The RB-4 was the first defensive space mine deployed by the deWulf Navy. Initially researched at the tail end of the First Contact War, the mine never saw widespread use either during the First Contact War or the following Binary War. Imperial Autonetics, the original manufacturer, bet on it becoming a standard fixture of the deWulf Navy. Unfortunately due to the lack of defensive warfare, it almost became an anchor that dragged the company into bankruptcy. It took Project Granit halfway through the Binary war to save the company and finally put the production lines initially built for the RB-4 to use.
Bomb-pumped weapons are fairly straightforward, as far as science fiction weapons go. Using a nuclear bomb’s raw energy output, several lasing rods are charged with enough energy to release a coherent beam of light. With a targeting package, the beams can be aimed reasonably well, enough to be used as a weapon. The requirement to initiate a nuclear explosion does make onboard usage of bomb-pumped lasers rather dicey to say the least. This is also partially… inspired, I suppose, by similar weapons used in the Honor Harrington weapon as the primary missile warhead. But that’s not really a surprise, as the genesis of the Honor Harrington universe comes from the time when David Weber was also a writer for the Starfire game series as well.
Dollarton Proxima Shipyards 