Ok so heres a little more progress, its still a slow moving project but hey, when I can fit some work in I do. Most of the time I cant do it cos my bro is on the PC so cant get to my reference pics and my printer just sucks. Anyway right bench finished and test fitted, i built the tiny little monitor screen thing-what is that? It was a big to make and sooo small, I used tiny PE bolt heads to make buttons and some tin foil to make some little bits. Lots of otehr small details have been made and added aswell such as the internal atmosphere monitors and some more cables and bits. The main work now is to add all the rest of the details and then start work on the turret interior and detail it out. Thanks for looking!

Looks like it is coming along well. The "little monitor screen thing" is an FBCB2 (Force XXI Battle Command, Brigade-and-Below) terminal. FBCB2 is a digital tracking sytem that shows where everyone is on the battlefield and allows messages (email) to be sent between vehicles, has a digital map, you can pull up databases that shows ammo counts, etc., etc. It is a pretty good tool, but requires constant inputs to be kept up to date. One more thimg to keep track of as opposed to fighting the enemy. As a note, if you are building a 3ID Bradley for OIF, we didn't have FBCB2 in 3ID at that time.

Thanks for the info Gino! So you can check the forum updates on armorama whilst riding into battle then Seems like a smart bit of kit, yes I was planning on building a 3ID vehicle so I better remove it then? What would the mounting for it look like if im not going to have one fitted?

Well, you can feasibly go to the www, but I assume you would be a little too busy to do that. Maybe not. Actually, it doesn't connect to the general internet. It is a separate, secure, Tactical LAN (TacLAN).

3ID Brads didn't have a mount either. No FBCB2 was installed in any of our vehicles. The mount, screen, etc. is all in a kit that you get when you are fielded the equipment. We were not fielded with any of it. Removing the whole thing would be accurate.

damnit that thing took ages to make-oh well. What goes in that area then on a new layout interior, cos on the older M2 one there are a pair of what appear to be extinguisers or something.
What vehicles did have the FBCB2 fitted?

HALON fire exstinguishers are still there. FBCB2 went on the outside of them.

When FBCB2 is fielded to a Division, most vehicles get it. There are separate mounting kits for each vehicle; HMMWV, Brad, Abrams, trucks, etc., etc. 3ID as a whole didn't have it at the time. No vehicles in the Division had it.

Looks very good Rob, even with the unfortunate mix up over the TacLan.....keep up the good work and post some more pictures when you have time...looking forward to seeing the rest of this one

Regards from the Swamp

Hawkeye

Wow its almost becoming a standard for all armorama members, when building an M2A2 to fill the interior as well. I know Gino has done it, Olivier and possibly EPI now you. Talk about raising the bar.

Nice job so far. I wish i knew more about actual M2A2s to comment / suggest further but i just cant.

Looking forward to the progress picts.

Now thats what I call scrapt-built. Can not wait to see it all done.

Happy Modeling
(++) 1:35

I understand that the Brads in 3rd ID did not have that screen, But portions of 3rd ID was equiped with BFT. Where did the BFT screen go? Up in the BC's hatch?

Yes, if BFT was installed, it could be up with the BC. Most vehicles just had a BFT transmitter and no terminal as well. Mainly the TOCs had terminals. Our MLRS launchers and a BOC for each battery were outfitted this way and the BN TOC had the terminal in 1-39 FA (MLRS), 3ID during OIF 1.

The FBCB2 terminal in the back is for the SQD Leader.