RoadwayR

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/ford-trucks-iveco-sign-memorandum-123000707.html

Met a GMC engineer years ago, and he told me that a Cummins powered Brigadier city tractor had the lowest cost-per-mile of any class 8 truck at the time according to their statistics. Yellow seemed to agree.......

Look like Shyft will support the new Isuzu plant in South Carolina as an upfitter: https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/the-shyft-group-and-isuzu-expand-collaboration-to-drive-long-term-growth-in-north-america-302384537.html

I can't help but wonder if Otosan would be better off if they could get out from under Ford at this point and align with Traton or Daimler, at least on the commercial truck side. Otosan's impressive commercial trucks are a home-grown effort, I see very little support or involvement from Ford other than the 'Ford' emblems on the trucks and a periodic mention of the operation around shareholder meeting time. Otosan is a small regional truck manufacturer with impressive product and good market share where they are active, but no way will Ford ever bring them to North America. I believe Otosan is still the lead manufacturing center for the Transit in Europe, but with Ford's European market share plummeting to 3.3% the business case for staying in Europe is becoming difficult. Should Ford pull out perhaps Otosan could maintain the Transit franchise in Europe themselves or with another partner. With Ford under Farley in the U.S. being such a hot mess these days perhaps the right move for Ford would be to sell off all European operations and spend the money where it's really needed, paying for warranty work in North America. I'll bet Stellantis would buy it!

Interesting statement that the plant will initially produce N Series gas and EV along with F series diesels. I wonder what may be coming. I also wonder if the contract with the Shyft Group will end. https://www.truckinginfo.com/10235847/isuzu-announces-south-carolina-truck-assembly-plant

Any news on this? I did hear Freightliner was interested, but now word is don't expect the Octane in the M2 until maybe 2006 or later. Other than Freightliner's 'maybe' there seems to be a total lack of interest among OEM's. Or maybe it's a 'wait-and-see' if there is any buyer interest.

You may have a valid point about Argentina, perhaps supporting it is that they did things quite a bit differently than Brazil. As far as Chevy trucks are concerned, Brazil manufactured their own engines (keeping the old 261 around until 1981 or so) and had their own distinct sheetmetal. Bedfords were sold in Argentina, and some of their 'Chevys' looked a lot like Bedford J series trucks. I'll defer to your opinion on the Bedford 6's vs. the Chevy 6's, I was just going by the copy in the flyer! I did like the old 'Mexican' 292, my employer had a lot of them and they gave good service. And 'Mexico' was cast right in the side of block above the starter. Only Bedford engines here in the U.S. were some 220 and 330 diesels marketed by Detroit Diesel for industrial use. They had a good reputation.

Australian Bedford TK's and TJ's received the familiar Chevrolet 250 and 292 in-line 6's in the mid-70's, replacing the reliable but somewhat dated Bedford 214 and 300.

Here are a couple of other interesting examples of GM cross-breeding. First up is a '67-'72 Chevrolet C/50 powered by the Bedford 300 6 cylinder diesel for Argentina. By best guess as to a reason for this truck was the D478 Toroflow diesel was too large and the Detroit 4-53 was too expensive for the market.

Thanks for the reply. I've always been intrigued by the Holden V-8. Naturally never saw one here in the U.S., but from pictures it looks like a cross between a Chevy Small Block and a Buick 350. Looked like a very nice design.

Speaking of GM trucks in Australia, I just found out that GMH built some Bedford TK's with Holden V-8's in the late 70's-early 80's. How did that work out? Wonder if that was the inspiration for the Chevy Small-Block V-8 powered Isuzu NPR's that have been so popular for the last 30 years.

Forgive me for resurrecting this old thread, but I am doing a little research on the earlier Mack V-8's and have a few questions. First off, according to some of my old service manuals, the 864's had a different bore and stroke than the 865/866's. The 864 being 5 X 5.5 vs. 5.5 X 5 for the later engines. The rod journals are also quite a bit larger. I am wondering if the 864 had crankshaft issues? I also see the 864's used a Bosch PSJ rotary pump, and some of the later V-8's used a Bosch APE in-line. I know the PSJ's could be trouble, at least they were on GMC Toroflows. Thanks.

More like the return of the CUCV, but yeah, the LUV name is back.

Hard to say what they are up to. The plant did work for both Toyota and Hino in the U.S.. Toyota has been very unhappy with Hino since the emissions scandal, and I hear Hino production has been hampered since they switched to Cummins engines in the U.S.. And that's after nearly a year of no production. Might be looking at the beginning of a spin-off, or a withdrawl from the U.S. market. Anybody's guess at this point.

https://www.commercialappeal.com/story/money/business/2024/06/04/hino-motors-arkansas-plant-closing/73978031007/

I saw Mack had an MD on display at the ACT show this year, and there was something about it having a Powertrain Solutions International engine in it. Is Mack going to offer a propane or gasoline option in the MD? Can't find any specific imformation about the truck that was displayed.

That's not part of the Common Tactical Truck program, is it?

This rumor has been more-or-less confirmed, but still no word on what the engine is going in to.

Who is going to offer it? I heard Freightliner in the M2 for one.

I like Isuzu's. A lot of them here are Chevy gasoline V-8 powered. Now the FTR's and FVR's are available with Cummins diesels.

There was a point in time during the mid-80's that Detroit Diesel was talking to Deere about forming a joint venture. Deere was involved with the development of the 60 Series and Detroit was looking to market the mid-range Deere diesels as highway engines. From what I understood at the time things were going well between Detroit and Deere until Roger Penske made GM an offer for Detroit Diesel that GM couldn't refuse. And that was that. BTW, Paul, were Chevy medium duties common in Australia in the 70's and 80's?

Speaking of diesels, they built a few with Toroflows in '73 and '74. I have NEVER seen one, but I have seen a few with the GMC gas V-6. Around 1986 they built a few with Deere diesels and even some with 6 cylinder air cooled Duetz diesels.

There was a lumber yard near my that had a couple of C-60's with 4-53T power. You could hear them coming a long ways off! The 8.2L V-8 diesel replaced the 4-53T sometime around 1980 in those trucks.

I don't think the 292's ever had the integrated head/manifold. I only saw 250's with that, both 1 bbl. and 2 bbl. with split exhaust manifolds. The 2 bbl. versions ran pretty good and didn't seem to crack as bad as the earlier 1 bbl.'s. The 4 bbl. 4.3L V-6 was much better though.

I sent a lot of time driving those things. Had good power with a 366 or 427 gas engine, great turning radius if the wheelbase wasn't too long. Didn't like changing the spark plugs if the truck had air brakes.