Things you always wanted to know the answer to [Vol. 3]

[227bhp]

Hugo a Gogo said:

227bhp said:

Hugo a Gogo said:

also UK had roughly 20% of the bombs dropped that Germany got in the end,

Say what?

yeah, that doesn't make much sense

amount of bombs dropped on UK vs dropped on Germany

UK number is 20% of German number

so there are less in Britain, that was my point, hence stuff from WW2 exploding nowadays would occur less often

So if we dropped 100 bombs on them, they would have dropped 20 on us?
Maybe our bombs were made better too which is why they still work....

I can think of someone who would have done the job with me, sadly he's no longer with us.

[Hugo a Gogo]

equally concentrated on the Rhein/Ruhr, Berlin, a few other big cities I'd say

although they did spread it around a bit towards the end, out of fairness

[Hugo a Gogo]

227bhp said:

So if we dropped 100 bombs on them, they would have dropped 20 on us?
Maybe our bombs were made better too which is why they still work....

I can think of someone who would have done the job with me, sadly he's no longer with us.

US and UK were still increasing bombing up into 1945, Jerry couldn't hope to keep up after the main Blitz

I think they were pretty much designed to blow up at the time though, I wouldn't consider them still working now is a particular boast

[mrtwisty]

Shakermaker said:

mrtwisty said:

Why is there a 130 page thread about one film? (Prometheus)

Because you are only viewing the forum in standard 20-post per page mode. Its only about 72 pages in 40-post mode.

Still seems like rather a lot of discussion for one film? Is there something else going on in there?

[Jimmy Recard]

StevieBee said:

Has anyone in the history of the world ever had a USB stick damaged because they did not eject it properly?

I've got a USB hard drive that has never worked since I did just that. And I've tried every solution I can find. If anyone wants to have it to try, you're welcome. One terabyte Hitachi

[Shakermaker]

mrtwisty said:

Shakermaker said:

mrtwisty said:

Why is there a 130 page thread about one film? (Prometheus)

Because you are only viewing the forum in standard 20-post per page mode. Its only about 72 pages in 40-post mode.

Still seems like rather a lot of discussion for one film? Is there something else going on in there?

No idea, I haven't read the thread or watched the film.

Maybe its a "keys in a bowl" type thread?

[Dr Jekyll]

Has a military unit under friendly fire and knowing it was friendly fire ever fired back anyway out of self preservation or just frustration?

[227bhp]

Hugo a Gogo said:

US and UK were still increasing bombing up into 1945, Jerry couldn't hope to keep up after the main Blitz

I think they were pretty much designed to blow up at the time though, I wouldn't consider them still working now is a particular boast

There is your next question then What percentage of British bombs compared to German ones didn't explode on impact or when they were supposed to?

[Hugo a Gogo]

hang on, I'll get right on that

ok, I have the answer, negligible difference, margin of error and all that

[Balmoral]

Isn't it the case that unexploded WWII bombs don't explode anyway? The bomb disposal people come along and blow them up, but the resulting explosion is only the explosives that the bomb disposal team use to blow the unexploded bomb up with, the unexploded bomb itself still doesn't blow up, it just gets blown up.

[Hugo a Gogo]

yeah, but they do that (sometimes) because it could blow up properly

[guindilias]

Same as the way they carry out "controlled explosions" on terrorist car-bombs, etc. - the idea is to blow the bomb apart, so it cannot explode itself, rather than to set it off from a safe distance.

[SpeckledJim]

There's that shipwreck in the Thames which theoretically could take out a big portion of South Essex and North Kent if it ever exploded.

[spitfire-ian]

SpeckledJim said:

There's that shipwreck in the Thames which theoretically could take out a big portion of South Essex and North Kent if it ever exploded.

SS Richard Montgomery https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Richard_Montgomer...

[popeyewhite]

mrtwisty said:

Still seems like rather a lot of discussion for one film? Is there something else going on in there?

Huge amount of geekery with posters discussing glaring faults in every Alien franchise science fiction movie.

[matchmaker]

Balmoral said:

Isn't it the case that unexploded WWII bombs don't explode anyway? The bomb disposal people come along and blow them up, but the resulting explosion is only the explosives that the bomb disposal team use to blow the unexploded bomb up with, the unexploded bomb itself still doesn't blow up, it just gets blown up.

E-mailed to me yesterday for use on a construction site about to start - "Explosives Safety & Awareness Briefing". It's 32 pages long. A 50kg bomb would cause serious injury even 70m away. The minimum safe distance from a 500kg bomb is a kilometre.

[The Don of Croy]

matchmaker said:

E-mailed to me yesterday for use on a construction site about to start - "Explosives Safety & Awareness Briefing". It's 32 pages long. A 50kg bomb would cause serious injury even 70m away. The minimum safe distance from a 500kg bomb is a kilometre.

But that's only relevant for German (metric) bombs they exported to us.

Over there they'd need to be 1093.61yards away from a 1100lb bomb. Makes a difference.

The scale of production of munitions in the war was staggering - all those factories, magazines, workforce filling, testing and storing millions upon millions of rounds...makes me giddy.

And now we're coming full circle with those rail-gun thingies hurling solid projectiles at massive speed via electromagnetic current. (Or we could try talking to one another.)

[Vipers]

Any idea what this is.

[Vipers]

Balmoral said:

Isn't it the case that unexploded WWII bombs don't explode anyway? The bomb disposal people come along and blow them up, but the resulting explosion is only the explosives that the bomb disposal team use to blow the unexploded bomb up with, the unexploded bomb itself still doesn't blow up, it just gets blown up.

Take it from me sometimes the bomb itself explodes, or I think the term is "High order"

During my Navy days, we found a GG mine off Portland in about 10 msw of water, this German George (GG) was dropped by plane.

It was cylindrical, and the plan was to use curva linea to separate the mechanism end from the charge. Curva Linia is basically a shaped charge which would cut the end off of the mine which is the firing mechanism leaving the charge intact to be disposed of later.

On this occasion, the charge (curva linia) set the main charge off, or "High order", so yes sometimes they do explode.

[fomb]

227bhp said:

One was found yesterday by a mechanical digger so it must have received quite a battering (you can see the marks on it) yet remained intact. I know you have to be safe, but do wonder if a lot of time and money could be saved if two blokes just picked it up, put it in a softly lined box and took it off somewhere safe.....

But how do you know that last bang on the casing wasn't the one that finally knocked the fuse back into shape and ready to blow?