26 Apr
2005
26 Apr
'05
11:31 p.m.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Joe R." <rigdonj at cfl.rr.com>
To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts"
<cctalk at classiccmp.org>
Sent: Tuesday, April 26, 2005 9:08 PM
Subject: Re: End of Surplus?
Sorry but that won't work. After the first couple of generations of the
chain reaction it simply blows itself apart and the chain reaction dies.
That's why A bombs have POWERFUL chemical explosives to FORCE the nuclear
material together. Getting the bomb to stay together long enough to work
(ie, use up most of the available nuclear material) was probably THE
biggest problem in the building of the A bomb. Ultimately two approaches
were used, one was to fire to hemispheres of nuclear materail together by
means of a modified 16 inch navel gun (Tall-boy) and the other was to
implode a hollow sphere of material by explosives that completely
surrounded it (Fat-man). Go read 'Building of the Atomic Bomb" by Richard
Rhodes. It has a lot of detail on the subject. That book and "Building of
the Nuclear Bomb" are both very interesting reading.
Joe
The major problem with the Fatman method was having the explosives
surrounding the uranium explode at the exact same time with 1940's era
electrical technology. Getting a uniform explosion to compress a ball off
enriched uranium so that a large chain reaction takes place is probably
still a pain to do for most countries wanting to build a bomb. A fraction of
a second off and you have a fizzle.