Japanese trucks - post your thoughts here

Not make specific, just a place to throw impressions, likes/ dislikes and opinions around. This is partly my own experience and partly inspired by comments like this from [zb] anorak on the synchro box thread:

Why can’t the Japs make lorries? They do everything else to a high standard, but the best thing you hear on this forum about them is “basic but it works”.

As far as smaller capacity vehicles go (say up to 7.5TGVW), they don’t seem too bad. They’re light, pedal efforts are light, steering is light (if sometimes too light and feel-less) and economical. On the debit side, they can be cramped, limited seat adjustment, the interiors are really nasty and don’t start me on their auto boxes…

The market for medium weight wagons (say up to 9-10T payload 4-wheelers) is dominated here in Oz by Jap trucks - Isuzu, Hino, Mitsubishi (Fuso), UD (Nissan Diesel). Again they’re light but the cabs are at best functional, the steering is too light and the engines all need a good poke with a sharp stick. I guess if that’s what you’re used to it’s no big deal, but I was brought up on European wagons in the 80s which even back then mostly were about developing good torque figures at lower revs, so coming from say an FL6 Volvo (in Britain) to a Hino FF (in Oz) was a helluva shock. As I said elsewhere I’ve recently driven a (new) Hino GH 1728 6-legger (24T gross) which I didn’t like very much at all (I thought it was a slug and hard to see out of), and when I got in the much older Merc 2328 (same GVW) I realised how much better the Merc was.

I’ve not had the privilege (if that’s the word) of driving Jap tractors with semis (artics), so if anyone has any experience with them by all means give us your impressions, warts and all. Over here there are quite a few more Hinos and Mitsis appearing towing semi-trailers around on local distribution work than before so they must be finding favour.

OTOH I know from reading here that the 8-legger Hino is a good tipper - rugged, good traction and cheap to run.

So, Jap trucks - whaddaya think? Good, not so much, or not at any price thank you?

Thanks for the quote! Australia and New Zealand are the places to compare the World’s vehicles, because they take all comers- Euro, US and Japanese. According to one of the other Jap truck threads, the Hino 8 wheelers were seen as unsophisticated but reliable. The cabs were not liked, due to being cramped and having flimsy interior trim. Those middleweight lorries must be cheaper to buy (in Oz) than the Euro ones, if they dominate that market (Incidentally, how do the US middleweights compare?). Why the Japs don’t just get their act together and make a better job of them, is what confuses me. Their cars are competitive, so is their earthmoving equipment. Somewhere in betweeen sits commercial vehicles, and on those products they seem to struggle.

Japanese trucks are designed by the Japanese, for the Japanese… and then they sell them to the rest of the world. The closest they have come to a European truck is the Hino 700 Series.

I can remember laughing at Japanese motorcycles ,then Japanese cars …one day they will !! get it right

syramax:
I can remember laughing at Japanese motorcycles ,then Japanese cars …one day they will !! get it right

Hiya …just what i thought… benley honda 125 hahahah…then a 5cylinder 125 racer that reved to 18,000rpm…no joke.
the 250 honda dream another bike to smile at…then the 297…6 cylinder cr51…not to smile at.
maybe just a waiting game. it’ll be no use saying i want a scania, if its japaneese and cheap you’ll drive it or get out.
they can’t be worse that a leyland buffalo can they.
John

syramax:
I can remember laughing at Japanese motorcycles ,then Japanese cars …one day they will !! get it right

They would have done it by now. The basic designs could have been copied and adapted years ago, then it would have been a simple case of following trends, improving the specifications when necessary and treating reliability and cost of manufacture as the only important engineering criteria. This is what they have done with cars, motorbikes, tellies etc, but it has not happened with lorries. The Hino 8 wheeler is still regarded as nothing more than a basic workhorse, with a flimsy interior and dodgy control layout- at least according to the comments on here. If the Japs had done the same as as they did with cars, a Hino tractor unit would be seen as a more reliable Volvo, but it is not. Europe would be full of Hinos, Fusos, Nissans etc, and those makers would have products in every market segment, right up to 700bhp “supertrucks”.

It would be too easy to say that the Japs are good at consumer products, but fall short when function and durability are paramount. This is not true, because their machine tools are popular, as are their diggers, site dumpers etc. Hitachi and Komatsu are not, as far as I am aware, regarded as cheap and nasty machines.

I can think of two products which European makers seem to have the lead over the Japanese:

1. JCB still builds a competitive JCB. If you want a tracked machine- a “Hymac”- you would probably end up with an Hitachi or similar but, if a traditional JCB is required, the original seems to be best. The JCB products seem to have an image of innovation about them, whereas their competitors just make “me-too” products.

2. Land Rover still competes strongly with the Japs all over the World. While the Japanese 4x4s may be more reliable, Land Rover’s products seem to have the “premium” end of the market to themselves. Farmers will pay more for a Defender, than a Jap pickup, for its superior off-road and towing abilities. No amount of tinsel will make a Japanese 4x4 estate car as desirable as a Discovery or Range Rover, so LR is able to charge a huge premium for these vehicles.

Could it be that the heavy lorry market is similar to those two? Clever, cutting-edge design, innovation and styling are essentials for a maximum weight tractor unit. Basic function and reliability are not enough to sell such vehicles at a good profit.

Japanese trucks have the light end of the truck market down here, after all what’s the point of bringing a product from the other side of the world when there are plenty available form just up the road. The home Japanese heavy truck market rarely gets over heavy ridigds so there’s not much requirement for there truck builders to go any bigger than what they require for them selves.
A bloke down here had a Hino running a b double set up on timber out of the forrests a few years back, I always saw it parked up at the side of the road with a recovery truck in front of it. I’m not sure the deal he got but I assume it was cheaper than the usual KW, Mack, Western Star, Volvo’s being offered, and some say it was on a prooving ground thing for Hino. I think it was pushing about 450 hp, but I never run beside it so I can’t give it a comparason.
I think for a light to meduim truck doing metro deliveries they wouldn’t be to bad, I wouldn’t like to put them in front of a triple set and haul east west on a weekly run, regardles of what the adds say. Toll seem to have a load of them on city and short haul work, and if they were breaking down all over the place they would have got the heave a long time ago. My first truck was a Ford D series, as far as I was conserened it was rubbish, but it usually got the job done, they’re no worse than that. Guvnors motors!!!

There are very few JCB’s in Australia as no one rates them, most backhoe operators I work with recon that JCB stands of Just a C*&t of a Backhoe. I never rared Land Rovers even when I lived in the UK.

Jeff…

Hey, Nowadays we have the Japs here in the light class and they are good,a car garage can work on so everything OK. But in the 70’s we had Hino in the big class for those days they were not bad,but not up to the Europeans. The lack of service points and back up killed them off,and surrely for International work. After a while you could find a Scannie engined Hino with a ZF box in it. But if it came to specific parts you had to sell it because of lack of parts no import anymore. Only Hino was here (and by accident because an importer lost the UNIC import caused by the IVECO group). And it was the time in the mid 70’s that everything was trying to sell here. Some were good one’s other very bad,but all were killed off by bad service. First for international work not useable because some were not sold in other countries. I think that it was the same with British marques too, no service points outside Britain. A marque may as good as possible but always you need service.
An anecdote (“Transconti” we only had one real truck garage in Belgium for it) otherwise you arrived at a dealer (it was rainning) the entrance was too low and if… they couldn’t tip the cab garage too low again,no parts so to order,a mecanic used to work on a Ford ■■■■■■ or a D serie of 6 tons,ooh la la a ■■■■■■■ engine a Fuller box SORRY DRIVER I DON’T NOW HOW TO WORK ON. And of couse the mecanic complaining it’s cold and rainning to the chief.
but japs in other things are strong and good cars motercycles electonics and so on.
One’s a GERMAN told me they are good if they are no better as our…!!! and that means something doesn’t it.

Bye Eric,

Oz and NZ people- do you have any experience of these?
commercialmotor.com/big-lorr … ineswere-g

I’ve seen some reports in the trade press but never heard of any on the road yet, nor have I heard of any one having the doors blown of by a mighty Jap Road Train. But give it time. The latest thing is that Kenworth are now going to up grade the 13 liter Daf motor to run big power as a replacement for Cat motors which they can’t get any more. They are already running the Daf motor in the SAR range but only on Euro spec at (420 bhp) at Euro 6 regs which aren’t due to kick in here until 2018.

Jeff…

I think they have stopped making that model now. There are loads of interesting Japanese wagons from the 1970s onwards, all with big naturally-aspirated multi-cylinder engines. Unfortunately, most of the websites that Google finds are in Japanese. That one seems to have been the biggest of them all- a 30 litre V10, no turbo and 600bhp, all under a cab no bigger than a low-datum Leyland T45’s! I would have thought that it would have been ideal for the Oz roadtrain market.

How about this one, from a decade or so earlier:
youtube.com/watch?v=25n80IunlvY

Did you translate that right… 30 liter v 10 no turbo, it sounds like some kind of marine engine. Does it say what kind of weight is in it■■?
The Australian Road Train market isn’t really that big, the biggest problem is getting the chassis right to drag the weight. I used to run at 103 ton which is about right for general freight, and the torque going through the chassis is the main thing to deal with, which is why we run double chassis’s, one C section folded inside the other. The older ones used to be home made, but thankfully now they come from the factory like that.
Most of the guys running Road Trains are fairly set in their ways and I don’t thing many would take the chance at running something so different. As I mentioned before there use to be a guy down here that had a Hino running a B Double log jinker but it didn’t last more than 6 months. The transport mags have adds saying they are going to be the next big thing, but they’ve been running those adds for years and have only seen a few about, mainly up near Brisbane.
Any one doing line haul is going for US and big European first. I wouldn’t like to think how much a Hino or ND would be worth if you took it back for a trade in at 3 years, if it had been hauling a triple set round the clock with 1,000, 000 k’s on it.

Jeff

I had a brand new SY283 (I think that’s what they were called) in 1988. F156WCW. It was a 280hp IIRC and it had a twin splitters in it.

My memory tells me it had steering that was too light and totally lacking in feel, the brakes were bad, scary bad. The exhaust brake was as much use as mudflaps on a tortoise. The gearstick felt as if it was connected to the gearbox by rubber bands.

The cab was not designed for someone of European dimensions, no legroom, no headroom, the bunk was a ■■■■ take and the interior plastics made a FIAT look expensive. The quirky mirror positioning was a joke too.

You can probably tell, I wasn’t a fan and moaned so much that I got my old C reg F10 back.

I also had a go of the naturally aspirated 8x4 version, that was a totally different experience, a good solid tipper chassis that was surprisingly good on a tip.

Being passed by 3025 Mercs however revealed its shortcomings in the get up and go department.

My verdict…FAIL

Jelliot:
Did you translate that right… 30 liter v 10 no turbo, it sounds like some kind of marine engine. Does it say what kind of weight is in it■■?

Jeff

Here’s the list of engines they fitted. I think it’s from the early 1990’s:

isuzu engines.JPG525×516 36.5 KB

Yeh I see the chart 30.39 liter 600 bhp I don’t know what happened to it. It seems a bit odd considering most other engine manufacturers were using 10, 12, or 14 liter engines around that time. 30 liter V10 was pretty well out there !!!
I’m sure some one will have one sitting in a shed somewhere, wouldn’t mind finding out what happened to them.
I was down here in 91 and Volvo were running development trials on what was then the F16 motor, I think it was a DT161, some of the drivers were saying it was pushing 660 bhp but the fuel was out ( down as low as 2 to the gallon ) as they didn’t have the computers and electronics they use now a days.
When I was on for Road Masters we were part of a similar program for Volvo and I had one of the FH’s on line haul doing triples to the NT, the only problem we had was getting stuck behind everything else. Fuel was good but they dropped the power out put after a couple of months and the fuel went up a bit more. By the way it was going compared to other trucks at the time I would guess around top side of 800 bhp. My mate took it out light at 80 tons and was pretty certain it was close to 10 hp per ton in comparison to other trucks he was driving at the time.

Jeff…

There’s loads of it. They were mass-producing 8, 10 and 12 cylinder engines, for use in lorries, all through the 1970s, '80s and '90s, with capacities starting at 15 litres then going up from that. This is the country that gave the World sensible, reliable cars, for Christ’s sake. When it came to commercials, they just added extra iron, willy-nilly, or so it seems. The old lorry fraternity should be drooling all over historic Jap trucks.

You just have to look at the Decatora trucks to see how mad they are, the ones with all the stainless and built in laser light displays.

Jeff

Jelliot:
You just have to look at the Decatora trucks to see how mad they are, the ones with all the stainless and built in laser light displays.

Jeff

Those things are as daft as a box of frogs, aren’t they? Euro and US custom trucks are silly enough, but when the added fluff is bigger than the vehicle itself…

I’m more interested in the reasons for them using such monstrous engines. 20+ litres was normal, from the 1970s onwards. I think I remember reading that turbo lag was unacceptable, in the stop-start conditions of crowded Japanese cities. It still seems like a desperate solution to the need to keep up with the traffic, though. Thank God for different cultures.

Jelliot:
I think for a light to meduim truck doing metro deliveries they wouldn’t be to bad, I wouldn’t like to put them in front of a triple set and haul east west on a weekly run, regardles of what the adds say. Toll seem to have a load of them on city and short haul work, and if they were breaking down all over the place they would have got the heave a long time ago.

As you say there’s little point paying extra for a light or medium Euro truck (unless there are sound commercial reasons to wear the extra cost), and in the main Jap trucks are alright for the job, providing you don’t expect much. At the heavy end I had a yarn with the bloke who drives a Hino 700 series with a stepframe tautliner doing Melb-Sydney for the mob I work for and he said… well I can’t say the exact words he used cos I’ll be banned, but complimentary he was not. Coming from the other direction (Queensland-Sydney) the wagon is a Merc 2644 which is a few years old now, and its driver is not at all looking forward to the day the Merc goes and is replaced by… a Hino.

So while the bigger Jap tractors (prime movers) may be adequate on short-hop or multi-drop runs, I would hazard a guess and say that even the tight-ar$es at Toll will figure out they just will not (and cannot) cut the mustard on linehaul or interstate work. And as you mention in another post, a thoroughly used Hino or ND will be worth both halves of Sweet Fanny Adams at 3 years old. I’m no expert but I’m not even sure a Jap truck chassis would be up to the punishment anyway.

newmercman:
I had a brand new SY283 (I think that’s what they were called) in 1988. F156WCW. It was a 280hp IIRC and it had a twin splitters in it.

My memory tells me it had steering that was too light and totally lacking in feel, the brakes were bad, scary bad. The exhaust brake was as much use as mudflaps on a tortoise. The gearstick felt as if it was connected to the gearbox by rubber bands.

The cab was not designed for someone of European dimensions, no legroom, no headroom, the bunk was a ■■■■ take and the interior plastics made a FIAT look expensive. The quirky mirror positioning was a joke too.

You can probably tell, I wasn’t a fan and moaned so much that I got my old C reg F10 back.

I also had a go of the naturally aspirated 8x4 version, that was a totally different experience, a good solid tipper chassis that was surprisingly good on a tip.

Being passed by 3025 Mercs however revealed its shortcomings in the get up and go department.

My verdict…FAIL

Recently I managed an experiment of sorts .

On three separate days I drove 3 of the 23T GVW 6-leggers at the depot I work at back to the yard on the same route. All runs were with the wagons empty, all runs in daytime and all in reasonably similar traffic conditions. The “test” course (see google maps HERE) involves a stretch of dual carriageway that runs down a hill, over Woronora Bridge and up the other side (from East to West). On all three occasions I was not blocked or baulked by any other vehicles. The speed limit for the stretch of road used is 80km/h (50mph).

The three wagons “tested” in the order I happened to drive them were:
#1 2005 Merc 2328/ MB 8-speed range change synchro/ 11.3m tautliner;
#2 2013 Hino 500-series 1728/ Eaton 8-speed synchro/ 11m tautliner;
#3 2005 Merc 2328/ MB 8-speed range change synchro/ 11.5m flatbed.

I did my darndest and made sure three things were constant - firstly that I wasn’t going to get baulked by traffic in front of me at any point (not as easy as it sounds), second that I was in 8th (top gear) and third I was doing exactly (as indicated) 80km/h at the bottom of the hill.

In top gear, doing 80km/h at the bottom of the hill…
#1 topped the hill at 75km/h in 8th (still in the green band on the tacho)

#2 went down to 7th and topped the hill at just over 60km/h (and had the hill been longer would have slowed even more)

#3 romped up the hill in 8th at a constant 1750rpm and topped it at 80km/h.

The difference between #1 and #3, both being Merc 2328s of similar age and mileage, is probably just down to wind drag. A little of the difference between the Mercs and the Hino (#2) could be partly due to the Hino still being a bit tight, but all the same… What the figures don’t and can’t show is how lively the Mercs are to drive and how gutless the Hino feels (it has neither torque in its indicated “green band” nor power above it).

A bit further along the same road is an incline that made the Hino slow from 80 to 75 but that neither Merc even noticed (in fact #3 would have accelerated up it).

(Yes I know this “test” wouldn’t pass any sort of scientific scrutiny, but whatever. For me the results give a hint as to how a wagon shapes up in typical ordinary use. And besides, I enjoyed doing it.)

PS - I am no fan of the Merc ‘slap-over’ range change, but I expected a lot better of the Eaton synchro box in the Hino. It has long fore/aft throws (so long forward that 1st/ 5th feel out of reach), a notchy gate and an uneven feel across the gates. Perhaps that’s just Hino’s installation(?)