rossmum posted:

I could've sworn Vulcan had more letters than that.

Ygolonac posted:

"Hey Dave, what's the weight of that reactor? How many tons? Slamming and rolling and total loss of cooling systems and controls and uranium is kinda mass-y, is there any chance it could get slapped into a critical mass?"

"Well... lemme see here... <runs calculations> uhm. Go on to lunch without me, Frank, I'm not hungry anymore."

iyaayas01 posted:

That whole bit is awesome and is what this thread is all about. I would just add that the part I quoted above was what was driving a lot of uncertainty regarding the plutonium implosion design (what eventually became the standard for a fission weapon).

iyaayas01 posted:

covering the surrounding area with highly radioactive debris.

MA-Horus posted:

Interesting fact about Canada's go-fast bird.

The Iroquois Orenda engine, that was custom-built for the Arrow was flight-tested on a B-47 that was called the CL-52. It was mounted on the tail because that was the only place to put it, turning it into a real bitch to control.

Another problem was that the engine kept overspeeding the airframe. At 75% throttle. In a climb. It got to the point that when the US got the airframe back it was so stressed they scrapped it on the spot.

Those engines would have been MONSTERS, 30000lbs of thrust each.

Sunday Punch posted:

_{Shattered remains of graphite fuel elements from destructive reactor test.}

Sunday Punch posted:

Bonus image of a shuttle-like design with a hovercraft aircushion instead of standard landing gear

The supposed advantage was wider distribution of stress on the runway when landing, higher landing speeds and rough terrain and water landing capability! That would have been quite something to see.

Sunday Punch posted:

It was part of a design study from Bell carried out in 1970. Everything you could ever want to know about air cushion landing systems can be found in this PDF of the report.

Enjoy!

Sunday Punch posted:

I'm putting together some stuff for a post I hope to get up some time in the next few days, here's a clue.

Sunday Punch posted:

Here's some illustrations from a 70s Sikorsky design study for low radar cross section modifications for the Blackhawk. Obviously the idea of a stealthy Blackhawk has been around for a long time, but it would be pretty interesting if it turns out the crashed chopper is just such an aircraft. No details on the rotors (too bad), the main changes are a pointed nose and sloped fuselage sides:





Maybe the mystery helicopter looked something like this?

Or possibly this:

iyaayas01 posted:

Slo-Tek, those pictures were awesome, especially the engine test bed pre-BUFF. Regarding the Cutlass, it's amazing just how much the Westinghouse engine debacles of the '40s and '50s hosed US military aviation, specifically Naval Aviation.

iyaayas01 posted:

Sup

mikerock posted:

To be fair to the CF-104 most of the accidents on those planes were to the Luftwaffe using them inappropriately.

Throatwarbler posted:

"Cymbeline" mortar locating radar send by our good friends Britain, in use against dirty Vietnamese imperialists.



One (of the four delivered) was destroyed by Vietnamese infiltrators who somehow snuck through the perimiter wire. Who knew they were so good at this?

Propagandalf posted:

brains posted:

this pic works well as a reminder that ch-53s are almost as long as a c-130. longer, if you count the rotor diameter in total length, and almost the same footprint. they're gigantic.

edit: the ch-53e is actually longer

Propagandalf posted:

Fast acquisitions like A-12 and P-51 had the advantage of filling a massive gaping hole in military capability, which is much easier to back than a new tanker than doesn't do anything better than the old one except 'be new'.

wkarma posted:

Here's some cold war history I'd never heard before.

It’s part of a secret, nuclear-powered U.S. Army base that was built under the Greenland ice cap only 800 miles from the North Pole. The base was officially built to conduct scientific research but the real reason was apparently to test out the feasibility of burying nuclear missiles below the ice under an effort known as Project Iceworm.




http://defensetech.org/2012/04/06/inside-the-armys-secret-cold-war-ice-base/

BrainGlitch posted:

I want to hear all about this. I love me some NATO MBTs.

Phanatic posted:

It would be trivial for Japan to produce a nuclear weapon were it to decide it wanted one. It's got plenty of plutonium from reprocessing spent fuel, and while it does use it for creating MOX fuel, it could easily stop doing so and instead use it for bombs. Also, they make their own uranium fuel in the first place, they have their own enrichment facilities, and if they really felt like it they could produce HEU for a bomb.

Cyrano4747 posted:

Sweden: willing to fight to the last Finn

Phanatic posted:

The issue's not Pu241, it's Pu240, which undergoes spontaneous fission and releases neutrons, which means predetonation if you try to build a light gun-type weapon out of plutonium.

Phanatic posted:

The reaction that turns U238 into Pu239 at Hanford is exactly the same as the reaction that turns U238 into Pu239 in a civilian power plant. The difference is that the U238 targets in a reactor specifically intended for that transmutation are irradiated for a shorter period of time, so not as much of the Pu240 side-product accumulates. It would not be *efficient* for the Japanese to modify the fuel cycle of a PWR or BWR so that they're inserting new fuel elements and removing old ones each month, but it could produce plutonium with sufficiently low amounts of Pu241 to be used in a bomb.

Stroh M.D. posted:

Nah, Barsebäck took care of the Danes for us. "With Plutonium we bring the Danes to their knees"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YlTukY9fV9Y

Now that the plants are closed, however, maybe its time to bring the bunkers back again?

Nebakenezzer posted:

Russia's Missile Forces have Sledgehammers for opening malfunctioning launch code safes.

People used to worry about Russia's nuclear arsenal being secure. Well, evidently we were worrying about the wrong nation:

British nukes were protected by bike locks

Slamburger posted:

This sounds like a Laurel and Hardy sketch.

Nebakenezzer posted:

In Soyuz space capsules, there are two switches next to each other. Once does a task that is routine that you have to do frequently (like stir the oxygen tanks or something); the other fires the parachutes, which if you fire before the right time, will cause you to die. Both switches are unlabeled.

movax posted:

I thought I read somewhere that they had to purposefully poison/denature fluids in the aircraft (de-icing I think) because conscripts kept drinking it to get wasted.

Conscripts own. (especially the Red Alert 2/3-kind) It's a mixture of and

The Proc posted:

Here's a detailed government report on the aftermath: http://www.ornl.gov/info/reports/1961/3445600598663.pdf

mlmp08 posted:

Unpublished was the report "effects of horrible poisons on lower-caste peoples"

StandardVC10 posted:

Our air mattress landing strip technology is clearly superior.