What is the difference between a uranium bomb and a plutonium bomb?

Question

Didn't N. Korea just test a uranium bomb?

What is the difference?

Answer 1

Not necessarily a whole lot, other than the metals themselves, and the way that conventional explosives are arranged to create the "critical mass" which results in the explosion. the bombs we dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, were uranium, and plutonium respectively, and their yields were of similar strength.
A hydrogen bomb, would dwarf them both.

Answer 2

I believe they had been enriching uranium, so it would have been a uranium bomb, the same type as the one dropped on Hiroshima. Fat man, the bomb dropped on Nagasaki, was a plutonium bomb.

The uranium bomb was a gun-type, where an explosion like a cannon ball out of a cannon forced elements together to create a critical mass. The plutonium bomb was an implosion device, where the spherical plutonium core was surrounded by a charge which when exploded produced a strong inward pressure on the core causing it to reach critical mass. The implosion method was safer and more efficient than the gun-type. The difference between the uranium bomb and the plutonium bomb then is mainly in the way the charge is detonated to compress the core to critical mass.

It is possible to build a gun-type plutonium bomb but the length of the gun required would be too long for practical purposes, so the implosion method was devised.

Answer 3

Uranium bombs have a smaller yield than plutonium bombs. But you have to "create" plutonium it does not occur naturally in nature. Uranium, although rare is mined and enriched to make them more powerful. If you want a truly powerful bomb though, which seems silly when you think how destructive all these bombs are, you want a hydrogen bomb.

Answer 4

Uranium Bombs are the smaller nuclear bombs. Uranium bombs involve splitting atoms when they detonate, thus the atomic bombs that were used on japan to end World War 2. Plutonium bombs are the thermonuclear bombs that are in the arsenals of most nuclear countries. North Korea tested a uranium bomb, which was made from nuclear fuel rods used to feed nuclear reactors in nuclear powerplants.

Answer 5

Uranium is a naturally occuring material, however it has to be enriched to provide for good weapons material. Plutonium has to be created in a laborotory from other elements.

Answer 6

they tested a nuclear bomb, the difference is one has uranium and one has plutonium, both different elements. and both unstable.

Answer 7

plutonium bombs, mass for mass, are better. could I observed extra detrimental. in spite of the shown fact that, they're extra inefficient to offer, plenty extra costly, and require extra processing. considering that Uranium is extra much less costly, who needs a nuclear bomb that would do one hundred mile radius of harm........while seventy 5 is barely adequate you recognize?

Answer 8

nothing realy,both bombs are fission bombs. both bombs releases energy generated by the breaking apart of plutonium or uranium nuclei