Robin primary

The Robin was the common design nuclear fission bomb core for several Cold War designs for American nuclear and thermonuclear weapons, according to researcher Chuck Hansen. [ [http://web.archive.org/web/20050525064436/http://www.thebulletin.org/article.php?art_ofn=ma01hansen Beware the old story] by Chuck Hansen, "Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists", March/April 2001 pp. 52-55 (vol. 57, no. 02)] [ [http://docs.nrdc.org/nuclear/nuc_02019401a_121.pdf United States Nuclear Tests July 1945 to 31 December 1992] , NRDC NWD 94-1, Robert Standish Norris and Thomas B. Cochran, accessed Dec 11, 2007 ]

Primary is the technical term for the fission bomb component of a thermonuclear or fusion bomb, which is used to start the reactions going and implode and detonate the second, fusion stage.

The Robin design was used as the W45 nuclear and as the primary in the W38 and W47 thermonuclear weapons. [ [http://www.designation-systems.net/usmilav/nuke.html Designations Of U.S. Nuclear Weapons] , Andreas Parsch, 2005, accessed Dec 11, 2007]

It has been associated with the W48 nuclear warhead, but this is probably an error.

History

The Robin is apparently a weaponized version of the Swan primary first tested on June 26, 1956, in shot Redwing Inca at the Entewetak island test site. It was tested again as a primary for a test thermonuclear device in Redwing Mohawk on July 2, 1956. Both tests were complete successes.

Design features

The Swan device and Robin primary are apparently the first examples of two-point air-gap lens implosion nuclear weapon designs tested by the United States.

The Swan device weighed 105 lb (47.6 kg) and was cylindrical in shape, 11.6 inches (29.5 cm) in diameter and 22.8 inches (58 cm) long. The above schematic illustrates what were probably its essential features.

References

See also

* List of nuclear weapons
* Teller-Ulam design
* Python primary
* Tsetse primary