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  • 3 months later...

Well guys.... don't knock it 'til you try it...!!!

FH16 XL 750hp.... as the Brits would say... "it's the dogs bollocks"

Two different standards... N America and Europe.... different roads, vehicle lengths and weights....

Would it work over here??? well, there is thought at Volvo, MAN and Daf (Paccar) to do just that. From what I read there is interest in allowing longer trailers here and even steerable combination trailers to optimise new cubic demands from light weight high volume shippers and you will need a cabover to remain withing legal length requirements.

Will it happen, big maybe... it's all down to the big freight guys, dollars/profit and of course the lobbyists and their closely tied legislators. Will the trucker be included in the discussions?... most likely not. Figure on 'cab shrinkage' being part of fuel mileage gains.

Volvo USA have got a bad rap, do they deserve it? I say yes.... and not because I'm a Mack owner but by analasis of their poor USA performance and product to date. Improvements are coming as an offshoot of the FH program, it is a long derivitive of the F88/89 program of the 60's which, in its time, was the king of Europe and the middle east (sorry Scania fans) which then begat the F10/12.

Am I biased?, as a cabover guy who started out with this F88... you decide..!!!

BC Mack

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It is proberly a great truck, easy to drive and easy on the driver, but dang what ever happen to style, They could make it look a little better, i mean some people would say cabovers are ugly and they would not drive one, but the old f model macks and the mh are really sharp old trucks, look at the older trucks like the k 100's and the old freightliners, man they made some good looking trucks, i look at that thing and thank, who thanks that is a good looking truck?

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There is indeed a market for shorter BBC trucks here- for example the Dakotas allow doubles but have a 110 foot overall length limit, so you'd need a cabover or short conventional to pull double 48s. In Michigan the loggers prefer a truck and trailer combination, but with the 70 foot length limit and a conventional they have to pile the logs higher than they like... Another potential market for a cabover. In overlength permit loads like wind turbines, the truckers that haul them are complaining that the Titan pushes them over the 95 foot threshold where escorts are required.

Put an FH cab on a thoroughbred Mack chassis with build-to-order options and Mack would have a small but profitable market. Add a shorter BBC Titan and they'd add a bunch more profitable sales. Heck, they could turn the Titan into a whole model line of custom built ultra heavy duty trucks.

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AAAARRRRRGGGGHHHH!!!

wrote a long reply and the 'puter swallowed it and sent it into cyber-somewhere... supposed to copy before sending, just-in-case, right!!!

anyway... here are the two videos I added to show EU "concept" steerable trailers currently in test awaiting legislation... cubic optimisation within legal length laws. Rather than the Ozzie road-train or our Canadian Super B's these are designed for tight EU roads, lane width and roundabouts etc.

BC Mack

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cabovers will never catch on here in north america again. we prefer style over function . we load alot of canadian flatbed haulers with logs and almost all of them have peterbilt 389 or kw w900. with 250 to 280 wheelbases and a huge gap between trailer and truck. they have all kinds of trouble getting into log landings 15 yrs ago the canadians were running more practical trucks . its the same with dump truckers around my area. half of them have big long nose paccars and 15 or 16 liter engines in there tri axle dumps. so they loose a couple tons of payload to have a "cool " large car truck. to haul 69000 lb gross weight on a triaxle in vermont its crazy to me again 15 yrs ago you didnt see this . it just seems dumb to me . but hey its a free country

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