Many of you who monitor the MMR Network and also like to pay attention to the appliances and portable UiD’s may, or may not, have noticed something in regards to the MFB’s portable radios.

I’m not going to concentrate on the actual primary appliance UiD’s as there are already several resources covering this elsewhere on the net (like the Unofficial MFB Wiki Page) and if you look at the MMR Network UiD’s page on this site you’ll see the primary pattern, that being 199###, where ‘###’denotes the MFB’s appliance fleet number, or ‘Car number’ as it is more commonly referred to. So Car 028 would have a MMR Network UiD of 199028

Back to the main purpose of this blog…MFB portable radios!

Many keen observers are familiar with how appliances portables break down to identifying portables as belonging to a particular station.

As an example let’s look at the basics many will have noticed.

Pumper 50 from Fire Station 50 located in Ascot Vale will have a portable radio UiD showing as 150001, many believe this would breakdown as;

First Part = 1 = MFB
Second Part = 50 = Station 50 (Ascot Vale)
Third Part = 001 = Portable 1

Let’s pay particular attention to the Portable ID section, the third part in the above table, being the ‘001’. What many don’t realise is that this section does in fact hold even further identifying protocols, in particular the 4th and 5th digits in the overall UiD, so in essence a fourth part can be introduced.

As a comparison lets also look at another UiD of another appliance from another station, that appliance will also be a different appliance type.

A Pumper Tanker from Fire Station 52 in Tullamarine with a portable radio UiD of 152033, which many would expect to breakdown as;

First Part = 1 = MFB
Second Part = 52 = Station 52 (Tullamarine)
Third Part = 033 = Portable 33

In actual fact the 4th and 5th digits of the over MMR UiD identifies a particular appliance type. In this case the ‘03’ identifies appliances of the ‘Pumper Tanker’ type and the final 6th digit the individual portable number assigned to the appliance.

So the reality is;

First Part = 1 = MFB
Second Part = 52 = Station 52 (Tullamarine)
Third Part = 03 = Appliance Type (Pumper Tanker)
Fourth Part = 3 = Portable 3

From what I’ve been able to glean so far from various software logs and other notes is that Part 3 which is made up of the 4^th and 5^th digits should follow the below table;

As with anything there are always exceptions to the rules. For example;

Fire Station 6 Portables still use ID’s which would correspond with a Pumper even though they now use a Pumper Tanker. This is simply because their radios have not had their UiD’s updated since they changed their appliance type some time back. Fire Station 7 is another example of this.

Appliance types may change at a Station should their vehicle become unserviceable and it is replaced with a different appliance type until they get their usual appliance back from the workshops or is back online. An example of this could be when Fire Station 44’s Teleboom is taken offline and there are no spares of this type so it is replaced with a Pumper or Pumper Tanker for a period of time.

Please remember the above is a guide only and does not cover Commanders, Zone Cars, Rehab Units and the like. It also is dependent on crews returning the correct radios to the correct appliance and not moving them about at multi appliance stations.