had taken a technologically aggressive approach with its F100 engine, which, though they won the contract, earned them years of headaches in maturing that technology to the Air Force’s satisfaction.
The results of the flight tests reflected the different approaches. GE’s push to meet higher thrust requirements resulted in its YF120 engine significantly outperforming the YF119 in the YF-22 and YF-23 . It showed better high-mach performance and was preferred by the airframe companies for their high angle-of-attack flight tests. Nevertheless, in August 1991, the Air Force announced that P&W’s YF119 won the ATF engine contract. Though GE’s performance was outstanding, the Air Force was reportedly concerned about the risk involved with the YF120’s
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Defense ARJ , Summer 2025, Vol. 32 No. 2: 104—130
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