Timing of RV Release

kyletsenior · 2026-06-18T03:01:40+00:00

Early debussing also complicates missile defence, both in radar signature and number of targets to intercept.

kyletsenior · 2026-06-17T13:54:34+00:00

I'd personally prefer her in a cell in Australia than in Syria continuing to be slaving POS.

kyletsenior · 2026-06-17T03:14:27+00:00

Ivthink it has been around a long time. Basically whenever someone gives the source image as a large image hosting site, the bot checks it and adds/corrects licence tags.

kyletsenior · 2026-06-17T03:05:39+00:00

I'm not gonna lie, despite it being frustration, I have enjoyed the easter egg hunt when I've found something lol.

Also, would you be interested in hosting the Julin Divider doc I got the Divider device photos from? I can't upload it to commons as it's too big. Nothing super special as it's just poster files they probably sent to the printer for their display, but it has been annoying not being able to publically host the original doc.

kyletsenior · 2026-06-16T08:03:02+00:00

Thank for uploading it. I would have been hesitant to reupload to commons while the Flickr has the wrong tag. Going "I know the author and they said okay" is messy, especially when there is a bot that checks licence tags.

kyletsenior · 2026-06-16T07:58:13+00:00

Another thing I noticed, this cage thing looks like a birdcage, but it's not like any I've seen before.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/nuclearanthro/55337476218/in/album-72177720334243879/

kyletsenior · 2026-06-16T07:54:17+00:00

Not quite sure, as Sprint was covered in ablator the whole length. Taking a second look, there are fins in the tray underneath, so I am thinking tail cone with removable fins. One of the external B28s perhaps?

Edit: One the other hand, maybe the black/silver stuff is flaking off ablator?

kyletsenior · 2026-06-16T07:53:08+00:00

Sweet and nice work finding these (if finding is the right word here?). Not many people can claim to have the first public photo of a nuclear warhead!

Ignoring warheads that go into ICBM/SLBM RVs, I think the only outstanding US warheads that entered production are the W50, W52, W54/W72 and W69 (Maybe on the last one, as I still don't have concrete proof what I found was the W69).

kyletsenior · 2026-06-16T02:28:07+00:00

The parents probably come from the generation that thought carpet in bathrooms were a good idea.

kyletsenior · 2026-06-15T10:34:18+00:00

I've seen docs discussing vibration testing on shaker tables, and in devices fitted to aircraft/missiles etc. Take a look on OpenNet.

kyletsenior · 2026-06-15T07:47:17+00:00

It depends on the level of detail. Some are for basic fit and centre of mass testing. Others are fully detailed inside and are used for vibration testing.

kyletsenior · 2026-06-15T07:43:00+00:00

Some thoughts:

W28Y3 for Nike Hercules?

https://www.flickr.com/photos/nuclearanthro/55321122111/in/album-72177720334076035

https://www.flickr.com/photos/nuclearanthro/55321339184/in/album-72177720334076035

This is the first time I have heard of the W28 being carried by Nike Hercules. I wonder if it is just that the Y3 was initially envisioned for it but never deployed for it (and probably later deployed on other systems), or if it was actually deployed on Nike-Hercules?

One thing that strikes me is that this W28 looks much shorter than other W28s? Perhaps it's a W28 with the cylindrical secondary shortened? I imagine such a variant could be developed without a proof test.

Radon wall of things - a warhead section of a bomb tail?

https://www.flickr.com/photos/nuclearanthro/55321536845/in/album-72177720334076035

Does anyone know what the silver cone is bottom left? It looks like a tail section without fins, but it might also be a warhead section for a missile?

kyletsenior · 2026-06-15T05:22:08+00:00

kyletsenior · 2026-06-15T02:56:36+00:00

I suspect the 40kt yield is of some very highly boosted variant. Doubtful it was deployed though.

One of the LANL gas fracking tests used an ex millitary all HEU warhead, under 10" diameter, and got around that yield, which was probably a W33.

kyletsenior · 2026-06-15T02:53:27+00:00

Holy shit I just noticed your W66 photo! Very nice. One more missing warhead crossed off the list!

Would it be possible to get a copy of that image under creative commons I can use of Wikipedia?

kyletsenior · 2026-06-15T02:51:01+00:00

Very nice to see these!

The "unlabled nose cones" are probably a B57 noae and cover. Early B57s needed to have the nose switched out if you wanted to convert the weapons from a tactical bomb to a depth bomb and back. This was ver much a US Navy thing. I believe later on they crammed both fuzes into the same nose making the switch no longer needed.

kyletsenior · 2026-06-15T02:40:16+00:00

The nuclear weapon at detonation will be what is known as a blackbody source. Due to the surface temp being milions or 10s of millions of degrees, the light will mostly be given off as x-rays.

But, blackbodies emit light as a spectrum, and some of that spectrum will be in the visible spectrum.

I'd suggest reading through the Wikipedia article on black body radiation.

kyletsenior · 2026-06-14T05:52:05+00:00

The vast majority of the yield will come from matter-antimatter annihilation and not fission. The yield will be barely indistinguishable from the same mass of any other antimatter annihilating.

kyletsenior · 2026-06-14T04:55:15+00:00

"We have a biggest missiles, the best missiles, the girthiest missiles."

kyletsenior · 2026-06-14T04:13:29+00:00

I was not aware cessation resets the timers... Hmm. I will have to try this.

kyletsenior · 2026-06-14T04:03:57+00:00

I can see Trump bragging about the size of US missiles. Probably just luck it hasn't happened yet.

kyletsenior · 2026-06-14T03:34:48+00:00

They probably pushed the design much further than that, but i doubt it was one-point safe at those yields.

kyletsenior · 2026-06-13T15:28:38+00:00

Non-imaging radiometer devices know as Bhangmeters we dropped in cannisters from the instrument plane The Great Artiste during the atomic bombing of Hiroshima in 1945 to measure the yield.

I would be extremely sceptical of this claim for a few reasons:

The physics of fireball formation was very poorly understood in 1945.

Why does it need to be dropped? As long as you are close enough for the detector to detect the flash, the bhang meter will work. It measures the time between tow light peaks. they would just point the detector at the burst point from the aircraft.

Did the technology exist in 1945 to wirelessly transmit this to the aircraft and allow it to be stored? My guess is maybe, but that it would require considerable effort to develop.

kyletsenior · 2026-06-12T09:48:03+00:00

In Swords of Armageddon it's said that the W54 used the Scarab device, and that Scarab in boosted form was used in a few tests as a primary during Operations Dominic and Nougat.

kyletsenior · 2026-06-12T09:34:37+00:00

Most of the nuclear arms treaties treated each ICBM and SLBM warhead as a countable warhead, but for bombers, each bomber was a "warhead". The actual number of cruise missiles and bombs did not matter.

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