Why is that. Are we talking about normal old Heavy Water or Soft Water?
New evidence of a german nuclear weapon project?
- Thread starter delcyros
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- #62
delcyros
Tech Sergeant
Norsk Hydro produced heavy water, chemical known as D2O. It was a moderator for the Uranium projects.
I disagree that Heisenberg was involved in the later part of the nazi nuclear weapon program. He was the keyperson for the Uranmaschienenprogram (ractor project) but surely not involved in the later parts of the weapon project. He excluded himself at the nuclear research symposium at 26th of february 1942, when he was asked by Erhard Milch if he could succesfully build a nuclear weapon ("a weapon of decisive effect on this war"). He answered: "no". From that moment on the HWA cutted the money for the nuclear weapon project, Heisenberg worked for the KWI only (in order to build a Wärmekraftmaschiene=nuclear power plant). Gerlach and Diebner kept on to work on a nuke later (and they excluded Heisenberg because of many reasons) even with the help of the SS. Heisenberg made mistestimations, yes. Gerlach and Diebner on the other side went after the Ohrdruf test to Berlin by plane (they informed Goebbels and Hitler), at a time at which even generals had to go by foot (thanks to general fuel shortness). Farm Hall is interesting, but look at the protokolls: Diebner refused any comments on the Hieroshima nuke. Hahn asked Heisenberg why he is saying that you need tons of Plutonium and why Heisenberg sooner in the war told him that you anly need 10-50 Kg! This indicates that Heisenberg has changed his math in Farm Hall. Ther was no miscalculation in Heisenbergs maths! Heisenbergs letters are also very misreadable. But there is no hint in them for a coworking with the HWA, with Diebner (maybe except for reactor related questions), with v. Ardenne or with Schuhmann and Trinks or Bagge. There are only very general aspects of a nuke (like the use of Element 94=Plutonium for a bomb). I see no proof for a claim that Heisenberg was the keyperson of the nuclear WEAPON-project.
I disagree that Heisenberg was involved in the later part of the nazi nuclear weapon program. He was the keyperson for the Uranmaschienenprogram (ractor project) but surely not involved in the later parts of the weapon project. He excluded himself at the nuclear research symposium at 26th of february 1942, when he was asked by Erhard Milch if he could succesfully build a nuclear weapon ("a weapon of decisive effect on this war"). He answered: "no". From that moment on the HWA cutted the money for the nuclear weapon project, Heisenberg worked for the KWI only (in order to build a Wärmekraftmaschiene=nuclear power plant). Gerlach and Diebner kept on to work on a nuke later (and they excluded Heisenberg because of many reasons) even with the help of the SS. Heisenberg made mistestimations, yes. Gerlach and Diebner on the other side went after the Ohrdruf test to Berlin by plane (they informed Goebbels and Hitler), at a time at which even generals had to go by foot (thanks to general fuel shortness). Farm Hall is interesting, but look at the protokolls: Diebner refused any comments on the Hieroshima nuke. Hahn asked Heisenberg why he is saying that you need tons of Plutonium and why Heisenberg sooner in the war told him that you anly need 10-50 Kg! This indicates that Heisenberg has changed his math in Farm Hall. Ther was no miscalculation in Heisenbergs maths! Heisenbergs letters are also very misreadable. But there is no hint in them for a coworking with the HWA, with Diebner (maybe except for reactor related questions), with v. Ardenne or with Schuhmann and Trinks or Bagge. There are only very general aspects of a nuke (like the use of Element 94=Plutonium for a bomb). I see no proof for a claim that Heisenberg was the keyperson of the nuclear WEAPON-project.
Okay that is what I thought, I did not actually think we were talking about Heavy and Soft water.
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- #64
delcyros
Tech Sergeant
The main question belongs to the fissionable material. How much was produced by the MSA Auer-Gesellschaft? I will try to find as much material as is known. Maybe we can get a number of tons Uranium. How many tons were avaiable for Heisenberg, how many could be gone to Diebner? I will start with the soviet sources: They have taken around 7 tons of metallic (in plates or cubic) Uranium into the SU. At Stadtilm were another 3.5 tons storaged (and brought to bavaria/austria in the colsing weeks of ww2). Heisenberg had 3-4 tons of metallic Uranium for his reactor try at Haigerloch. I don´t know how much was taken by the french, US and british, but it can be found.
I will see what I can find, but for now it is bed time.
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- #66
delcyros
Tech Sergeant
Anything found? I can add some 0,4 tons of 10 % enriched Uranium and 3,5 tons of Uranium ore, found by the french in mid 1945 at different sites at the Saar valley. I would really like to see what was found by the british and US troops.
To be honest I forgot to even check. Will have to get back to that.
evangilder
"Shooter"
Interesting article from the BBC about the German nuke program:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4598955.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4598955.stm
I am trying to see what I can find out about the stuff found in Stuttgart. I dont think any radioactive stuff was found but there was deffinatly a project going on there.
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- #70
delcyros
Tech Sergeant
Would be fine to know.
Well from what I have found is that south of Stuttgart there was some program that was discovered by the French when they occupied the city and its surrounding areas.
The area south of Stuttgart they are talking about is Haigerloch and Hechingen. The first one in a cave under a church and the second in a Textile Mill. I am going to see if I can find some more info on this particular site and see if it still exists today.
The area south of Stuttgart they are talking about is Haigerloch and Hechingen. The first one in a cave under a church and the second in a Textile Mill. I am going to see if I can find some more info on this particular site and see if it still exists today.
Kiwikid
Airman 1st Class
Anonymous wrote previously:
I have done considerable research on the nazi nuclear projects of which there were three or possibly four if you count two related ones as separate.
The Nazis did know of Plutonium as far back as 1939 when Professor Josef Schintlemeister advocated making an A-bomb from Plutonium. The germans however called it Eka Rhenium (super Rhenium), because it most closely resembled the properties of Rhenium.
Dr Fritz Houtermanns persuaded hitler to fund a project to develop the Plutonium A-bomb but this was dependant upon Heisenberg's efforts to create a sustained chain reaction (nuclear breeder reactor) from which to harvest Plutonium.
Houtermanns figured out the six step process of precipitation and hydration to chemically separated Plutonium from uranium waste during the war.
After the war considerable Uranium, Thorium, and Cobolt was dug up from Nazi caches in Bavaria and traded on the black market.
In 1939 Nazis were the world leaders in nuclear physics and in fact the Manhatten Project would not have succeeded without recruiting German Jewish scientists.
I have done considerable research on the nazi nuclear projects of which there were three or possibly four if you count two related ones as separate.
The Nazis did know of Plutonium as far back as 1939 when Professor Josef Schintlemeister advocated making an A-bomb from Plutonium. The germans however called it Eka Rhenium (super Rhenium), because it most closely resembled the properties of Rhenium.
Dr Fritz Houtermanns persuaded hitler to fund a project to develop the Plutonium A-bomb but this was dependant upon Heisenberg's efforts to create a sustained chain reaction (nuclear breeder reactor) from which to harvest Plutonium.
Houtermanns figured out the six step process of precipitation and hydration to chemically separated Plutonium from uranium waste during the war.
After the war considerable Uranium, Thorium, and Cobolt was dug up from Nazi caches in Bavaria and traded on the black market.
In 1939 Nazis were the world leaders in nuclear physics and in fact the Manhatten Project would not have succeeded without recruiting German Jewish scientists.
Kiwikid
Airman 1st Class
The site is a public museum today. It was carefully dismantled and not destroyed. One reactor was called the Leipzig IV experiment and this overheated causing a massive steam explosion.
(NOTE: I am citing from memory only and it may have been the Gattow III or IV reactor which exploded - sorry)
Actually this exposes Heisenberg's denial that he was involved with an A-bomb project as a lie. The Heereswaffenamt team working on the nazi A-bomb was based at Dahlem which I gather is a suburb of Leipzig.
Heisenberg was trying to create a fast breeder to provide Plutonium for work at Leipzig on the Plutonium A-bomb.
Kiwikid
Airman 1st Class
The supply of heavy water from the Norsk Hydro plant at Vermork, Norway was not the only source of Heavy water to germany through the war. There was also a large stockpile of heavy water available from the beck plant in Germany.
The development of a successful nuclear reactor for Germany in WW2 was not limited as far as I can tell by limited supply of either heavy water, nor uranium.
Germany was exporting tons of uranium-oxide by U-boat to Japan in 1944 on boats like U-219, U195, U-180 and some of the UIT boats. Some Japanese I-boats collected Czech uranium from Lorient and sailed back to Japan too, like I-30. I-52 which was sunk before reaching Lorient was expecting to collect 800kg of Uranium oxide for Japan.
What limited developing nuclear reactors was a failure of thinking. It is truely a shame for Germany that the Jewish scientists were so despised and rejected.
Fermi was of course the man who solved it for USA.
Reactors were the road to a Plutonium A-bomb. Uranium enrichment was the route to a Uranium A-bomb.
My belief is that Nazi Germany could have enriched sufficient Uranium by March 1945 for an -bomb but by that time all was in ruins from bombing.
Also the British had various spies in Norway, Denmark, Germany and france leaking information to project Epsilon in Stockholm. The British knew where the uranium enrichment facilities were located and bombed them before any significant U235 production.
They had massive banks of centrifuges at some locations and scale was not the problem by late 1944... Allied bombing was.
Uranium enrichment under Harteck was known by the codename Volmer's Furniture factory at Freiberg and the Angora farm at Kitzbuhel ( think it was) in Austria. There was an early laboratory at Hamburg and after that was bombed there was a Uranium enrichment facility at Kummersdorf too.
The development of a successful nuclear reactor for Germany in WW2 was not limited as far as I can tell by limited supply of either heavy water, nor uranium.
Germany was exporting tons of uranium-oxide by U-boat to Japan in 1944 on boats like U-219, U195, U-180 and some of the UIT boats. Some Japanese I-boats collected Czech uranium from Lorient and sailed back to Japan too, like I-30. I-52 which was sunk before reaching Lorient was expecting to collect 800kg of Uranium oxide for Japan.
What limited developing nuclear reactors was a failure of thinking. It is truely a shame for Germany that the Jewish scientists were so despised and rejected.
Fermi was of course the man who solved it for USA.
Reactors were the road to a Plutonium A-bomb. Uranium enrichment was the route to a Uranium A-bomb.
My belief is that Nazi Germany could have enriched sufficient Uranium by March 1945 for an -bomb but by that time all was in ruins from bombing.
Also the British had various spies in Norway, Denmark, Germany and france leaking information to project Epsilon in Stockholm. The British knew where the uranium enrichment facilities were located and bombed them before any significant U235 production.
They had massive banks of centrifuges at some locations and scale was not the problem by late 1944... Allied bombing was.
Uranium enrichment under Harteck was known by the codename Volmer's Furniture factory at Freiberg and the Angora farm at Kitzbuhel ( think it was) in Austria. There was an early laboratory at Hamburg and after that was bombed there was a Uranium enrichment facility at Kummersdorf too.
The one near Stuttgart is not a museum. I am from Stuttgart and it is not on public display.
- Thread starter
- #76
delcyros
Tech Sergeant
..but it has a promoting shield if You drive the Autobahn (Haigerloch)...
Hmm I have not seen it. But then again I have not actually lived in Stuttgart for many many years. I only go to Stuttgart every few weeks to visit and then my time is filled with visiting relatives that I dont go and see anything.
sebastiandarre
Recruit
hello guys,new here! and new with the posting thing.
I wonna ask each one of you one question:
u have the bomb,in its two samples "canon gun" and "implosion"
trinity was after german surrender, teh guy of the book "winderwaffe"states and the electronic necesary to detonate all tnt at the same time was retrieved from the german with the U234 sub. was invented by some Von Ardene.
ok trinity worked,fine u can justify millions spent on the project.
and now u will drop a state of the art weapon with so million spent on it witjout testing?"remember there were no "canon style test" into an enemy city with scientists able to reverse all mechanism and with good aknowledge about atomic science? u could dropped fat man first for sure,will work, but little boy? why u r so sure it will work.
before saying what everybodys states here "was simple maths" they were quite sure" REMEMBER AT THAT TIME NOTHING WAS 100% SURE THATS WHY TRINITY EXISTED.
IT COULD BE A LIE ABOUT THE GERMAN TESTINGS BUT THERE IS A VERY STRANGE THING WITH ALL THIS.
CHEARS!
I wonna ask each one of you one question:
u have the bomb,in its two samples "canon gun" and "implosion"
trinity was after german surrender, teh guy of the book "winderwaffe"states and the electronic necesary to detonate all tnt at the same time was retrieved from the german with the U234 sub. was invented by some Von Ardene.
ok trinity worked,fine u can justify millions spent on the project.
and now u will drop a state of the art weapon with so million spent on it witjout testing?"remember there were no "canon style test" into an enemy city with scientists able to reverse all mechanism and with good aknowledge about atomic science? u could dropped fat man first for sure,will work, but little boy? why u r so sure it will work.
before saying what everybodys states here "was simple maths" they were quite sure" REMEMBER AT THAT TIME NOTHING WAS 100% SURE THATS WHY TRINITY EXISTED.
IT COULD BE A LIE ABOUT THE GERMAN TESTINGS BUT THERE IS A VERY STRANGE THING WITH ALL THIS.
CHEARS!
Propellorhead
Airman 1st Class
It's often claimed that because Heisenberg did not understand the critical mass required for nuclear explosion that therefore the Germans could not build the bomb however Dutch Nuclear Physicist Dr Fritz Houtermanns who worked on the nazi atomic Bomb project did in fact publish the crittical mass required in a German scientific paper in 1941. He proposed developing a pile for breeding Plutonium.
A plutonium bomb not only required a successful nuclear pile but also three years operation and two years to cool the spent fuel before Plutonium could be used so it meant 5-6 years of delay to achieve the bomb.
Othe Nazi scientists Dr Paul Harteck and Prof Kurt Diebner in conjunction with Dr Wilhem Groth and Dr erich Bagge followed a far simpler path to the bomb of enriching Uranium hexafluoride to 90% U235.
Indeed a Kiel firm Anschütz Co built ten mark III-B ultracentrifuges at a factory in Freiberg before it was bombed on 27 Novemeber 1944. Groth had calculated in december 1941 that the output of one centrifuge was such that one centrifuge working alone could enrich enough U235 for a bomb in 9 months, however ten ultracentrifuges working in unison could enrich the same material to HEU in less than a month.
By October 1944 nuclear scientist Dr Wilhelm Groth advised Goering's private secretary in a preface to a report that the technical issues of enriching Uranium were overcome and production of U235 was in hand.
Thus what you can take from this is that by November 1944 Germany had the material and the means to build at least 3-4 Uranium A-bombs without the need for a working nuclear reactor or Plutonium.
Next big question is why didn't they?
A plutonium bomb not only required a successful nuclear pile but also three years operation and two years to cool the spent fuel before Plutonium could be used so it meant 5-6 years of delay to achieve the bomb.
Othe Nazi scientists Dr Paul Harteck and Prof Kurt Diebner in conjunction with Dr Wilhem Groth and Dr erich Bagge followed a far simpler path to the bomb of enriching Uranium hexafluoride to 90% U235.
Indeed a Kiel firm Anschütz Co built ten mark III-B ultracentrifuges at a factory in Freiberg before it was bombed on 27 Novemeber 1944. Groth had calculated in december 1941 that the output of one centrifuge was such that one centrifuge working alone could enrich enough U235 for a bomb in 9 months, however ten ultracentrifuges working in unison could enrich the same material to HEU in less than a month.
By October 1944 nuclear scientist Dr Wilhelm Groth advised Goering's private secretary in a preface to a report that the technical issues of enriching Uranium were overcome and production of U235 was in hand.
Thus what you can take from this is that by November 1944 Germany had the material and the means to build at least 3-4 Uranium A-bombs without the need for a working nuclear reactor or Plutonium.
Next big question is why didn't they?
