Maxidyne

Volvo North America is experimenting with it.

With my handle of course I'm gonna argue for the Maxidyne. That said, there's applications where a conventional torque rise engine and more gears works better. But first you might want to make sure your engine is putting out the power it should- with the gearing you've got a 285 HP Maxidyne should be good for about 63 MPH on the flat at which point the 2100 RPM governor starts to shut off the fuel flow. If you're running over OK's 85,500# weight limit you might need more power to run 63 MPH, and going up to the 315 HP rating might not be enough.

Kevin, couple days ago you noted that China has loosened their overall length requirements, allowing the use of an American style short conventional with a short sleeper there. Korea and Vietnam have done similar, in fact International has been dumping a lot of their "MaxForce" trade ins there. Europe will be allowing a half meter more length to improve aerodynamics. I suspect that the current small market for conventionals has scared Ford and others away from tooling up a new heavy conventional... If the market for conventionals expands to Asia and Europe, that makes a new conventional cab heavy truck a viable investment for Ford and others. The downside is that the Chinese will expect to build it there.

Probably the best Volvo can manage is the "Club Cab" with a B series Cummins, Allison, and Meritor axles= The same low cabover KW and Pete are selling.

What happened? Did a quarter century old non compete agreement with GM expire or something?

Link to article in today's Allentown paper.

This is what a good truck ad looks and feels like... Paccar gets it!

What really stands out is that just one of Daimler's models, the Cascadia, is flirting with six figure annual production volumes. That means that Daimler can crank them out at passenger car line rates and spread the development and tooling costs over a million plus units which makes the Cascadia very profitable. Volvo can't match that volume with the VN conventionals, LR, MR, and Mack conventionals combined. And instead of selling out and retreating from big trucks, Ford could be enjoying those six figure volumes today...

As far as the manufacturer is concerned, short life span is a feature, not a bug...

Now if Ford had developed a conventional version of the F-Max alongside the cabover, they'd be introducing it into the hottest truck market in years with sales success and profitability assured...

That's why DOT and Public Works trucks usually have a short box and not much overhang over the cab.

Ford might want to make the partnership with VW a bit deeper... This would make a great next generation Mondeo/Fusion.

Looks like a nice home for a Scania V8...

From what I've read, sounds like Chrysler had a lot of unsold big trucks and cabs when they quit selling big trucks in 1975. A lot of them went into Chrysler's own interplant transport and maintenance fleets at the proving grounds and such. With an adequate supply of spare cabs to replace rusted ones, I suspect some of these 70s Dodge trucks were still in use until Daimler took over and replaced everything with Freightliners in the 90s. The truck offered for sale is probably one of the ones that came up for sale as a result of the 2010 bankruptcy.

Not surprising, given that China for awhile was the world's biggest consumer of cement...

That looks like a short hood and sleeper. IIRC, doesn't China have an overall length limit long enough for this tractor to legally pull a 40' container?

I suspect a lot of those numbers are BS, especially on the half tons. You want at least 10% of the trailer weight on the hitch with a "bumper pull" trailer, and even more with a fifth wheel... Unless they're specced properly, no way can most of these "Tonkas" safely pull the huge trailer weights they're rated for!

In the proper application an Allison is damn near indestructible... Don't ask how I know.

Yup, for a lot of drivers it just got too quiet down around 1200 RPM, so they swapped to a gearbox with more and closer gears so they could enjoy the higher RPM noise they were accustomed to. Didn't make the trucks go any faster, though...

For the late 60s 900 lbs./foot was a lot, and by the early 70s Mack upped the ante with the 285 hp. "676" and 325 hp. V8 Maxidynes. As far as gear ratios, IIRC Mack offered a 5 speed with a closer 4th to 5th split, but it didn't sell well. After cabover sales dropped off and the shift gate no longer had to fit in the couple inches between the drivers seat and doghouse Mack solved this problem with the 300 series Maxitorque, featuring a closer .71 ratio split between top and the next gear down.

I agree- A clutch is going to need too frequent replacement in stop and go traffic, and automating that clutch as well as the transmission doesn't change that... A torque converter equipped transmission like the Allison is the way to go.

The big fleets don't care, if they can only get $10k for a 5 year old tractor because it has an automatic that's about to expensively break and a monster integrated sleeper, that's just more depreciation they can use to reduce their income taxes. One of the advantages Mack had was that a new OTR truck could be specced with a removable sleeper, thicker frame, and heavier axles so the 2nd owner could easily convert it into a heavy duty straight truck or lightweight day cab tractor.

Unless the other makers are exporting some engines, looks like only Cummins has the six figure volume needed to be profitable. Makes one wonder if the truck makers are favoring their own engines just to control a bit of the market, and they'd make more profit at least on new sales if they just bought engines from Cummins instead of building their own?

I agree, Ford looks for 6 figure annual production volumes and they're unlikely to achieve that with a Class 6-8 conventional. So a jacked up aluminum pickup cab is probably the best we can expect, unless they do something daring like putting a hood on the F-Max...

Ford in North America has an incredible ability to screw up a good thing...