GearheadGrrrl

Or if you want to keep it a little closer to purebred, ex-Postal Service Macks are going for less than $5000. They give you a 300 horse Mack engine, Allison automatic, and a bunch of other good stuff to swap into your classic Mack.

Probably the 300 Maxidyne with a 5 or 6 speed or the 350 Econodyne with a 10 or 12 speed. Either combination works well. BTW, I suspect most of the MHs built were single axles (MH612s) for UPS. They were a sweet truck, and the finest high tilt cabover I've ever driven.

In the announcement of Daimler's sale of Chrysler, CEO Dieter said that Daimler would become a manufacturer or premium vehicles. Freightliner and Sterling are not premium vehicles. Perhaps a hint that Freightliner and Sterling will be next on the auction block?

I've had the displeasure of driving Freightshakers for over a million miles. I've experienced their kluged together "engineering", rough ride, and "reliability" that kept you in the lane nearest the shoulder and familiar with the fire extinguisher's location. Life is too short to waste driving Freightliners, and I drive Mack by choice. Why torture yourself with a torqueless Detroit motor and the poor manueverability of a long conventional Freightshaker? Even a Volvo would be a better bet, and a Pinnacle with MP8 engine would outaccellerate and outmanuever that too long Freightshaker while using less fuel and carrying more payload. And Mack is American made, something you soon won't be able to say about Freighliner.

I agree- the parade of new names (CH, Vision, Pinnacle) merely confuses the customer, rather than convince the customer that it's a whole new model. It would make much more sense to stick with the CH moniker, then add letters to denote variations and upgrades.

There's some interesting new stuff on the Mack website- They've resumed posting the data sheets as well as the usual glossy brochures. The new MRU is indeed impressive- 485 horses in a low tilt cab should be able to motivate the biggest concrete placers Schwing can build. The MRU would fit military applications well too- the cabover would be a great platform for the NATO DROPS container system, and it shouldn't be hard to engineer a crew cab if the military wants one. The flat panels will be a lot easier to uparmor than today's swoopy conventionals too. The U.S. is going to need to replace all the trucks lost in Iraq, and the next administration will probably be more willing to give contracts to a "foreign" manufacturer instead of giving Navistar a monolpoly as the current administration has. The other interesting development is the availability of heavier duty frame options on the Pinnacle. Acording to the data sheet, the Pinnacle is now available with the same 300 mm. tall frame rails as the Granite. Now Mack can supply a suitable truck for the operator who needs a truck with off road ability and a sleeper. There is also a substantial market of farms that need a truck that can go into the fields to load grain one week, then take a load of cattle cross country the next. In the transmission department, the Pinnacle offers a Mack exclusive 6 speed transmission for driving ease on the highway, and an 8 speed+low+lowlow for vocational applications. Good to see Mack filling out the model lineup with more options to attract more customers!

My intention is to add about 4 feet of frame and only move the box back about 18" that should put enough weight on the front end to keep her down.... Sounds about right- 4' feet more wheelbase should move the load forward enough, and by adding that little to the end of the frame you won't have to weld/bolt together the highest stress areas like around the trunion.

I wouldn't care to try any steeper grades thought- a little weight shift to the rear and the Mack'd be sittin' on her rear, and maybe even doin' a back flip!

Clearly the R model has a box too long for it's wheelbase- the center of the box, and load, is in fact behind the rear axle, so the lightness on the front axle is not surprising. I'd go for a smaller box instead of messing with the frame.

Back around 1970 I met Dick Charbenau, one of Ford's top drag racers who had raced a very successful FE powered Fairlane station wagon. That car would wheelie at will, and was known for it's ability to do wheelies at over 100 MPH when upshifting into top gear. While these theatrics were popular with the crowds, they weren't helping to win races and were way scarier than intended. Dick did some calculations and figured out that lifting the front wheels was wasting over 100 horsepower. He then redid his suspension, setting up the rear soft so the forces causing the wheelie would instead drop the rear of the car, while the front suspension was set up stiff so the the underside of the car didn't become a wing. The suspension strategy worked, and that Fairlane wagon was a winner for years to come.

Was out cruising around in my VW dieselcar in southern MN & northern Iowa yesterday. Going price for diesel was $2.89 in MN, filled up in Northwood, IA at $2.78., clerk said price was going up overnight. On the way back north on I-35 in MN saw prices up to $2.93.

David, kudos for learning to drive truck the right was- I've seen all too many of the "one week wonders" wandering the highways. I sorta knew how to drive a truck back in '77, but It was a 6 month course at the local Vo-Tech school that really made me a truck driver. There's simply too much to being a competent truck driver than can be covered in week.

I was working at Continental Baking when the 6V92s came out, and we had a bunch of them in Freightshaker cabovers. Some of them were beat pulling turnpike doubles or running against the governor all day and night and blew up before 200,000 miles. On the other hand, an old guy and I shared one, drove it 55 (we got paid by the hour), and generally babied it- it finally blew after he retired and when I was on vacation with over 600,000 miles on it. The bakeries in Oregon and Washington had some of these with 8V-92s and they were pretty reliable. I suspect the 92 series, sharing a lot of parts with the 71 series, was just too overstressed to live at full power for long. Halliburton had a whole fleet of Cruiseliner nonsleeper tandems with 6V92s also, last saw them in the late 90s in the Williston Basin. Last time I stopped by their shop there all the big trucks were gone, just some pickups and SUVs for the supervisors to ride around in-Looks like they contracted out all the real work to subbies...

Well, it's past midnight in Allentown, so I guess I can post this now: MEDIA ADVISORY- EMBARGOED UNTIL APRIL 1, 2007: Mack Truck Company Re-Introduces "B" Model and V-8 Diesels In recent years Mack and Volvo engineers while driving new Mack and Volvo show trucks observed restored Mack "B" model trucks silently coast past on gentle downhills while they still had their feet on their new trucks throttles. Later examination of these "B" models at truck shows revealed that they were not ballasted or fitted with super quiet mufflers, in fact they were quite a bit lighter than current model trucks and many had very loud exhausts. These informal "coast down" tests were the talk of Mack technicians at Allentown world headquarters. For decades Mack had been the only truck only manufacturer with their own full scale wind tunnel, which explains why Mack produced sleek, stylish trucks while their competitors delivered boxes on wheels. After Volvo bought Mack that wind tunnel fell silent, and recently Mack technicians were told to disassemble the wind tunnel and ship it to Sweden. Before they took apart the wind tunnel the technicians thought it proper to test it to make sure it was shipped in working condition. Truck production now being a couple miles away in Macungie and the keys for the Mack on display out front being missing, an employee's restored B model that he'd driven to work that day was brought into the wind tunnel. The big blades were set spinning, but the scales measured no drag at first. Finally at 50 miles per hour drag was measureable, and the tests continued to well past 100 miles per hour air speeds. The technicians were incredulous- they'd never found a truck as slippery as the "B" model. When Volvo engineers in Sweden received the results by e-mail they insisted the wind tunnel was out of calibration, and ordered that a Volvo with full aerodynamic kit be brought from the New River Valley plant to the Allentown wind tunnel. The old Mack wind tunnel gave the same drag figures for the new aero Volvo as did the wind tunnels in Sweden. One of the Mack test drivers then snuck over a new Granite with steel bumper and no aerodynamic options from Macungie to test, and it was found to be slightly slipperier than the aero Volvo. Neither new truck was anywhere near as aerodynamic as the old "B" model thought. The technicians proceeded with dismantling and shipping out the wind tunnel, finding some old body dies long hidden behind it's walls. Soon thereafter Mack received an RFP (Request For Proposal) from the military for a low profile truck. Noting that Allentown was not in a competitive state in the last election and Ohio was, Mack management figured International would get the bid and circular filed the RFP. A few weeks later a small company of uniformed Marines arrived at Mack headquarters, and the security guards at the gate were unable to convince them that they needed an appointment and firearms were not allowed on the premises. The Marine's reiterated the request for a low profile truck, and would not take no for an answer. Under military guard the old "B" model body dies were put back in service and prototypes built, but the Volvo engines were too tall and their wasn't enough room for a big enough radiator under the "B" models sleek hood. Fortunately, old military contracts for replacement tank engines still had to be honored, keeping the Mack "Magnum" V-8 engines in production to the dismay of Volvo's Swedish management. But how would a V-8 engine fit under that sleek hood when a Volvo 6 wouldn't? A tank engine has to be designed to run at all kinds of extreme angles, even upside down. Mack's tank engine had developed into a 1000 horsepower engine that didn't have to fit under the hood- it could be mounted on it's side under or behind the cab, and the radiator can be as wide as the truck. There we're initial worries about the pushrod Mack V-8's ability to meet 2007 and later emmissions standards, but new research at Mack found that the Macks pushrod engine had an advantage over the rigid Volvo overhead cam design- pushrod resonance. Much as musicians discovered that the distortion of tube type amplifiers produced a better sound than solid state amplifiers and Honda motorcycle engineers found it possible for a high performance motorcycle chassis to be too stiff, Mack found that the distortion in pushrods could produce a tunable resonance that reduced emmissions. The Volvo engines will be phased out, and the Mack V8 and it's modular engine family will become the standard powerplant for Mack, Volvo, Renault, UD, and Brockway trucks by 2010. The modular engine family will range from 3 cylinder units for light trucks all the way to V20 powerplants for the reintroduction of Mack railbusses and locomotives. Over 100 horsepower/cylinder outputs will be achieved along with full compliance with all proposed emmission standards. The new "B" model Mack is in production now and available immediately. Options include the original integral sleeper and a reintroduced 12 speed transmission with splitter, low hole, and a choice of 4 reverse ratios. The "B" model will be followed next April with the reintroduction of the "A" model medium trucks, the Mack Jr. line of light trucks to fill the gap left by the disappearance of the Power Stroke Super Duty pickups, and the "H" model cabover. 30 This communication contains certain backward looking statements that may or may not be truth, and may in fact be the products of someones wild imagination. Mack Truck Corporation is a fictional corporation that exists only in virtual reality and whose stock is worthless, but I'll be happy to sell replica stock certificates at $1000/share. Offer void in Iowa, Utah, and planet Earth. Viewer discretion advised, your mileage may vary.

Sounds like you've got a Maxidyne engine, in which case the operating range is either 1200-2100 RPM (ENDT 675 or 676, EM7) or 1000-1800 RPM (EM7L). Most of the Maxidynes used the higher RPM operating range, but there was a low RPM version built from the late 1980s throught the late 1990s. Being yours won't rev beyond 2000 RPM I suspect its the low RPM version. The transmission you have has very wide ratios- for example if you upshifted @1800 RPM the next gear will bring your RPM down to a bit over 1000 RPM. Thusly it takes a while for the revs to drop, but don't try to hurry the process. It helps a lot if the clutch brake works, but virtually every Maxidyne I've driven had no clutch brake left. With no clutch brake you'll be OK upshifting on the flats, but if you're going uphill and the truck isn't gaining much speed you may as well stay in the gear you're in and make the upshift when the road flattens out.

I think we now have an explanation for why Mack had nothing new at the Truck Show last weekend- they may have been saving it for a press conference tomorrow, April 1st. I've heard rumors of an all new truck called a "B" model...

Volvo's press conference at the Mid-America Truck Show is just winding down, not that there was much of anything new to talk about anyway- some enhancements to Volvo's "spy in the cab" system to tempt the big fleets and the VHD mixer chassis will get the stability control system that Mack's had for months. There was no Mack press conference... Perhaps it portends the future when Mack is muzzled at the world's biggest truck show and media event and half of Volvo's presentation is trickle down technology from Mack. One gets the feeling that next year's Volvo press conference will feature the "new" Volvo "Delta" triple countershaft transmission and "hi-drive" double reduction drive axles and bogie. By then Mack probably won't even be in the exhibit hall, instead exiled to a distant and dusty corner of the parking lot. I know, Mack's North American deliveries for January and February were horrible, down over 50% from last years pace. But Volvo was down over 30%, and would have done worse had Volvo not had a big inventory of pre-2007 emmissions truck to sell. Consider also that Mack has been hit by a double whammy of new emmission standards and the collapse of new home construction. Now real corporate management would dig in now and agressively market Mack- like offering Mack in every country Volvo and Renault are sold in so Mack would have some insulation from downward swings in the North American market. With little capital outlay they could add new models like sleeper cabs on the Granite chassis, oil field specials, and a sleeper cab highway tractor pre-specced for conversion to a dump truck in later life. But Noooo... remember the "merger" of Packard and Studebaker, when they first slapped Packard badges on a Studebaker, then killed off Packard completely. A few years after that Studebaker joined Packard in the automotive graveyard. I'm not about to break open my piggy bank and buy a new Granite when it will probably be orphaned in a few years. Volvo needs to send a firm message that Mack will be here for another century if they want to survive instead of flaming out in a fleet truck price war with DCX. Until I see such committment, I'll be shopping for the best R and other classic Macks I can find instead of that new Granite!

The "No Compete" clause of DCX's purchase of Fords heavy truck operations is about to expire, and Ford's truck people would love to make up for lost time. Rumor has it that an F850 tandem is ready to go, but Ford is in such bad financial shape it may never make it to market. This is complicated by the fact that Ford would have to rely on International to build it, but those corporate lovebirds have been quarrelling lately. But who knows- we might yet see a marriage of Ford and International on the steps of bankruptcy court!

I went back over and took another "drive" of the webpages. The MP7 in the highest Maxidyne rating (405 HP)has about the same peak power at the old E7 had in the highest Maxidyne rating (370 HP). Both produce a peak of a bit over 400 HP at about 1800 RPM. Both provide over 90% of peak HP in a range of from 1300-2100 RPM. The MP7 seems to lose the odd handful of horses to the E7 at 1300 RPM, but the MP7 beats the E7 for low end torque- the MP7 has slighly more torque at 800 RPM than the E7 has at 1000 RPM. So it appears that Volvo has changed from rating engines at maximum governed speed on the E7 to rating them at peak power on the MP7. That little trick deceivingly makes the MP7 look 35 horses bigger. The outputs are actually pretty similar, but remember that the MP7 has to meet tougher 2007 emmissions standards. It is also noteworthy that in a comparison with the pre-2004 E7 Maxidyne the MP7 might be the loser- those engines in the 690 series had peak torque at around 1000 RPM and a governed speed of 1800 RPM. Those engines were quite conservatively rated at 300 HP, but they pulled like a 350 if not a 400. Those low RPM Maxidynes might very well have more low speed torque than the new MP7. I suspect the 2004 emissions standards forced Mack to move the power curves on those engines to higher RPMs. The whole industry is in the same boat here- I looked at the power curves of competitors 2007 engines and they've really narrowed. Virtually every manufacturer has been forced to set their governors up from 1800 to 2100 RPMs to maintain some vestige of the old engines performance. A lot of these engines just die below 1400 RPM, and Cat has even gone so far as to suggest matching their 2007 engines with a 13 speed transmission. I suspect we'll soon see a return of the A (close) ratio 10 speed Roadranger...

I suspect a lot depends on whether your Superliner has straight frame rails or the more common Mack rails which narrow, drop, and spread in the front. Those would be quite a challenge to duplicate.

Thanks for sharing with us a first hand account of what went down at Winnsboro. IIRC, Mack tried to bust the union by moving production to Winnsboro, but the union went to court and won back those jobs... but they had to move to Winnsboro to keep them. Please share with us more of the story of Winnsboro, especially the human side of the story that we too seldom hear.

If they're working OK, I'd stick with wedge brakes- Continental Baking had them in the 1970s and they worked pretty well. To switch to S-Cam I think you'll need the complete brake assembly from the backing plates out, the chambers and pushrods, and some hoses. Unless the mounts are already there, you'll have to weld up something to hold the chambers in place too. Maybe it would be easier to swap in a cutoff...

If folks have been paying attention to the stock market, the near future is looking gloomy, especially for manufacturers of construction equipment, trucks, power units, and big ticket items in general. When business is slow (look at the drop in car loadings and new truck orders), customers put off new purchases of trucks and fix up the old. Potentially, Mack parts counters may be very busy this spring while the sales floors will be silent. If their was ever a time to beef up Mack's parts operations, this is it. Customers should have ready access to everything from new door panels for their old DM or R through rebuilt engines and powertrain to whole new cabs and glider kits. If the parts are NLA, order up more, they're going to sell for sure! Instead of the "Not Invented Here" attitude, Mack needs to work in partnership with the aftermarket and even the junk yards to insure that the parts needed to keep every Mack made for at least two decades back are still available. Or how about mining those unsold '97 Postal Service Macks for cores to make into a rebuilt E7+Allison automatic package- it'd be a big seller! Customers will reward good service with new orders when business improves. In my "fleet" I have 4 motorcycles, 3 of them BMWs and the 4th a Harley product. The Harley product was cheap, but despite being a 2001 model I am having to wait a week or more for common parts like alternator stators and such. My newest BMW is a 1992, and the others date from 1983 and 1984. When BMW introduced a new line of 2 cylinder motorcycles in the mid 1990s they decided to reduce support for the old models in hopes of forcing their owners into buying the new model. That strategy failed, as owners of the old BMWs refused to buy a new one when BMW wouldn't support the old models that were only a couple years out of production. Lately BMW has rethought their policy, establishing a department in parts to insure supply for the older BMWs and putting NLA parts back into production. I buy a new motorcycle every 10 years, and keep the old ones for spares. Due to Harley's poor service I may replace their product early in 2000, and I will probably replace it with a BMW. Harley will probably never be able to sell me a new motorcycle again, no matter how much cheaper they are than BMW. There's a lesson here- the customers running decade or more old Macks will be back for a new truck someday. If Mack treats them well now at the parts counter, they'll come back to the sales floor when the economy improves.