MAN’s TGS 32.400 8×4 BB tipper chassis is a true multi-tasker!
By Steev Hayes
Photography Steev Hayes
German truck manufacturer MAN has an enviable reputation for building ultra-tough, heavy-duty trucks. Any operator involved in the demanding and punishing muckaway business who has experience with MANs will more than likely sing their praises.
One operator running some battle-weary old MAN 8×4 muckaway tippers on the construction of the Silverstone bypass several years ago admitted: “They are very good trucks for this type of work, because you just can’t break them!”
MAN produces three types of 8×4 tipper to suit different levels of on/offroad work. There’s the heavy-duty tipper (the 35.400 as tested in Trucking, February 2013), the one tested here – considered an intermediate version – and a lighter chassis aimed at operators hauling aggregates and not venturing off-road too much, and certainly not into the mire muckaway trucks often cope with.
Best of both
Being sort of half-and-half, this one can be used for some off-road work and an aggregates/muckaway mix. Hence it has some of the attributes of the full-blown muckaway truck, but is built a bit tamer.
For example, this version has a lighter body (a 7 mm chassis, as opposed to the heavy-duty version’s 8 mm chassis), a fixed lower step (there are other options), hypoid rear axle and drop beam front axles – not the hub reduction rear axle, straight beam front axles and ‘swinging’ lower step of its H-D brother.
The truck is geared more for on-road running, the hypoid axle set-up offering more in the way of economy on longer runs. It does, however, share the same Dx setting on the transmission, designed for heavy off-road work.
Read the rest of this feature in the September issue of Trucking. Buy the magazine here
