Original subtitles

- [Narrator] 1967...

In the middle of the Cold War,

the Soviets unveiled a brand new fighting vehicle.

It was fast, heavily armed and ran on tracks.

But the real surprise lay inside

where this new machine carried soldiers

who could fire their weapons on the move.

This was the birth of the tracked infantry fighting vehicle.

The Russian BMP-1,

built to survive a nuclear battle field.

- The BMP was designed to fight a war that never happened.

- [Narrator] The BMP forced the US Army

to come up with its own version,

the devastating M2 Bradley.

In Gulf War 1, this American powerhouse

completely overwhelmed the BMP.

- We were butchering those things left and right

in an armored stand up fight.

Many were left to rot in the desert,

but thanks to one true believer,

a BMP-1 is about to get a complete overhaul.

With a tiny budget, volunteer crews,

and not enough time.

- Whoa! Watch the camera. Holy Moly!

- [Narrator] This is one long, unforgiving mission.

- What's the deal? (beep) again.

(intense music)

- [Narrator] There are two ways to overhaul

a massive piece of military hardware.

The easy way, with a big budget and a big crew,

or the Greg Taylor way, with no money,

a great group of friends,

and as many guns as possible.

- Everybody's got guns out here.

The sound of gunfire out here means the sound of freedom.

(guns firing)

- [Narrator] Here in the vast Nevada desert,

Greg Taylor and his pals are living the dream.

And they're doing it in a corner of the continent

that has witnessed some amazing feats of engineering.

This is also where NASA built and tested

the Apollo rockets.

- This is great open space for having men's toys,

(laughing) or large boys' toys.

- Greg, do you have anything around here

that isn't worth a dollar or $2.98 that we can use?

- No, but....

- It's not a hobby.

It hasn't been a hobby for a long time.

I'm not sure what we would call it.

Torture. Maybe it's torture.

(dramatic music)

- What the hell are you doing?

- Well, I thought I would say us

a little bit of (beep) time.

Who in the (beep) died and left you boss?

- [Narrator] Greg's beat up and battered BMP

needs some serious cosmetic work,

a major engine rebuild and tons of electrical wiring.

To make this happen he's pulled together old friends,

and fellow tank restorers.

In this playground, Greg is the master builder.

- He's worked with so many vehicles, of course.

German vehicles, French vehicles, etc.

And I do not know if there is anybody else

that has as much experience as Greg Taylor.

(intense music)

- I bought that vehicle sight unseen in England in 2003

and had it shipped in.

- [Narrator] But Greg can't work on his BMP full time.

He restores military vehicles at one of the

world's largest private collections

owned by Jacques Littlefield.

It's a great job, but is a four hour drive

from his own personal playground

at his Pah Rah Dise Ranch 30 miles northeast of Reno.

Greg has spent years just trying to get started

restoring his BMP-1.

- Repairing the BMP is like...

Well, I don't know what you would say comparing it to,

but it's just terribly cramped and complicated

and there's all these...

Plumbing. It's a plumber's nightmare.

There's plumbing going everywhere in there.

It's absolutely hideous.

- [Narrator] Appearing for the first time in 1967,

the BMP was a major innovation on the battlefield.

The BMP was designed part like tank,

part armored personnel carrier in the Cold War

for nuclear battlefields.

- The BMP-1 was really the first of what

we now call infantry fighting vehicles.

That means an infantry vehicle that's designed

not simply to bring infantry into combat

and have them disembark and fight on foot,

it was designed to allow the infantry

to fight from within the vehicle.

In the 1950s, the Soviets had a dilemma

about how to use infantry on a battlefield

that was going to be contaminated by nuclear weapons.

Obviously unprotected human beings

can't survive in a nuclear battlefield.

- [Narrator] The Russians wanted more than just

a battlefield taxi dropping off troops.

- So, what separated the BMP from earlier types

of armored infantry vehicles is

not only could they survive on the nuclear battlefield,

they could fight on the nuclear battlefield.

- [Narrator] Unlike any other tracked vehicle,

the infantry inside were able to shoot

through firing ports in the hull.

The crew would be protected from nuclear fallout

by the composition and thickness of the hull.

A chemical filtration system would keep the air

inside free from contaminants.

- The BMP was in many ways a very ambitious design.

It was also an awful lot of firepower,

and an awful lot of features in a relatively small,

relatively light, relatively fast vehicle.

(engine rumbling)

(dramatic music)

- [Narrator] In 1981, the American Army introduced

their own version of an infantry fighting vehicle,

the M2 Bradley.

Even at 32 metric tons, twice the weight of the BMP,

this vehicle could still match the BMP's

top speed of 65 kilometers, or 40 miles per hour.

- It has the capabilities to haul troops into battle

and fight its way in and fight its way out.

When the Bradley was first developed,

it was designed for conventional warfare

where the battle was fought by opposing forces

from the front.

In a current conflict,

it's what they call an asymmetrical battlefield

whereas you can expect threats from all sides

around you, 360 degrees.

- And so the Bradley and the BMP

were kind of evenly matched at the time

because the Bradley was new to the battlefield.

Each had anti-attack missiles,

they had the stagger, we had the tow,

we had five quarts for our 5-5-6

and they have five points for their AK-47s.

But that's pretty much where it ends as an equal race.

After that it became completely unfair.

The Bradley evolved quicker and faster

than a BMP could even begin to keep pace.

- [Narrator] All the military skill and technology

quickly came to bear.

Building on what the BMP had introduced

the Bradley took it to the next level.

- You go to any observation post,

you go to any checkpoint,

and if you have one of these bad boys sitting there,

that sends a message to the enemy.

You can put a Humvee or you can put

a soldier on the ground with a weapon,

but if you're sitting behind a 72 ton tank,

or the M2 Bradley...

The reality is the enemy doesn't want

to mess around with you.

So it sends a message.

- [Narrator] Equipped with a 25 milliliter canon,

the Bradley's main gun can fire 200 rounds a minute,

both armor piercing and high explosive.

- But the real beauty that the Bradley

brings to the urban fight is

you drop the ramp and those seven flat belly,

barrel chested steely eyed killers come rolling off the back

with some of the finest led soldiers

and best trained soldiers in the world.

That is really the equalizer to the enemy force

that the Bradley brings.

There's no other vehicle on the Earth

that delivers that kind of lethality,

pinpoint accuracy that the Bradley does.

- [Narrator] Bringing the troops to the fight

was the BMP's innovation.

Protecting them was another story.

The BMP's armor was a lethal liability,

because the troops sat either side

of the central fuel tank and ammunition store.

- All of the ammunition is lined up underneath the turret.

If they get penetrated through the very thin side armor,

all that stuff blows up.

And it blows up right next to the fuel tanks.

So the BMP is a very impressive design

in its tactical features,

but it's very, very vulnerable if it's used

in an environment where its weak side armor,

weak rear armor is exposed to the enemy.

- [Narrator] When it comes to armor,

the M2 Bradley is an impregnable fortress.

- Basic level of protection of the vehicle is

steel armor that's added to the front and sides

and top of the vehicle.

And that provides 30 millimeter protection

from opposing forces.

I've been in nine IED blasts while I was in Iraq,

and the Bradley fighting vehicle

was able to bring my crews home safe.

I only had to evacuate one soldier

and he was evacuated for a broken leg,

he was my driver during one of the worse IED attacks.

- [Narrator] Built in the 1960s, Greg's BMP has driven

a long, winding trail all the way from Eastern Europe

through the Middle East to Western Nevada.

In the 1980s it fought in the Iran/Iraq War.

During the 1991 Gulf War,

the British Army captured it from Iraqi forces.

- They brought back a few samples

and the tested them and they were evaluating

the Russian technology at that time.

'Cause there hadn't been a lot of these captured

until the 1991 Gulf War.

- [Narrator] This is one piece of equipment

that didn't spend life on the sidelines.

And it's got the scars to prove it.

- The damage we have on this BMP...

I believe was incurred in the Iran/Iraq War.

The damage you see here is quite deep into the armor plate.

There's a gouge right here.

There's also a big dent back here.

So, there was quite a bit of damage to this vehicle.

- [Narrator] For the first phase of his restoration,

Greg pulls in Roy Robertson.

- He's got a lot of knowledge,

and mechanical knowledge of the Russian equipment

because we worked together on a lot of that over the years.

- [Narrator] The first step in the restoration is

sandblasting off the years of paint, dirt and rust.

- Sandblasting is a lot of work.

It is physical work.

You have this equipment running behind you

and things can happen.

But it's a lot of fun to see that your

equipment is getting cleaned

and getting the old paint off and the rust and everything.

Sandblasting is a lot harder to do now

that I'm older than it was 20 years ago.

But normally, I used to be able to go for an hour or two

at one time blasting,

but I go half an hour or so,

that's it, I'm done for a while.

So, it takes longer.

- [Narrator] Greg needs to get the BMP down to bare metal.

When you're working on a tight budget

with less than state of the art equipment,

sometimes even the simple things can go wrong.

- While we were sandblasting here,

Greg Taylor had his hoses over here,

didn't realize we had broken an air line right here

that feeds his map.

And then I ran over to stop what it was

and sand's blowing everywhere.

So, then I immediately head over to the machine, the pump,

and shut everything down.

(engine revving)

- I was thinking about sandblasting.

For every hour of sandblasting you do,

you spend five hours working on the equipment.

So, that's the part that I hate,

working on the equipment.

I kind of like doing the work

but the drudgery and the repairs....

Obviously I have up to date equipment here.

This is the latest thing that's available on the market.

- The hardest part is probably throwing these sacks of sand.

So, as you get older,

it's a little harder on the hemorrhoids.

I'd write a book but the statute of limitations

is not up on a lot of the stuff I did.

(laughing)

- Okay, well cut the (beep) shit

and let's get back to work.

- Yeah, this thing is full.

- Okay, we're good.

- [Narrator] On Greg's budget,

work sometimes has to wait for the equipment

to get its act together.

(engine stalling)

- Now what's wrong?

The fuel's on.

- Yeah, it is.

(engine revving)

- [Narrator] Greg can't afford to lose time.

He only has a few days at his ranch

before he has to head back to his regular job in California.

Coming up, Greg and Roy raid the kitchen

to clean the BMP's engine.

Here in Nevada, Greg Taylor and Roy Robertson

continue to beat this BMP back to full working condition.

This is how it's done with no money.

(intense music)

(clanking sounds)

- There it's in.

- [Narrator] About 3600 kilometers or 2200 miles away

from Greg Taylor's sandbox is a BAE Systems plant

in York, Pennsylvania.

At this state of the art facility,

they're rebuilding M2 Bradleys to get them back to Iraq.

- Since we're in a time of war,

the OPTEMPO is increased significantly

for the Bradley fighting vehicle.

Approximately 120 vehicles a month,

an average of about eight a day

that we'll be producing.

- [Narrator] Attacked and battered in Iraq,

these Bradleys are coming back to life in the USA.

- When the vehicle comes back from theater

they will assess it when they tear the vehicle down.

It's difficult to tell how much damage

you have to a vehicle until the components are tore out.

This vehicle came back from Iraq,

it was in theater and it ran over an IED,

basically an explosives device.

This particular one had damage to the front

and the entire floor in the engine compartment

we had to cut out,

which is what this guy is doing now.

He's putting parts back into it now.

- [Narrator] To get the Bradleys restored,

the crew has everything they need

to get the job down right and fast.

Need to pick up a couple of tons of armor?

Not a problem.

- The last new Bradley to roll off a

production line was in 1994.

Since that time we've been in a re-manufacture state

where we take old vehicles and recycle them

into new vehicles by upgrading with new components

and to bring them up to date.

- [Narrator] In the original configuration,

the infantry inside could fire their weapons

from within the Bradley just like the BMP,

but as the design was upgraded,

the firing ports were sealed up.

- The challenges of shooting with the weapons

on the side of the vehicle is

that the viewing for the soldier

was through a periscope,

not in the same line as the weapon itself.

So, it's difficult to bring the bullets on the target.

But by the time you actually get on target,

you might have expended most of your ammunition in the gun.

- [Narrator] But deep in the land of Greg Taylor,

restoring a single BMP-1 is a whole different grind.

His wife, Sharon, works at home

as a freelance writer and editor.

She's seen him through all his trials

and tribulations with the BMP.

It was not properly prepped for shipment

and so when it got here,

it had eight inches of water in the engine.

We spent an extra $2000 getting the engine

and shipping it here.

- I did purchase an engine for it,

so I'm really hoping the engine is okay...

and I've been assured that it is a good engine.

However, you never know until you actually

are ready to start it up and run it.

- [Narrator] Greg is driving home to Nevada from his job

restoring tanks for collector Jacques Littlefield.

He's been making this out of state trip

about every two weeks since 1994.

Greg's love affair with military metal

began when other kids were still messing around

with plastic models.

- I ended up actually inheriting an old

1941 Dodge weapons carrier,

which I got running and cleaned up and painted

and drove to high school.

- [Narrator] Greg eventually graduated to owning

bigger vehicles and finally tanks.

The first tank he owned was a T54.

- I drove that tank for many years

and used it in film work,

such as Tank Girl, Courage Under Fire

and Mars Attacks and couple of other ones

I don't want to mention.

(whirring sounds)

- [Narrator] When he's off duty,

he gets to work on his own projects

and right now that's a Soviet BMP-1,

pockmarked with battle scars.

I just think they're very sleek looking,

they're Star Wars looking,

they're fast, they're reliable, and easy to drive,

so I really wanted one.

- [Narrator] According to government regulation,

Greg is not allowed to restore the gun

to full working condition,

but he is allowed to get the engine up and running.

- Okay, Roy is putting on some oven cleaner

on this engine that we bought from eastern Europe.

- Don't give up our secret.

- This is a Czech engine and transmission

out of Czechoslovakia.

And it's a low time, it has low hours on it.

These power packs were basically very reliable

and we're taking a chance by just cleaning it up

and changing the oil and putting it in the vehicle.

So, we'll see if it's what it was made out to be

when I bought it.

- [Narrator] The BMP's engine is a 300 horsepower,

6 cylinder diesel made in Czechoslovakia.

Greg can't be sure this second hand engine will work,

but he knows the original models

were solid, dependable designs.

- In fact, I have a friend that has a BMP

and they've been driving it around for 15 years

and never had the engine apart or out,

just incredibly reliable.

Better get doing it before it

freezes up the pressure washer.

Where we are right now I think we're about

40 degrees out here in northern Nevada.

We gotta get this done so we can

put this puppy in there.

- We're in Nevada? I thought we were in Siberia.

(lively music)

I'm not even going to speculate what it is.

It looks a lot better.

Look in here.

Remember, it was all black.

- Looks like brand new.

- Yeah, it does.

I just gotta hose off a little bit right here.

- There's a little bit down here on the side

here on the intake manifold there.

- Yeah, I gotta put some more right here.

- And around on the heads there, yeah.

- Yeah, but we'll do that tomorrow.

- Okay.

- [Narrator] But even on a no budget tank overhaul,

Greg still needs to buy parts and pieces

that can't be found in a local hardware store.

- When you're in a small business situation like we are,

you have to do what's called creative financing.

So, sometimes I'm shuffling things around and....

It's not too bad.

Sometimes we get caught. (laughing)

Especially when we have to come up with $3000

for a new engine and that sort of thing.

I saw the UPS truck come in again today.

- Yeah.

- What was it?

- Was it something for you?

- No, it wasn't something for me.

That's why I'm asking.

- Okay, well, it was cheap.

I ordered some bolts for the BMP deck.

- Okay, well what credit card did you use?

The home card--

- Does it matter, they're all full?

- Okay, the home card or the business?

- I used the business card.

- Okay, that's good.

Alright, well that's all I needed to know.

We're fine.

I don't have to move money today.

- [Narrator] The BMP-1 was created to fight

NATO forces during a nuclear strike in Europe.

But those battles never happened.

Instead, the BMP stormed into action

across the deserts and mountains of the Middle East.

- The BMP was first used in the 1973 Mid-East War.

It was used by the Syrian Army in their attack

against the Israeli force on the Golan Height.

It wasn't very successful.

- [Narrator] The Syrians liked the BMP speed and handling.

Designed to be amphibious,

it could cross soft, wet terrain

that would trap other tanks.

But the Syrian troops discovered serious drawbacks.

The main 77 milliliter gun was less than

2 meters off the ground.

This was low enough to hit fellow troops marching in front.

The BMP's rear, where the gas was stored,

could be penetrated by a 50 caliber machine gun.

This was a design flaw that could spell disaster.

When the BMP was moving,

troops inside couldn't fire with any accuracy.

But the BMP was not the reason

the Syrian's lost the 1973 war.

- Lack of success of the BMP on Golan Height

had less to do with the BMP and its design

than the tactics used by the Syrian Army

and by the successful use of entrench firepower

by the Israeli Army.

It's very skillful tank forces on the Golan Height.

- [Narrator] After the October war,

the Soviets began upgrading the BMP,

but it would never become the equal of the Bradley.

For Greg, working on an American unit

would be much easier than his Russian BMP.

At least he could read the instructions.

- One of the problems with these pieces of equipment is

that the manuals themselves were either in

Russian or German or Czechoslovakian, Czech.

(exploding sounds)

- [Narrator] Coming up, Greg calls in his support troops.

- I just do this for more of a curiosity

because I like to be miserable. (laughing)

Come on, let's go.

- [Narrator] It's a new day in the Pah Rah Mountains.

Greg Taylor has called on his gang of volunteers

to overhaul a Russian antique.

A Cold War relic.

A veteran of the Iran/Iraq War and the Gulf War,

the first ever infantry fighting vehicle, the BMP-1.

But it's not all fun and games in the land

of heavy duty tank overhauls.

- Is this thing plugged in?

- It might be.

It's supposed to be.

- Maybe it's broken.

- Greg, do you have anything around here

that isn't worth a dollar, $2.98, that we could use.

- No, but, you know...

That's odd.

It's probably broke.

So, I really do need to go spend some money on some tools.

It would be nice if there was more money

to build a bigger shop and buy more toys,

but I'm happy with what I have so we're fine.

- [Narrator] The BMP has been sandblasted.

The engine has been cleaned.

Today, Greg's gang will attack the body work

and battle damage and get the turret ready to come off.

- This is that nickel well so it's harder hubs of hell,

so you gotta chew at it the best you can.

I can't even cut this off it's so tough.

And when you get down to where it's like that,

that looks good, use the little grinder to finish it.

- Alright....

- [Narrator] To share the pain and the glory,

Roy Robertson is back on site.

Also here today are neighbors John Glatthar

and Bruce Cote.

- I usually get up every morning and try to decide

what can make me the most miserable everyday,

and then I usually come up here and see Greg.

He gives me something to do.

We couldn't have restored Volkswagens

or something like that.

No, that would be too damn easy, wouldn't it?

- Bruce Cote is a ex-Sheriff.

I've known him for a number of years as well,

and he lives down the street here.

So, he kicked me in the butt and got me going.

He's a good motivator.

- This thing was way beyond (beep) up

before we ever got it. Okay?

- (laughing) Well, that's the only thing we got.

If you wanna drive this thing, Bruce,

it's gonna be a lot of work.

That's all I can say.

- [Narrator] All the guys are here because they

believe in Greg and his mission to save these vehicles

from history's junkyard.

- He's so meticulous when he restored it back to

its original condition, he really is.

He's overworked is what it is.

He is a good restorator. One of the best.

- [Narrator] Greg and neighbor Don Glatthar,

cut, torch and grind,

while Roy and ex-Sheriff, Bruce Cote,

remove the bolts and linkages keeping the turret in place.

- I'm cleaning the (beep) out of the bottom

so we can get to the nuts.

I've got rusty nuts in the bottom of this thing, okay.

We thought that it wouldn't be...

Challenging enough unless we filled the bottom

of the BMP up with about two or three inches of sand

before we tried to take the nuts off.

- [Narrator] During the ordeal inside,

Bruce finds a reminder of the BMP's battle history.

- No, I'm serious, there's bullet holes through

the bottom of this.

Somebody must have been shooting at this at one time.

- [Narrator] August 1990, Iraq invaded Kuwait.

Five months later, led by the United States,

a U.N. backed force confronted the Iraqi Army.

The Iraqis were still using original BMP-1s

and they were no match for the American Bradley.

- There were many instances of Bradleys encountering BMPs

during the 1991 Gulf War,

and the results were very one sided.

- We were butchering those things left and right

in armored stand-up fights.

You come across an armored column,

they would destroy the lead and trail vehicles

bottling up the enemy in between.

If the enemy was on equal footing or anything,

it wouldn't have mattered.

They didn't stand a chance.

It was completely unfair,

and that's what we strive for.

(intense music)

- [Narrator] The Bradley's dominance did not come down

exclusively to fire power or armor.

The winning edge was the ability to draw first blood.

- The big thing in any armored vehicle battle is

who spots the enemy first,

who engages first,

who fires first.

And that's where the Bradley had the big advantage.

- [Narrator] The BMP's 2A28 73 millimeter gun

has a range of 1300 meters,

but is only accurate to about 500 meters.

The Bradley is still deadly accurate

at up to six times that range.

- So what usually happened when a Bradley

encountered a BMP is that the Bradley saw the

BMP really early at 2000 meters, 3000 meters,

engaged first and hit first.

And that's always the secret in armored vehicle warfare.

See 'em first, fire first, hit first.

You do that, you win the battle.

- Look at the Iran/Iraq War,

that was nine years of them fighting to a stalemate.

And you look at what the U.S. Army did

and the heavy brigade combat teams,

within a hundred hours we pushed everybody

out of Kuwait back into Iraq.

- [Narrator] It's almost closing time,

but Greg wants to get one big piece out of the way

before they call it quits.

- You can't reach up that far.

- Oh yeah I can.

That thing reaches--

- You think it'll reach over to the center of this?

I don't know, Greg.

- Yeah, I think so. Yeah, no problem.

How much you think it weighs?

- Not very much.

- We'll see.

Watch your head, Roy.

- Okay, I'm coming out.

- We don't want to hit anything important.

- The head would be the best shot.

I had a CAT scan that says it's a void there.

- Okay, close that hatch and we're done.

- [Narrator] But the BMP doesn't want to make anything easy.

- Alright Greg, give it a little bit.

Let's see what happens.

- Hold it, Greg, hold it! Hold it!

I gotta go inside there's something wrong.

- Something might be.

- Let her down.

- You got something hung up in there.

- Hold it, Greg!

There's one bolt.

- The story of our lives, right?

- I think it's a bad bolt now.

- One bolt

- Take it up!

Pop goes the weasel!

We're gonna put it on stands,

go inside and finish stripping out

everything that's there.

All the electronic components and stuff,

and go through all the wiring systems

and pull it all out and sandblast the inside.

Make it beautiful.

- Just cleaning off the remainder of the paint

that's left on the gun mantle.

So that the paint adheres a little bit better.

Turret's in excellent condition for something

this old that's been set out in the weather this long.

No big bomb holes in it or anything.

Pretty good. (chuckling)

- [Narrator] Not a bad way to end the day.

A big piece came off making way for the

inside to be restored.

But with only hours to go before he heads

back to his job in California,

Greg still can't put down his torch.

He knows this is his last chance to work

on the hull for the next two weeks.

(buzzing sounds)

(sizzling sounds)

(intense music)

Coming up, the engine struggles to come back to life.

- Come on, baby.

(soft music)

- [Narrator] Back home from two weeks in California,

Greg and his buddies get ready for the next phase

of his BMP restoration.

Greg is trying to drop his gleaming engine

back into place.

- Little bit more. Right there.

- Take it down a little. Start taking it down.

- Cable down.

- Okay, let her down, Greg. Cable down.

- Let it down.

Down.

That's it!

- No, it's not it. Take it up a little.

- Okay. You want to pick it up?

- Greg!

- Yeah? Alright!

- Take it up just a little bit,

maybe boom it back a little bit.

- [Narrator] The grime and rust from two desert wars

have been stripped away.

Now, the BMP gets prepped for a paint job.

This red is just the primer.

A standard color with body work.

- As hard a work as it is,

there is a gratification to this,

and that's when you get done and you stand back

and just look at it, man.

It's running good and looks good.

That's the reward that you get from this.

(thunder rumbling)

- [Narrator] But before they can start painting,

the desert gets soaked and the rain will not stop.

Strapped for time and cash Greg doesn't have a choice.

He's sandblasting small pieces for the BMP.

- Well, right now the rain is being relentless.

Rain, rain, rain, won't let up,

he's out there in the rain sandblasting like a dog.

I can't believe it, man.

We gotta tend to his attitude right now.

When he comes in, he's gonna want to kill something.

So, I would recommend you guys hide

when first quits sandblasting.

(buzzing sound)

- What the hell are you doing?

- Well, (beep), I'm trying to get ahead here,

while you're out there sandblasting in the rain.

- Well, yeah, I told you we were going to sandblast that.

- Yeah, but I thought I'd save us

a little bit of (beep) time.

Who in the (beep) died and left you boss?

You do it all yourself.

I don't give a (beep) if it never gets done.

- No, I'm okay.

Later, I'll kill somebody.

(buzzing sound)

It hasn't stopped raining for five days.

And normally it's like 95 degrees this time of year,

so, this is why I moved here to get away from that.

And here we are, and we're trying to get work done.

- [Narrator] To finish the BMP,

Greg wants more than shiny, pretty surfaces.

He wants the inside looking as good

as it does on the outside.

- This is my hobby, this is what relaxes me, grounds me,

not to use a pun.

- [Narrator] Yuri is a Project Manager in Silicon Valley

at one of the world's most successful

and celebrated internet companies.

He and Greg met while working at the Littlefield

collection in California.

A wizard with outdated technology,

Yuri is Greg's best hope for restoring the BMP's radio.

- The vacuum tubes are glowing,

you can measure capacitance, resistances, inductances.

You can't do any of that stuff with computers.

You can actually get your hands on

the electronics and the technology

of these radios that were made in the 1930s and the 1940s

and that's powerful for me.

(whirring sound)

(exploding sound)

- [Narrator] On the battlefield, information is a weapon.

It's as critical as ammunition or troops.

- By the time World War Two started in 1939,

the Germans had a full command and control structure

to guide their tanks.

You get a command tank,

every battle tank had a transmitter receiver.

The airplanes had radios.

You have ones that fly over,

transmit the enemy's position to the command tank,

the command tank would dispatch the battle tanks.

The French and the Polish used semaphores

in order to communicate still at this time.

You'd have the tank commander or the gunner,

get out of the hatch and start waving flags around.

Well, what does that mean?

Shoot me, I'm right here.

(exploding sounds)

- [Narrator] Fifty years after World War Two,

information on battlefield position

is still essential to winning.

In the 1991 Gulf War, the American Army learned

that vital lesson.

Communication across a theater of action

was essential to a coordinated attack.

Fighting against the BMPs,

the Bradley's communication technology

was head and shoulders above the Iraqis.

Computers, GPS and solid state technology,

handily defeat the BMP's 60s era com systems.

- You can just spread wide across the battlefield,

so you've got a lot of independent operators out there.

Your platoon leaders, platoons start operating a

group of four Bradleys at a time

and to control that and those fires,

because these fires reach three kilometers.

So, if you fire at a sector,

three kilometers with armor piercing round,

you can ruin someone's day you don't want to mess with.

- [Narrator] Lieutenant Colonel Bill Sheehy

commanded a Bradley before they went digital.

- It was just analog,

we talked on radios to each other,

we had flags we would signal with.

- [Narrator] The current A3 Bradleys used highly

sophisticated digital communication systems.

- This allows us to link all the weapons,

platforms, the Bradleys and A1s together,

to maximize lethality.

- These Bradleys were built with lessons learned

from the Gulf War.

And in that we had a tactical navigation system.

We had a laser range finder,

and many other enhancements that helped us

be able to shoot, move and communicate on the battlefield.

Since then, the A3 has been introduced,

which allows us to track two targets at the same time

and kill two targets almost simultaneously.

(shooting sounds)

- [Narrator] Greg and his volunteers have sandblasted

every inch of the BMP.

They've ground away loose ends

and repaired the battle damage.

They've replaced hundreds of meters of wiring.

They've got parts moving that haven't budged in decades.

- Down just a little bit.

- [Narrator] And it all culminates in this milestone,

turning on the engine.

- Okay, here we go.

Master switch, this is the flame test.

(rumbling sound)

Come on, baby.

Okay, what's wrong here?

(whirring sound)

Here we go.

(rumbling sound)

(cheering)

- [Narrator] Incredibly, Greg's mail order Czech engine

has exploded to life on the second try.

But there's too much smoke.

- Okay, we had good oil.

- I think we have or I probably have air in the fuel lines

is what's happened.

When it crapped out, it just gotta get the fuel up

from the back of the tank.

That's all.

- I'm checking for oil leaks,

so it's very important that we jump on it right away.

All this is doing is blowing out smoke.

That ain't nothing.

And maybe if it backfires a little bit

and does its thing, it's alright,

because we don't a flame to ignite any of the diesel

that's running out.

- These things smoke when you start them up anyway.

- Yeah, they do.

- And, this engine probably hadn't been run in 20 years.

So, it's gotta clean itself out

and we're gonna drive it and it'll be fine.

- [Narrator] It's close, but not quite there.

Roy and Greg are going to take another shot at the engine.

- Everything is history.

- [Narrator] Coming up, the Cold War veteran is

going to make Greg's life pure hell.

- Greg it looks awfully good.

You can still sit in it.

- Yeah, it's pretty.

It doesn't do any good to be pretty.

Gotta work.

- [Narrator] While this BMP waits months

to come back to life,

these Bradleys are reborn and sent back

to the war in Iraq at a rate of eight a day.

The overhaul is part of the U.S. Military's reset process.

- When you get back, you go through reset.

You get your equipment turned in,

you reset personnel and you start your training cycle

as soon as you possibly can to get ready to go back.

Because there's two things,

you're either in the fight

or you're trained to go back into the fight.

And that's the reality of today.

There is no real break,

just prepping to go the next time.

It's not if I'm going to go again,

it's when I'm going to go again.

- [Narrator] Since Greg Taylor started

the tank overhaul on his BMP,

the BAE plant has repaired or upgraded

close to 500 Bradleys.

- Well, I'll tell you one thing right now,

if we don't get this thing running right now, today,

we're gonna jump in the T55

and we're gonna blow some (beep) up.

Cause that'll really make me feel good.

- [Narrator] There's something wrong with the BMP's engine.

Greg and Roy are working their way

through a maze of Russian wiring, tubes and pipes.

- We're not getting fuel through to the heads right now.

We got it in the filter,

but we got the governor that's low on oil right now.

We're thinking that's what's blocking the engine right now

from getting fuel.

So, I'm gonna put oil in the governor

and hopefully we'll be back in business.

- What's the deal?

(beep) again.

Well, you know what it is?

I trust people in Europe to sell me something

that they say is the way it is.

When really all they're trying to do is just screw you.

They wanna get your money

and they don't care because they're 8000 miles away.

- I said, tell Greg where he can find sympathy

between (beep) and syphilis in the dictionary.

(whirring sound)

- Okay, fire in the hole.

(engine stalling)

- [Narrator] Even the best tank experts

can be mystified by their machines.

And they don't get to call 1-800 for customer service.

- It's like it's not getting fuel.

- Well, it's not.

- I wonder why.

- It's because the....

- And you got the fuel bump on.

- Yeah, but the rack, the rod that controls the fuel

to the injectors is not moving.

It's just sitting there.

(engine rumbling)

No, it ain't gonna start.

Well, I have to make a call to somebody

that knows about BMP engine if the rod freezes up.

And he's probably gone home by now.

- (beep) it, I was gonna go join the Iraqi National Guard.

I can't do nothing now, they got crappy equipment.

- And of course the manuals don't show anything.

They don't tell you, if this happens, how to fix it.

They don't tell you.

They just tell you how to run the optics

and turn the turret around.

They don't give a (beep) it runs or not.

- You can train a monkey to do that.

- So much for the toast.

- Just another (beep) damn reason I don't like Nevada.

I'm coming home California, I'm coming home.

- [Narrator] Greg has lost this battle,

but he's determined to win the war.

For now, he's going to lay down his arms,

rest up and try again another day.

That's what makes him one of the best in the game.

Yuri manages to get the BMP radios working.

The second set is installed in Greg's T55,

another Russian tank from the Cold War.

The good thing about working with Greg is

if the restoration doesn't work out,

at least you still get to play.

(speaking Russian)

- Just driving the vehicles is like

going into a time machine.

But when you get the radios working,

it's like adding an extra dimension to that time machine.

You actually get to hear the sounds

as the soldiers heard it inside the tanks

back when these were brand new

and top of the line technology.

- [Narrator] After a lifetime of repairing busted vehicles,

Greg has no illusions about how much more work

and struggle are left with his BMP.

- [Greg] They used to say you do what you love

and the money will come.

That's not true anymore.

The money doesn't come.

- [Narrator] With Greg's passion and dedication,

the BMP will one day be back.

But right now he has little time to worry

about how exactly he's going to get his BMP finished.

It's Sunday, and he's got to head back to California,

to be at his job Monday morning.

He'll return in two weeks,

ready for another round on the tank overhaul battleground.

(intense music)