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Armor/AFV: Modern - USA
Modern Armor, AFVs, and Support vehicles.
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M2 Bradley firing ports
lavgnr
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Alberta, Canada
Joined: November 03, 2003
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Posted: Sunday, November 13, 2005 - 07:52 AM UTC
Hello all,
Were the firing ports still in use (not covered over, anyways) after the seating plan changed inside the M2?
I'm doing an early one and would like to use the ports for the "look cool factor", but the seating is the current one with four troops facing rearward. Osprey's book is unclear on this.

PS- THANK YOU to Epi for showing his Bradley hole on the internet.

Thanks!
Mike

EDIT-Sorry, the four that I mean are back-to-back individual seats with two facing the turret and two facing rearward as my floor plan's laid out.
Vodnik
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Warszawa, Poland
Joined: March 26, 2003
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Posted: Sunday, November 13, 2005 - 07:57 AM UTC
Mike,

Your picture doesn't work. But if you think about the benches on sides rather than earlier individual seats, then this arrangement was introduced in M2A2ODS, while firing ports on hull sides were eliminated already in M2A1, so there is no way you could see benches in M2 vehicle.

Pawel
Vodnik
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Warszawa, Poland
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Posted: Sunday, November 13, 2005 - 08:11 AM UTC
Oups, I see that you edited your post and removed the picture link. But now I don't understand what you mean by "four troops facing rearward"... In current seating in M2A2ODS has benches on compartment sides and all troops are facing the center of the vehicle (their backs to the hull side). In previous configuration in M2, M2A1 and M2A2 there were individual seats and only three soldiers were facing rearward (one of them seated in narrow space behind driver), while one was facing the vehicle center (his back to the hull side), and remaining three troops were facing forward.

Pawel
lavgnr
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Alberta, Canada
Joined: November 03, 2003
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Posted: Sunday, November 13, 2005 - 08:20 AM UTC
Thanks for the replies, Pawel
It's been edited again for clarification as I'd gone by memory instead of picking up the interior behind me! Sorry, they're back-to-back but definitely in individual seats. Perhaps someone involved with Bradleys while these upgrades were taking place would know? My pictorial references are sketchy. Thanks!
HeavyArty
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Florida, United States
Joined: May 16, 2002
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Posted: Sunday, November 13, 2005 - 08:26 AM UTC
To make it more clear, the firing ports were covered over when the side armor plates were added on the M2A2 version. They never really worked well anyways due to limited vision and fumes from firing building up inside the vehicle.

The original seating arrangement, of 6 individual seats (as described above by Vodnik), was only changed recently (mid-late '90's) to the bench seats on M2A2 ODS versions. Some M2A2 ODS versions can still be seen with the individual seats as well. Not all vehicles have all the ODS mods completed.
Sabot
Joined: December 18, 2001
KitMaker: 12,596 posts
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Posted: Sunday, November 13, 2005 - 08:27 AM UTC
Here are some photos in my motor pool: Major Rob's Motor Pool. It may be of some use to you.
Vodnik
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Warszawa, Poland
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Posted: Sunday, November 13, 2005 - 08:30 AM UTC
Okay, then it looks we think about the same (the version depicted in Tamiya old M2 kit and Academy copy of it). As far as I know this was the only individual seat layout used in production M2 vehicles, so it was also used before firing ports were eliminated. I'm not aware of any earlier seating plan being used in production standard M2s.

Pawel
Vodnik
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Warszawa, Poland
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Posted: Sunday, November 13, 2005 - 08:40 AM UTC

Quoted Text

To make it more clear, the firing ports were covered over when the side armor plates were added on the M2A2 version.

Yup, that's correct. I was wrong about M2A1 - it still had firing ports (M3A1 confused me, as it had them completely eliminated, not just covered as M3).

And I also believe I know what early seating plan Mike thinks about. I just checked Hunnicutt's book and it shows that earliest M2s had only three individual seats in the middle. The fourth seat (the one facing the turret "door") was added there later and I think older vehicles might have been modified and had this fourth seat added as well.

Pawel
lavgnr
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Alberta, Canada
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Posted: Sunday, November 13, 2005 - 09:17 AM UTC
Pawel, Heavy Arty and Sabot-
That's exactly what I'm looking for- it is Tamiya's old M2 kit, and I can now go ahead and use the arrangement that I'd wanted. Progress pics will follow.Thank you very much!
Mike
2CAVTrooper
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Alabama, United States
Joined: October 21, 2005
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Posted: Wednesday, November 16, 2005 - 06:59 AM UTC

Quoted Text

Oups, I see that you edited your post and removed the picture link. But now I don't understand what you mean by "four troops facing rearward"... In current seating in M2A2ODS has benches on compartment sides and all troops are facing the center of the vehicle (their backs to the hull side). In previous configuration in M2, M2A1 and M2A2 there were individual seats and only three soldiers were facing rearward (one of them seated in narrow space behind driver), while one was facing the vehicle center (his back to the hull side), and remaining three troops were facing forward.

Pawel


Only the early M2A2's had the individual seats, and the early A2's only had 6 troop seats because they deleted the 7th seat behind the driver.

The later restowed A2's with the bench seats once again added the 7th seat behind the driver. AFIK, the restows started to appear just before ODS
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