I'm interested in seeing the interior of military vehicles which are in use... not the tidy and clean interior photos we usually see from various military shows or parades, but the vehicles (like Humvees, MRAPs etc) which are really being lived in. Are there empty soda cans, food containers and similar mess all around, or is it neatly packed backpacks, ammo cans, etc?

Photos are welcomed.

Mario

Mario hi. From a personal level of being inside as crew on Chieftain, Challenger and all CVRT's, on exercise or ops, these places become your home and we would always try our upmost to keep everything as clean and tidy as was possible.

The biggest issue by far was and always will be mud and the like being brought into the crew / fighting compartments.
We used to keep an old toilet brush hidden away near the main hatches or entry point so we could give our boots a quick brush off if they were particularly muddy.
Also in regards to food etc, as a tank loader or radio op, their secondary role would be to sort the food/ meals out for the crew. Either on the move or when we pulled up for any length of time. Once the meal was done, everything would be repacked and you would carry on with what ever task was required, rest, maint or more movement etc.
We would usually keep on hand a ready supply of snacks/on the go stuff like crisps,biscuits, cans of pop but again these wouldn't be just scattered around, they would kept out the way as much as possible. Hope that's a bit of an insight.
John

http://armorama.com/forums/216941&page=1&ord=1



H.P.

Dear Mario,

Looking back at my own military career I think that one may conclude that this highly depends on various aspects.
Let's take the most simple ones first:
In case a vehicle (truck, AFV etc.) was handled by a single or two man crew, things might have been organized quite well. Also, its position in the order of battle might have its impact. E.g. ammo and/or supply carrying trucks, which drive between fixed large bases and the front in a supply chain would most likely not been filled with large amounts of food and complete battle outfits since they would be back in a solid base within reasonable time.
Also, medical units mostly have decent bases where their staff returns rather easily.
How different with fighting units: mostly shared by multiple staff, on their own for longer periods, operating 24/7, will have to carry all necessary equipment, personal gear, ammo, water and food, next to those items the crew consider as an absolute necessity for their own luxury. Taking into account that most vehicles have been design as compact as possible, all spaces will be used and still give an overloaded impression.
This counts for both long term exercises as well as real missions.
For technical missions on shooting ranges and alike, one operates mostly from a steady base, deleting the necessity to take all sorts of extra gear and survival kit.
I "lived" quite a while in a M577 of a gun battery, which operated as a command and communication center, visited by the individual gun commanders, external arti LSO's, higher command officers and who else thought that having a look into a live firing battery was highly interesting! This required a high level of 'management': a. the give a well organised and clean impression and b. to avoid that all luxury items we collected (extra tin cans with Indonesian food, soda bottles, chocolate bars etc., but also pencils, maps and adhesive tape were 'borrowed), and b. to keep enough working space for 4-5 staff members.
So actually, what ever you think of (absolute well organised up to complete chaos) is valid.

We had four soldiers in our M1025 Humvees with all our gear. We lost about 50% of our cargo space due to our ECM/ESM equipment so we didn't spread out. Personal gear was kept in our rucks and duffel bags, cots were strapped to the rear tailgate with the cammo nets and sleeping pads were placed over the multiple antennas. A box was kept under the VRC47 rack to keep the unused parts of MRE's and we kept two trash bags handy. One for non-burnable waste and the other for paper only. The paper trash was burned every day because it was mainly classified intercept data and non burnable was disposed of when refueling or when Top came out with our bullets and beans. There might be the occasional MRE spoon lying around and assorted brass but we were organized and neat. Most of the stuff found lying around in our vehicles was leaves and twigs, mud, dust, pens, markers and notepads. We took a lot of notes for some reason. Four soldiers stuck in a box for weeks on end with out showers can get nerve wracking so we alleviated as much stress inducing causes as possible.

Is this VAB interior messy enough for you ?



Olivier

| agree, we tried to keep things neat and orderly. I say this from having crewed an M551, an M60A1, an M113, many different M151s, M577s, HMMWVs and other types of vehicles, both wheeled and armored. You tried to keep the trash down, not just because of space, but because it gets into places it shouldn’t. We used an old C ration or MRE box, and large plastic bags to isolate the trash from the gear. Mud and dirt are a little more difficult to keep out, especially around steps, turret floors and where the crew puts their feet, but before it becomes a huge problem, it would be removed.
VR, Russ

I never served in the military, but I would think that you would try to keep your vehicle from being a pig-sty.

In your home country or even on an exercise elsewhere, you may have the occasional VIP or such drop in.

In "Injun country", you don't want to dig through a mess to find your weapon or box of ammo or radio handset. A vehicle would probably be at its messiest during or immediately after an action with lots of brass lying around, odd bits that have been shot away, blood from casualties, or empty ammo boxes. I'm guessing that the vehicle would be cleaned up after action as soon as possible just in case something else pops up. The mess might be around the vehicle after a very hasty cleanup.

“In action” is a bit different, as Gary implies above. You’ll always have the detritus of combat around. However, it also depends on how organized the crew is, and items like catch bags for brass. Tankers usually have a method for stowing fired brass, if not just tossing it out a hatch. Having expended casings rolling around the turret floor is not a good thing for equipment or people.
VR, Russ

Is there room for the crew in there?

EDIT

Here's a photo of the crew cleaning the blood out of their choppers in Vietnam.

https://i2.wp.com/www.robertcmason.com/images/gallery/17%20Washing%20Out%20the%20Blood.jpg

"Messy" covers a lot of ground...

The interior of an APC or patrol vehicle can become extremely cluttered and often full of assorted stuff - supplies, personal effects and personal equipment, ammo containers and tool-boxes, etc. The interior can become extremely disorderly-looking. In more modern times, things like boxes of disposable water-bottles and other "non-military" items have become more common-place in and out of vehicles. Dirt and mud is common-place. The clutter and disordered look and presence of assorted extras is clearly evident when one looks at photos of APC and other personnel-heavy vehicles during training ops and in action across perhaps a century-plus of wheeled and tracked warfare.

And who is using or "owns" the vehicle matters. Some military forces are more casual about some things then are others - the Israelis may be a good case-study for a modern, effective force which seems to be pretty "informal" in terms of what stuff gets into a vehicle. Other forces, and some units more than others, and who (a senior officer versus a bunch of grunts, perhaps...) is actually living in that vehicle may well count.

There are a few general rules which apply across most vehicles and most users: Real garbage usually goes out fast - so no empty food-cans, waste-paper, etc. gets to loiter. Who wants to live in the dump or with someone else's garbage? And that stuff can pose a threat when things get exciting. 2), most vehicles actually have a well-developed stowage plan for assigned stuff - German modelers building half-track kits have seen this for years - look at all the specific and dedicated stowage and equipment-attachment points one sees therein! Dedicated stowage is common to virtually all military vehicles for most of the past century. And 3) whatever the added and extra stuff and degree-of-clutter, usually the users strive to avoid placing themselves in increased danger from their stuff. Getting out quickly is important, and reaching one's weapons and servicing vehicle weapons is important. Avoiding getting trapped and blocked by extraneous stuff is important. So the clutter one sees in photos should probably be seen as being "tolerable or acceptable" by the users, and how and where stuff gets stuffed and stowed counts. I, like many here, have some applied experience with this...

For us modelers; IF one wants to model in-use vehicle interiors, doing a number of Google searches and looking at pics of "in action", "at war", and by force or nationality or event (action) are all likely revelatory as to what the accepted clutter looks like in the type (truck, apc, patrol vehicle, tank, etc.) at that time and place. Being at war or even in intensive and prolonged training ops is a messy, dirty business, and vehicle interiors will reflect that. And skip the real garbage - guys toss that druck out - and skip looking at blown-up or otherwise destroyed vehicles unless that is what you seek to portray... the insides of bombed vehicles look pretty different from what they looked like when up and running. Structured and actually-ordered, FUNCTIONAL clutter becomes chaos.

Just my thoughts!

Cheers! Bob

We had load plans for stowing everything, logically laid out as to frequency of use, fit and mission. Our jammer rigs were different from our direction finding rigs because the equipment was different in size and installation but you could
go to any of the six rigs and find chocks, MG barrels, fuel, water, NVG's, tools and whatever in the same place in each vehicle. Individual gear was stowed as to seat assignment, driver, team leader, left and right rear, tho we all took turns running the systems and driving. Since ECM and ESM crews were interchangeable having each rig laid out the same was important. Any leftover space was filled with boxes of irradiated milk, water, ramen soup, extra ration, pogey bait, extra ammo, diesel cans, cases of Pepsi and everybody had an extra duffle bag or flight bag. I had a flight bag which held books, baby wipes, several decks of cards, a football, hackysack, frisbee, at least 15 pounds of beef jerky and a small pillow which was usually "confiscated" by my LT. before we even rolled out. It was surprising how much crap you could load into a humvee with a good load plan.

Nope. This VAB was used as a supply vehicle. In a normal use you have some room under the benches to store the crew stuff. You also can store ammo, food and other things on racks behind the benches. There are some nets under the roof to store the life vests which are rarely used in operations. So the crew use them as additional stowage room.

Olivier

Great replies, thank you guys! It is always welcomed to hear first-hand experiences and try to recreate those in scale.

HP, thanks for pointing me to that old thread, I completely forgot about it.

Best,
Mario

I do not know if this applies to vehicles, but one thing that got drummed onto our heads throughout my naval career is that when things are laying around and not put away they become fire and missile hazards in case of a hit...so we spend a lot of our time cleaning and always pick up after ourselves. Good question though.

It applies to any confined space. One of the reasons we don't let everything lie around on the floor at home.
Compare with stepping on a LEGO-block in the middle of the floor at night.

Did you ever notice that almost every model of an open bed vehicle has chains and rags and boxes and tools draped about? (For artistic effect, natch.)

KL

Why is the "water" in those bottles yellow?

Field toilets?