Discuss the technical aspects of NK nuke.

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Lucky

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If it was a nuke, I'd like to read what people know about it. The entire thread rests upon the supposition that it was a nuclear device, and not a hoax.

Off the top of my head I'd like to ask if anyone can say what type of bomb it would have been, what material would have been used, and if the test was a success or failure?

Additionally, I've been contemplating what if they tested a SADM device, a small nuclear weapon designed to be delivered by humans.
 
The High Road does not like current event topics not expressly related to firearms.

Guns and only guns. Move along. Nothing to see here.

Take it to APS they say.
 
Guns and only guns. Move along. Nothing to see here.
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Wouldn't a nuke be a "Destructive Device" and in an awkward way, with no relation to the true meaning of a firearm, be a firearm by definition- much like a suppressor or certain Full Auto Conversion parts, or a reciever for that matter...
 
Perhaps a firearm or destructive device by our definitions... I doubt North Korea recognizes such drivel. The glorious leader heeds no law :evil:

There is some interesting stuff on nukes out there on wiki though.... that's where I would start my search... to learn the basic physics behind it first.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_weapon

From what I see, it basically comes down to how much material you can steal/procure/make. It's pretty easy to make a 'dirty' bomb... just take a bunch of plutonium or something radioactive and pack around it with High Explosives.... light it off and the resulting nastiness will kill a lot of people.. slowly... giving them time to think about your cause as they die.

I don't think a man-portable thermonuclear device is feasible by any means. Maybe during the cold war some believed it... but I doubt it. You can only put so much in a suitcase.

I dunno... lots of people here are smart and can probably explain the semantics. Despite what most people think, making a serious atomic weapon is difficult. Difficult for terrorists, not difficult for countries with existing infrastructure that has tight manufacturing tolerances. I think the main problem lies with making the explosives to actually detonate it. You have to make the non-critical mass critical, by compressing it... and it has to be done so fast and so correctly... which requires teh tecknology... I'm sure with more radioactive stuff you need less of a bang, but it's still difficult. Good (or bad) thing about nukes is that they get rid of that delivery accuracy factor... that and the scary fact they are so small and do so much damage.

Hopefully we can stay ahead of those turds. Hopefully. I don't see us actually stopping them from making anything.
 
Better discussed over at APS.

There's already a thread started, and current verification techniques are part of the discussion. ;)
 
The redeeming factor of The Armed Polite Society forum is that it is another Oleg Volk brain child and several of the Mods here at THR are Mods there as well.
 
Well, I guess one question to be asked first then, is whether it was a gun-type bomb or an implosion. If it was a gun-type, then what calibre is best for nukes?

Gewehr98 I don't see the other thread, I think it was closed when it stopped being technical. But if you can throw some wave-form diagrams up that would be appreciated.
 
The other thread is over at APS.

It wouldn't survive long here at THR, even if you said "gun-type" many times throughout the thread. :D
 
FTF said:
I don't think a man-portable thermonuclear device is feasible by any means. Maybe during the cold war some believed it... but I doubt it. You can only put so much in a suitcase.
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Maybe not a thermonuclear device, but I've seen nuclear devices that would easily fit in a suitcase. It would be a very heavy suitcase, though.:evil:
 
To address the original thread topic: I believe the yield was about one-fourth of the intended power.
SatCong
 
This thread is better suited to APS.

As for the North Korean nuclear bomb, I'll simply defer to Jeffery Lewis of Arms Control Wonk:

A plutonium device should produce a yield in the range of the 20 kilotons, like the one we dropped on Nagasaki. No one has ever dudded their first test of a simple fission device. North Korean nuclear scientists are now officially the worst ever.
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