Originally Posted by
Buster Hyman
My humble contribution to this interesting aspect of the thread was a "thorough" inspection of the An-124 Avionics bay. The sheer mass of Valves surprised me at the time but it all made sense in the long run.
Wasn't the use of 'valves' (tubes over here) to prevent equipment EMP consequences from nuclear explosions on transistors and printed circuit boards - the valves being much more resistant to EMP? Off topic, but there are concerns that neutron flux from nuclear explosions might potentially initiate ignition of unexploded weapons, so timing and spacing are important. Not that I hope to find out if that's true.....