No Subject

[owner-cypherpunks@toad.com]

On Sun, 18 Feb 1996, jim bell wrote:

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> At 10:25 PM 2/18/96 EDT, E. ALLEN SMITH wrote:
> >	I've been kind of busy recently (the reason I haven't responded to
> >the more recent Assasination Politics stuff), but I'm curious what 
> >your method is for achieving simultaneous explosions.
> 
> 
> "Multiple very thin flexible hollow tubes (1 mm ID? teflon?) filled with a
> homogenous liquid 
> explosive (for example, pure nitromethane), length accurately cut to produce 
> the exactly desired delay.  Kept separated from each other by foam spacers 
> to avoid inter-fiber detonations. Detonated from a single cap, with an 
> intermediary chamber of liquid explosive to stabilize the shock front, the 
> detonation wave travels along each tube simultaneously at (presumably) 
> identical velocity."

This method is so dependent on the uniformity of the initiator (the cap 
in this instance) as to be nearly useless.  Normal blasting caps do not 
detonate with the uniformity required to initiate each of the tube paths 
at the same time.  In the off chance that you contemplated surrounding 
the cap with liquid explosive of a sufficent type, (which still wouldn't 
assure proper uniformity with any certainty as the liquid explosive is as 
likely to detonate slightly off left to right as up to down) you still have 
extremely difficult problems to overcome.

1>  Interference from the milling shape and accuracy of the openings to 
the tubes containing the liquid explosive.

2>  Mild to obscure impurities in the liquid explosives causing 
differences in velocity with respect to other tubes.  Even small changes 
in pressures within the tubes might cause enough timing problems to make 
uniform initiation of the primary high explosive assembly impossible.

3>  Interference from the milling shape and accuracy of the terminus of 
the tubes containing the liquid explosive.

4>  Overpressure in the device causing premature detonation of the near 
portion of the high explosive assembly.

All of these might cause enough timing error to prevent uniform pressure 
and thus prevent uniform compression and make supercriticality impossible.

Remember, kryonic switiches are necessary even when dealing with the 
speeds of electric conductivity.  The velocities of even hydrazine based 
explosives are signigicantly lower.  The margin for error is similarly lower.

Plutonium gun is still the easiest method for the home grown nuclear 
device, even if it requires more fissile material.

> It's a race, designed so that the detonation waves reach their targets (the
> foci) at 
> the same time.  If the detonation velocity was, say, 5,000 meters per 
> second, an accuracy of 0.5 millimeter in length would produce a delay 
> accuracy  of 100 nanoseconds.
>
> Whatcha think?
> 
> Now where did I put that pit...   <G>
>
> Jim Bell
> jimbell@pacifier.com
> 
> Klaatu Burada Nikto
> 
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