Hi Dale –
Interesting Post.
Just so I understand, you are a
non-commissioned officer in the Army reserves and you have to report to your
commander that you participate in a web page dedicated to discussing submarines
for personal use, and one of the members commented that it is “disturbingly
simple” to make a reactor.
Am I to understand correctly that in your
opinion ( and by inference, that of the Army), you now
have to report Nero’s comment to your C.O.?
If this is the case, then two comments. 1> I join Nero in commenting that
yes, given the amount of literature available in our public libraries and on
the internet, It would be relatively easy to build a
reactor in theory. And 2> As a
republican voting, flag flying, NRA member, eagle scout – I think that
your feeling a need to report these statements and your C.O.’s pretense
to care would be a waste of our militaries time in a period
when resources are limited enough, not to mention making me a little
uncomfortable about infringements on our first amendment right to free speech and
assembly (i.e. Virtual assembly).
I hope that I misunderstood your comments.
For the record, The
only person I ever have to report to is my wife, who is convinced that the
fiberglass hull in the garage will someday become a stylish flower planted. I show her pictures of Carsten’s
sub when she complains that it is hard for her to get her car in the garage next
to the sub hull. Thanks Carsten!
Best wishes for a New Year to all.
Greg Snyder
-----Original Message-----
From:
owner-personal_submersibles@psubs.org
[mailto:owner-personal_submersibles@psubs.org] On Behalf Of Dale A. Raby
Sent: Sunday, January 05, 2003
3:56 PM
To: PSUBS.org mailing list
Subject: Re: [PSUBS-MAILIST]
nuclear psub?
Hey, now.... wouldn't that be cool. The reactors
on board some of those old space probes launched in the sixties are still
producing current from their thermocouples in atomic piles... tiny ones at
that...after all these years.
Here's the problem... such little reactors generally use weapons grade reaction
mass... and even when they don't they are still carefully controlled by various
government agencies. There is radiation shielding and all the danger from not
containing the reaction properly.
Then there is the problem with people like Saddam wanting to grab your sub for
a source of fissionable material... oh, and did I mention this? I am a US
Army Reserve NCO, and bound to report such things to my commander... though I
suspect he'd get a good laugh out of this one.
I find it interesting though that in the 40 odd years since the Nautilus, that
there are still military submersibles being made with diesel/electric
propulsion. Economies of scale, I'd guess.
On Sun, 2003-01-05 at 14:59, Nero Wolfe wrote:
I was at the University of Chicago today and i saw the monument to
enrico firmi's CP-1. Chicago Pile 1 was a big pile of graphite and
unenriched uranium... Litterally a pile. This got me
thinking... A reactor is disturbingly simple. I think you
know where I'm going on this.... The technology is simpler than cartsens
boat...
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