Nuclear Grenade

Originally posted by DanD9
Yes, californium is fissionable, and in small quantities. It is extremely expensive though. It's also extremely radioactive, it heats up to be bright hot in gram quantities, and is surronded by a glow. It's possible, but impractical.

But how spectacular!

I saw a glow inside a reactor once, it's way cool

Yeah, it's cool. I'm assuming you saw fuel rods, not californium, right? And you're talkin' about underwater glow, right? It's called Cerenkov radiation. It's because the particles of radiation travel faster than light through the water, light photons will bounce around off of water molecules and stuff, whereas the particles just cut straight through. I think that's what it is, but I would like to know for sure. Does anyone know?

Originally posted by DanD9
Yes, californium is fissionable, and in small quantities. It is extremely expensive though. It's also extremely radioactive, it heats up to be bright hot in gram quantities, and is surronded by a glow. It's possible, but impractical.

I can't find any inforamtion which says californium is fissionable, please post a link if you have it.

Here's one link, it's a bit further down, under "Other Fissionable Isotopes"
www.isis-online.org...
Enjoy

Originally posted by DanD9
Here's one link, it's a bit further down, under "Other Fissionable Isotopes"
www.isis-online.org...
Enjoy

Thanks for the link From what I can gather though Californium is the last fissionable element you'd use for nuclear weapons. Plutonium would be just as effective with not as many of the disadvantages.

Yeah, youre right. I read that the minimum critical mass for californium would cost over $1 billion! I think plutonium is a better option.

Originally posted by Aelita

Originally posted by mad scientist
I don't think you understand physics too well, californium can't be imploded to create a nuclear yield. All it is, is highly radioactive.

Do you care to comment in more detail? Feel free to post cross sections and such, I'll be able to read this stuff.

I'm pretty sure the Californium device will work.

There are plenty of sources who say

Other transuranics such as curium and californium could also theoretically be used in nuclear weapons, but are not believed to pose significant proliferation threat at the present time, as they too rare, especially in separated form, or too radioactive

And, when I was a kid, there was an urban legend about californium bullets that Soviets manufactured to be used against tanks.

[edit on 15-9-2004 by Aelita]

The element you want to know about is americium-242m.
The reference URL is sec353.jpl.nasa.gov...
Unfortunately after the 9/11 incident it was blocked.



[edit on 17-9-2004 by mockan]

Originally posted by mockan
The element you want to know about is americium-242m.
The reference URL is sec353.jpl.nasa.gov...
Unfortunately after the 9/11 incident it was blocked.

No wonder, it would be very effective when making dirty bombs.

Californium-252 (half-life 2.6 years) is a very strong neutron emitter and is thus extremely radioactive and harmful (one microgram spontaneously emits 170 million neutrons per minute).



Most of Americium isotopes have very short half-life so when making bomb from Americium you could use only few specific isotopes, otherwise spontaneuous radioactive decaying would consume bomb's "fuel" fast.


en.wikipedia.org...
education.jlab.org...

has any 1 seen starship troopers i beleive a small grenade sized nuke much similar to a shoulder like rpg weapon with a very very small low yeild nuke and id like to know what is the smallest in yeild capacity u can have with a destructable force of about a mile radius would probs be acceptble

Am-242m is far too expensive, more that californium I think.

What kind of destruction over 1 mile radius? You mean like kill everything? depends on terrain , burst height, and stuff like that. on a flat plain, 1.5 kilotons will cause casualties out to 1 mile radius.

This sounds like something that I would like to see......

















from about thirty miles away.........


















on television from inside a bunker.

I believe the sort of weapon your friend heard about was a nuclear isomer weapon, which can be made any size.

One gram of Hafnium isomer = 50 Kg of HE, so a nuclear grenade is certainly possible, even a nuclear bullet. Load an assault weapon with those and take out city blocks. Very scary indded.

www.newscientist.com...

OK! Now I am starting to get a little bit nervous here. Why doesn't someone just post a set of prints for a grenade here? I don't have a problem with conventional weapons, but nukes scare the hell out of me.

The smallest nuclear weapon will always be dictated by 2 things - the thickness of the reflector and the corresponding critical mass.

As stated earlier, the W-50 Davy Crockett was as small as we ever got, and is pretty much as small as you can get.

The smallest "grenade" would feasibly be about the size of a bowling ball bag, and that's pushing it. Forget anything smaller.

Originally posted by ShadowXIX
have also heard of nuclear demolition charges to take out things like bridges

I would be interested in any information you might have in regards to the nuclear demolition charges, would make some interesting reading I think erhaps relevant to some other research I am gathering, lemme know if you have a link or something.

Originally posted by Hyperen
I heard someone speaking about the Americans developing a nuclear grenade.

He said it only had a tiny amount of nuclear fuel in.

The person said that they had been told it by a professor who teaches where they are studying.


[edit on 11/9/04 by Hyperen]

Methinks the professor is teaching at the local school of hairdressing or something. First of all, the minimum fissionable mass alone is big enough to make it so heavy that you wouldn't be able to carry it around very long let alone throw it. Add shielding, explosives, casing and, well you get the point. I'll bet one of those nuke artillary shells weighs in at 50kg or so. You need a minimum amount of plutonium to produce the self sustaining chain reaction. They are reading too much SciFi. lol.

Are you kidding me..., the grenade would propably kill the thrower (radiation) and what's the point with them, the radiation doesn't kill in seconds, perhaps not even in days...

[edit on 31-7-2005 by Figher Master FIN]

"First of all, the minimum fissionable mass alone"

Not with nuclear isomers - there is no minimum, because it's not a fission reaction, but triggered isomer decay.
Whether they can make it work or not is another matter ; many say not, Carl Collins reckons they can...

Nuclear Grenade Instructions
Model M-25(N)

1. Pull pin.
2. Throw towards enemy.
3. Locate yourself outside the 1km blast radius, quickly.
4. Enjoy enemy free afternoon.

A nuclear grenade is the dumbest weapon ever!! What's next?? Nuclear Bullets? Or a nuclear combat knife?