For MSFC, there is no requirements that boot loader have to be at certain version for a particular MSFC IOS. The boot loader in the MSFC is used for disaster recovery as if you do not have it and the MSFC will not boot the IOS, you will have to do an xmodem. The IOS in MSFC does not need boot loader to load an IOS. On MSFC3 there is no longer a boot loader.
I do not know for the routers if the same is true.
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