And a couple more....

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I think you will see these types of munitions make a comeback.

The F-4 guys had a cool patch...

"Einbanhstrasse."

I want my own backpack nuke. Sportsman’s warehouse have any Memorial Day sales?

Will they hump it all the way to New York City or just blow up Harlingen?

Easy enough to just walk it across the border in Texas.

Could an aerial asset like the SR-71 or even a satellite with a releasable transmitter built around the same concept as the film buckets dropped for CORONA been an option to transmit remotely?

I have!

... put it in a bell tower or a windmill lol

Plus, there was a ton of sites in the UK and other... friendly countries that it could emanate from. I guess lol




THATS FUCKING AMAZING!!

That is EXACTLY what that is, the M96 Firing Device from the M3/M4 system.

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It's amazing what escaped custody over the years. I bid on a control panel for the B61, I missed buying the PAL coder for a Pershing by two days, and there's been a few... other things.

Sorry you lost out on that. The war reserve and some of the trainers had explosive squibs in the fire and safe circuitry, and there was something funky about the batteries, too.

Thank you again for posting those.

I can see a transmitter van driving around in the UK trying to get the skip right to detonate a device hidden in Moscow.  

You don't think menwith hill would help us out? Or maybe a Russian radio station with some 'altered' electronics.

Dunno, I can do a lot with just a hundred watts. What about the elf system for ringing the subs bell?

This thread delivers!  It was being told that I was going to 59th ORD that would lead to my attending SFAS and a fantastic SF career....Thank Tom Holshul!


18Z50

Very interesting thread. I find the subject of nuclear weapons fascinating.

I am surprised that the OPSEC nuts haven't derailed the thread or had it locked. I guess they are too busy looking for racists now. Good thread OP, unless this is some commie honeypot.

This thread is great. Thanks to the contributors for sharing this information. I have a question about maintenance. It was mentioned that a warhead needs the tritium replaced at approximately 15 year intervals. How do we accomplish that?  Has the DOE actually done this through Obama and Biden?

Coolest thread in weeks!

I recall reading and watching an 80s documentary on this.

Fourth...Protocol I think?

I haven't even gotten a single nasty IM like I usually do. (Shrugs). I just hate that there's so much history based off of the sweat of Americans that will probably never get told.

Everything I've posted was at the time I obtained them known to be unclassified by markings or through the  DOE's own list of declassified topics that they haven't updated in 20 years. I guess I should point out that just because it got outside the fence on the net, or in a book, or paper, doesn't make it unclassified. Just public knowledge, and if you know it's supposed to retain classification, you're not to comment either way on it.

Which puts a lot of us speculators in a hard place, because a while back, Energy decided to REclassify a bunch of documents and facts. Ones that had been through layers of review, and determined nothing harmful was in knowing them. But, under No Comment, they won't tell what is again sensitive, because that would draw attention to it. So, you can be possessing classified material, that was properly marked declassified.

It's a really smart way to stifle discussion.

Now, I can put some stuff on here that would be problematic. There are photos and data that were (assumed) inadvertently released, that we all believe they probably didn't want out. There are pics of the early B61 physics package that is out, for instance. The UK released a photo of an item that is most likely a pit in a currently-stockpiled system. DOE released a video of a pit on national television they have tried to walk back. There is an alleged 'notional unclassified' thermonuclear system finite element cutaway drawing that the speculating community is pretty positive is an actual Allied system.

But, this old ADM stuff isn't particularly valuable to proliferators in my opinion. A Taiwanese national with access used privilege escalation to get design data on pretty much everything in the late 70's-80's and they let him go. It's all been memory holed, and if any of you can find news or other articles on the topic, I would appreciate the heads up. He was doing classified submarine vulnerability research on a topic, and realized his access badge would allow him unescorted access to other topical areas in a physical library. (I'm sure that's not the case today). (Pretty sure).

So, the shitbags have the data. I just don't believe until super recently anyone really had the technical capacity to make the systems. Like aerospace, but with greater tolerances and added hazmat-related issues (you can sit a bunch of classified overhead collection system parts together fresh out of the machine without worrying that they will interact and kill you over time.)

What we miss out on is how smart people solved problems no one ever had to think about before, with materials no one ever had to handle before, and how men with boots on the ground were able to prosecute those missions... successfully. For years. At some point I hope that the soviets and the Americans can finally say, yeah, we fucked you, here's how.

I live near Oak Ridge, and I'd love to find a russian safe house with a secret basement, or a cache point. It's fucking history. (Now, they all get invited in, but I think that's a different thread).







I don't know that the actual timetables have ever been declassified. You can look at the science of it, and see that a certain isotope has a half-life of nn, and let that guide you though.



There are people on this very board that have done that, perhaps ARE doing that, for a living right now. I have never had any access or exposure, but I have read a thing or two. Many of the procedures have been declassified, or judging from the publications, never classified at all. There is a couple of very... revealing videos on youtube if you know where to look, as well.

Essentially, these are the parts-ish:

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How do they get where they are going? How do they get back? I don't think I should say.

At a mid-level of detail, the unit gets taken off war-reserve status. Perhaps it is demated from the lifting system and bus or separated from the forward and rear bodies at a certain station, perhaps it occurs on-site. Serial numbers and inspection records and detection devices and grounding and pressure testing and sampling and two people that watch each other turn a single nut while a third person reads how to unscrew that nut from a worn binder, checking it off with a grease pencil while yet another person stands there and makes certain everyone else is doing what they are supposed to be doing. All tools are for that specific task, they are 'nuclear certified', and even though it may be a 1/4" square allen wrench, it has been specially tested to ensure it can't somehow fuck things up.

The unit might go into a holding fixture, things are applied to protect coatings and help remove other things, perhaps components are also removed, everything gets inspected, the items are swapped, more paperwork, installation is the reverse of removal lol. Any deviation from the procedure gets an immediate halt. Things that you wouldn't sweat on conventional ordnance gets a phone call to... people. At some point, a body of engineers may have to write out a plan on how to proceed.



Energy has relatively little to do with this. When the system rolled off the line and was delivered to the end user, those cats are then responsible for maintenance and upkeep, which at one point in time included applying Johnsons' floor wax.

When they have been baking in the sun internally for so long, or a ton of entities all agree a MC or subsystem can be upgraded, then they make the long trip back to... Pantex, where they get unassembled into larger pieces, some pieces go different places from there.

Pit reuse is one thing I am not certain about. I know a lot of smoke, but very little fire. Secondaries go home, and get rebuilt. AFF probably gets chunked like all the cabling and plastics and batteries and energetics.

Alamos was supposed to do pits after Rocky Flats got deaded (there are a LOT of books out there by the people that were there that were not kind to ERDA or the prime contractor, that are very illuminating, and there are a lot of videos of interviews of former employees. One lady talks with her hands, which was... instructive). I thought Y12 should have got this mission, but as defense production evaporated and they all started fighting for work for others, LANL tried to keep the lion's share in my opinion.

Now, I think it's going to Savannah River, where they did a lot of legwork anyway. (That's a side story, you think one place was the only place they did one thing, then later you learn they were also paralleling things at lab / small scale other places lol. History is fun).

anyway, apologize for the digression


I do not have direct knowledge, but I suspect strongly if they decided to send out a DIAMONDS message to stop doing LLC swaps; that would have leaked if it wasn't a short stop for a really good reason. (shrugs) I feel based on reading and reading and guessing and listening that LLC evolutions must never stop. Or get stretched out.

Much as I dislike those two you mentioned, I don't think either would have the pull to stop LLC evolutions. Now, they could absolutely fuck up Life Extension Programs, but surprisingly, 0 did not and it is my understanding he pushed those and the sub-fractional-we-swear-we're-not-generating-a-yield-but-we-are-wink-wink underground tests. So I have to concede that to him. Biden is current, that means current operations, so I am not in a position to say because I haven't played speculator in about two years now.

My dad was trained on this one way mission around the same timeframe.

Thank you for the reply. Lots of neat history in this thread

Here's a few more things that some of you may find useful before I get going:


I took these from Alex Wellerstein's site. He is a good egg, you should buy his book.

These are slides released from Pantex and NNSA, they show the shapes of things... Fat Man and Little Boy were classified shapes until the 1960's, so this should raise some blood pressure

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This graph he made using data compiled by another great of the speculators, Carey Sublette. Is it accurate? Dunno.

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Edit - I fat fingered the button, which is why I don't like responding on my phone.

This last one is a link in a spoiler. It is an example of how very, very classified data gets out. DO NOT GO THERE IF VIEWING IT OR HAVING POTENTIAL SECRET RESTRICTED DATA ON YOUR PERSONAL ELECTRONIC DEVICE IS A POTENTIAL ISSUE.

Click To View Spoiler

He has not been jacked up for it. Yet. And, there are a ton of others like it.

I think that's multiple separate questions.

You have detectability and dose.

Plutonium is an alpha emitter and alpha is easily blocked. However, nothing is pure and there may have been other emitters by coincidence or design.

What matters is a combination of rate and health damage from the particular radiation type.

Alpha is very damaging inside the body. Easily shielded outside the body.

Not everything has tritium. It requires maintenance due to short half life and increases dose.

I wouldn't think the demo nukes would have tritium.

Then again, I'm not a 50's and 60's era cold war nuke designer.

The MADM and HADM did. The one in the MADM was referred to by the MT's as the 'purple banana'. There is an unclassified picture of it out there, and the W30/31 has been described as boosted systems. Not sure what the HADM was made from off the cuff.
They did not release what the boost gas composition was, nor the amount, nor the timing in the detonation sequence, but the MC's for most of the parts are out there.
The SADM was the only 'point-and-shoot' 'no serviceable parts' kind of ADM they ever had.

... Also, as a point, Tritium and Deuterium weren't used in just the boost subsystem.

kirksmiling.jpg

The B91 gravity bomb? I have never heard of this development... was it supposed to be a development of the W91 off the AGM-131B?

We wore Dosimeters for a short time for maint and storage ops. (a few years) I think it was found that they were useless for our situation.  During the period I was on the DASA NET we wore them during all accident ops.

My limited understanding from reading Congressional / Energy bills and things, the Navy wanted a new depth bomb, and AF wanted a new land attack platform, but they couldn't agree on Phase II characteristics, so, energy rolled out the B90 as a combo using parts (I am probably remembering very wrong) the 83, and were arguing about the shape of the table for the AF 91. When the programs were shelved, I **think** there was a first production unit of the 90 in the pipeline, but the 91 never went anywhere past feasibility.

I think.

I don't know of any weapon systems after 91, at least not certified / design released.

... perhaps test articles? Very little gets out on those past associating code names with UGT test shots.

...the weaponeer intern program always designs 'something' each class, and allegedly, the complex is well under way on a next generation swiss army warhead right now, but that's something I have not indulged my unnnatural need to know on.  (shrugs)

Actually, I'm much younger than that. Back in the old days it was much easier to lie about your age and get away with it.  No one cared or checked.  I dropped out of 10th grade at 16, picked up a phony birth certificate and joined up.  Stuck around long enough to grab a commission and retired after 24 years.  I'm 82 now and living proof that Nukes, unlike some women, won't kill you if you sleep with them.

Such a neat thread, wish I could subscribe to it. Hope it doesn't get memory holed!

Tell us a story that has nukes in it!

Stopping nuclear smuggling at airports - Smithsonian

Figured alpha/beta particles weren't going to make it out of the case.


Thanks for answering my question back from page 1.

Canada. Milk comes in bags.

US Army. Sunshine comes in actual cans.

Good to know he had no problem sharing nuclear secrets.

Bump.
Cause I want to see where this goes...

Awesome

It is true. He was doing B-52 ecm and was a crew chief on a regular nuke alert aircraft. His actual plane is the one Bud Holland crashed. He flew with Bud in the instructor pilot seat for the prior airshow practice and had rotated out of being the crew chief when Bud augered the plane into the ground . He has a radiation exposure letter in his medical records that is the same type of letter given to guys who were at above ground nuke test and exposed outdoors to live nuke detonations.

I used to work with a USAF Col (Ret) at Boeing.  He described BH as a "massive POS".    

Ah! It continues to live.

Here are some more tidbits. A guy said in return for sending him data, he would make me one of the bags. He got the data, I never got the bag. Found some clips from the maintenance manual I sent him:
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My brothers story of riding with him 2 years prior at the practice for the previous airshow does not paint him in a kind light. He wanted only 55,000 pounds of fuel for the show so they flew for an hour burning fuel to get to 55,000 before he started the practice runs.  He was not well loved.

The museum in Albuquerque has a display of one.

Well the Soviet Union had similar atomic demo charges, and their inventory accountability is ... problematic, at best.

54 rebuilt into W72 for use in Walleye agm-62 guided bomb.

About
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How is this thread not rated EPIC!??!?!?!

This may be one of the greatest threads I have ever read on any forum.

Thank you, thank you, thank you to the ACTUAL nuclear weaponeers that are on here and sharing knowledge that I never, ever, would have gained were it not for you guys taking the time to educate those reading this thread!!!!!

I am humbled by the knowledge shown here, this is amazing.  Please keep this going!

Nope sorry.  564 is correct.   It was considerably heavier than 50 pounds.  

Maybe you actually carried one and can say otherwise.  I did and I’m pretty sure 564 did as well.

The empty circle, and the circle with the plus tells the end user if the lock secured cover is in the open or closed position, depending on where the lid rib is. There are supposed to be two shoelace circles in the top of the lid to help facilitating turning it.

The set of circles in the middle are a protective cover for the combo lock. The circle to the left is a window to observe conditions inside the rear body / control panel, and the one to the right allows the system to be armed and disarmed without removing the cover, assuming there has been a time dialed in.

The big sticker came from a few years back. (war story follows)

A nuclear weapons speculator who has since passed decided he wanted to know more, and as a result, went to a store, bought a digital recording borescope, and... went to all the museums with it.

I don't believe he was confronted. There were no signs saying, please do not disassemble the displays; they relied on DoD/DoE think about classified things; you're simply expected to not fuck with things that don't pertain to you.

Later, he published his findings, one being that what everyone thought up to that point about the Little Boy's gun assembly system was... visually ass backwards.

This set off a minor firestorm inside NNSA. They recalled every single weapon display in the country that wasn't badge protected. They allegedly said it was because they had concerns. What they were concerned about was that some of the displays still had classified contours inside them. Some could *potentially* be... for lack of a better term, be reloaded. Which is dumb as fuck, but, whatever.

Every display piece now has (_*should?) one of those reflective stickers on it, and it is a sign that the inside is either sanitized or otherwise has been inspected to the then-standards for release. (Plus, the holder has to sign a lease agreement that specifies additional security protocols.)

So you carried one?

No?

I did.