[MLB-WIRELESS] US unveils chip-zapping 'lightning bomb' to tackle Saddam

Wed Jan 22 10:33:18 EST 2003

I am still waiting for them to invent the Flux Capacitor. Marty, 10.21
Gigawatts!

Toliman <toliman at ihug.com.au> on 22/01/2003 02:34:00 AM

 To:      melbwireless at wireless.org.au                        

 cc:      (bcc: Michael Florence/Sales/DLINK-AUST)            

 Subject: Re: [MLB-WIRELESS] US unveils chip-zapping          
          'lightning bomb' to  tackle Saddam                  

At 10:19 PM 21/01/2003, Barry wrote:
>And I thought a microwave bomb was feeding rik a couple of large tins of
>baked
>beans. Oh well.
>- Barry
>
>US unveils chip-zapping 'lightning bomb' to tackle Saddam
>By John Leyden <mailto:john.leyden at theregister.co.uk>
>Posted: 21/01/2003 at 10:26 GMT
>Remember the neutron bomb, the radiation-rich atomic weapon of the 1980s
>designed to kill people while leaving buildings intact?
>
>Well now we have a weapon suited for 21st century war - designed to fry
>electronics while leaving people, mostly, unharmed. Allegedly.
>
>High-Power microwave bombs are "man-made lightning bolts crammed into cruise
>missiles", Time (somewhat breathlessly describing the bomb as potentially the
>next "wonder weapon") reports
><http://www.time.com/time/covers/1101030127/nmicro.html>.
>
>More at http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/54/28942.html

my fear with this kind of munition, is how close you want to be to the
impact/blast zone when the EMP/HPM-P goes off. regular military built
circuitry is unreliable in the field when it's been designed and
battle-hardened by army-engineers, but if a tank, radio or a friendly
platoon is in the blast zone, it might effect them, and not effect the
equipment inside the concrete/steel mesh and toughened bunker defenses.

but it did remind me of "e-bombs".... from 6 months ago, a strange article
popped up... which seemed familiar
http://english.pravda.ru/world/2002/08/27/35356.html

I do know that the US Mil has some "wonder" weapons, such as the
"soft-bombs" that can kill large turbines and switching relays they use in
power plants, by flooding the air surrounding the interior with micro-thin
pieces of graphite which create large amounts of static and disperse static
fields, arcing transformers and relays, which can then burn out the
turbines. its called a graphite-bomb, "soft-bomb", blackout-bomb or G-bomb.
and... here's the specs.
http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/dumb/blu-114.htm

and this one....
http://popularmechanics.com/science/military/2001/9/e-bomb/

This extract from Popular Mechanics was intriguing, they even tell you how
to build your own microwave bomb, with no intricate wiring or actual oven
parts needed: A Poor Man's E-Bomb. What makes this one interesting is that
it can be set like a firework...

"An FCG (Flux Compression Generator) is an astoundingly simple weapon. It
consists of an explosives-packed tube placed inside a slightly larger
copper coil. The instant before the chemical explosive is detonated, the
coil is energized by a bank of capacitors, creating a magnetic field. The
explosive charge detonates from the rear forward. As the tube flares
outward it touches the edge of the coil, thereby creating a moving short
circuit. "The propagating short has the effect of compressing the magnetic
field while reducing the inductance of the stator [coil]," says Kopp. "The
result is that FCGs will produce a ramping current pulse, which breaks
before the final disintegration of the device. Published results suggest
ramp times of tens of hundreds of microseconds and peak currents of tens of
millions of amps." The pulse that emerges makes a lightning bolt seem like
a flashbulb by comparison."

Toliman

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