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Jumbo was the code name for the 214-ton Thermos shaped steel and concrete container designed to hold the precious plutonium core of the Trinity device in case of a nuclear mis-fire. Built by the Babcock and Wilcox Company of Barberton, Ohio, Jumbo was 28 feet long, 12 feet, 8 inches in diameter, and with steel walls up to 16 inches thick.
Kent Pickering, who had been talking with his experts at a table apart, returned. "We've set up a program, general," he said. "It's going to be a lot harder than I'd anticipated. None of us seem to know exactly what we have to do in building one of those things. You see, the uranium or plutonium fission-bomb's been obsolete for over four hundred years.
Rip added it to the front of the plutonium wedge, along with a piece of beryllium from the bomb, and Kemp welded it in place. They put the thorium block which contained the plutonium into the hole, the plutonium facing outward. Trudeau rammed it to the bottom with his pole. The neutron source, the neutron reflector, and one piece of fissionable material were in place.
No cruiser could survive an atomic explosion within five hundred yards, and the Connie would have to get closer to the nuclear charge than that. Dominico reported that the bomb had been dismantled. Rip went to it and examined the raw plutonium, being careful to keep the pieces widely separated. This particular bomb design used five pieces of plutonium which were driven together to form a ball.
Beside their primary purpose of plutonium production, they furnished heat for the sea-water distillation and chemical extraction system, processing the water that was run through the steam boilers at the main power reactors, condensed, redistilled, and finally pumped, pure, into the water mains of New York.
But no one had taught him how to make two bombs out of one. The theory behind this particular bomb design was simple. Two or more correctly sized pieces of plutonium or uranium isotope, when brought together, formed what was known as a critical mass, which would fission. The fissioning released energy and produced the explosion. But there was a wide gap between theory and practice.
"As soon as Orgzild would hear about the possibility of making a plutonium bomb, he'd set up an A-bomb project, and don't think of it in terms of the old First Century Manhattan Project. There would be no problem of producing fissionables we've been scattering refined plutonium over this planet like confetti."
The old A-bomb was an historical curiosity, and there was nobody on Ullr who had more than a layman's knowledge of the intricate technology of modern nuclear weapons. There were plenty of good nuclear-power engineers on Gongonk Island, but how long would it take them to design and build a plutonium bomb? "... Gorkrink also has a good understanding of Lingua Terra," Paula was saying. "He and Dr.
We could charge our own prices for it, and we wouldn't need to tell them what gadolinium sells for on the Sword-Worlds." "We could, if we could do business with anybody there, after what we did to Eglonsby and Stolgoland. Where would we get plutonium?" "Why do you think the Beowulfers don't have hyperships, when they have everything else?" Harkaman snapped his fingers. "By Satan, that's it!"
First, two or more pieces of plutonium large enough to form a critical mass. Second, a neutron source—some material with the type of radioactivity that produced neutrons—to start the reaction. Third, some kind of neutron reflector. And fourth, explosive to drive the pieces together. Did they have all those items? He checked them off.
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