Large Aircraft Engine

[Joe L.]

Re: Large Aircraft Engine

John-----

The primary purpose of the B-36 (and, the ONLY reason for its existence) was to carry the Mark 17 and Mark 24 thermonuclear devices. These were the largest nuclear bombs ever manufactured by the US in terms of both physical size and explosive yield. These bombs were 24-1/2' long and 61-1/2" OD. They weighed about 21 TONS. The explosive yield was about 15-20 megatons. The B-36 could carry TWO of these things. No other aircraft in the US inventory, including the B-52, could carry even ONE.

Both the Mark 17 and Mark 24 were withdrawn from service by August, 1957. At that point, the B-36 was "instantly obsolete" and an "albatross".

[Clem Z.]

even rarer than a 67 L-88 tanker???? *NM*

[Chas Kingston]

Re: Large Aircraft Engine

About ten years ago, I was at the Russian city of Sarov, formerly the "secret City" of Arzamas-16, home of the Russian nuclear industry. In the museum there, I saw the Julius and Ethel Rosenberg copy of the Hiroshima bomb. I also saw a huge device that, as I vaguely remember, when teested, was several times more powerful than calculated, causing the loss af many of the Russian scientists.

[Joe L.]

Re: Large Aircraft Engine

Geezer-----

The largest Soviet thermonuclear device ever detonated was one in the 20+ megaton range. It was detonated in the late 50's-early 60's at Novya Zemalya in extreme north central Russia. I don't know if they ever had an operational nuclear weapon of this size, but they definitely did detonate the "test device". In general, Soviet thermonuclear nuclear devices tended to be considerably larger than US devices. That's because their missle delivery systems were less accurate than US systems in terms of CEP (circle error probable). So, they needed a larger device to ensure that they could "knock out" US missles in their silos (as part of the idiotic nuclear "war fighting" strategy subscribed to by both the US and the Soviets during the Cold War).

I did not realize that it was the Hiroshima bomb design (Mark I) that was the one leaked to the Soviets. The Hiroshima bomb was the simplest nuclear device that was ever made. It was never even tested for 2 reasons: (1) there was not enough of the "main ingredient" (HE U-235) for that type bomb to make more than 1 at the time, and (2) they knew that it would work. Only 5 were ultimately ever built and deployed. Obtaining the "active ingredient" for this type bomb is about 99% of the challenge in building one; not the design of the bomb, itself. Given the "active ingredient", almost anyone could build such a device.

Well, I think that I've gotten far enough away from Corvettes here.