Sorry to the rest for hijacking the thread....
Its kind of a mix between the A3 and the A2. The fuel tank is still internal, as opposed to the A3's internal tanks. As you can see, we operate a lot in heavily wooded terrain. The external fittings tend to take a lot of knocks from trees and what not. So I guess thats why they've kept it internal. We do have the new engine and transmission and suspension and the other goodies though.
We're phasing the M113's out gradually though, in favor of a more modern IFV. I think the new one got into the final 5 vehicles that contended for that new Stryker brigade in the US army.
Its easy putting the barrel in, but we have this half-assed rule that we had to keep the barrels in the armory. Which is hellava far from the vehicle.