As I understand it, a Pu warhead can only get so big, whereas a U warhead is infinitely scalable. But I'm not sure I'm remembering that right. Summoning @GeorgeWHerbert and @NuclearAnthro
-
A sphere of HEU with a 1 inch diameter is only 0.16 kg... that feels like a strong "no" to me (a couple orders of magnitude smaller than smallest U235 cores I have heard of). U238 fissioning releases approx. same energy per gram of fissioning as U235 and Pu (~18 kt/kg).
If you're asking about 1 inch around a Pu core, I don't know how much that would help. It wouldn't be a good approach to a composite weapon (which usually use a little bit of Pu and a lot of HEU).
-
-
In terms of less active material than usual, i think only 1 inch of uranium could release less than 1kt but even 1kt means a huge damage if it was exploded by airdrop ( that would maximize damage around its target) Is that right?
-
I am not sure I understand what you're asking (or why). Again, 1 inch diameter sphere of HEU is only 0.16 kg. Getting a supercritical assembly out of that is not going to be easy. Even if it fissioned 100% (unlikely) would only release <10 tons (not kt) of energy.
-
Sorry about my comments. I understood You wrote. I was trying to tell that if NK has not enough active material, weapons' engineers easily could build a nuclear weapon with low yield, but with best results.
-
It is possible to make very low yield weapons with a kilogram or perhaps less of material, but it is not easy and the results are not great. I don't think that's what DPRK would be doing.
-
Yeah. You can make a neutron/gamma grenade moderated criticality device more easily but useful explosives yield doesn't scale down well.
-
Yes. That i was trying tobtalk about : neutron bomb or enhanced radiation weapon.
End of conversation
New conversation -
-
-
In another words Uranium continues to be the best choice in nuclear and thermonuclear weapons' design. isn't?
-
There are tradeoffs. You need much more HEU in a core than Pu to get the reaction started — HEU has lower critical mass, etc. So for some purposes that is better, for some it is worse.
End of conversation
New conversation -
Loading seems to be taking a while.
Twitter may be over capacity or experiencing a momentary hiccup. Try again or visit Twitter Status for more information.