Here is an old 1628 that I sold in Lebanon in 1990, it was an old Y reg.
I bet that is still going too.!!
I will add my merc A K reg its a 814 with a 817 engine and semi auto gearbox(I cant remember the name of the box but u pull the lever forwards or backwards to change gear)goes well uphills even loaded.
The next 2 are pics I have got from other people.
this merc 911 and dennison trailer is a regular at irish shows…it was recently sold by the previous owner who restored it
By gogs2006
love the old bonneted Merc, nice one. Bowmur haulage ran bonneted tractors on Dart and Cast work, anyone got any photos of them?
This is my mercedes motor home that i use when in the UK bought it of a bloke who was going to travel overland to india in it but he never made it so i had it never uses any oil bit heavy on diesel about 16 to 20 mpg never failed an MOT upped the pump abit it will do 80 ish no problem on the flat on the hills its slow
one had an old 1831 powerliner with a real leggy diff, 56 at 1050 rpm! absolutely useless uphill so tried to get it to go faster down the otherside… popped it into scotchmans overdrive on the M11 dropping down onto the M25, and it stalled in the middle lane with 65 on the clock! not the best decision i evermade.
Luckily the gear selector that you could use to find the best gear selected top, dipped the clutch and it struck up again. lesson learnt!
we had a few 1628s from ryder on long term rent,they made the right noises ,but gutless as hell not a patch on our daf 2800s and they where not the fastest trucks about at the time.now we have ended up with 430 axors after years of dafs,very nice to drive, but the most unreliable truck i have ever driven. 
The Biker:
Also this one on P&O trailers
interesting, i have a picture of this in a later livery from the sufolk show earning its keep pulling a show trailer, its in a green livery still with the bullbar and murphys merc on the sunvisor (at least i presume its after this pic…)
That truck running out of Manchester Con Base is a 1626 with a 17.5" mid lift conversion, which suggests to me that it is ex Foleys from Fleetwood, they pulled B + I Line trailers.
Many years ago an ERF salesman having tried unsucessfully to sell me an E14-365 against a 2035 told me that in his honest opinion the 1626 had the “finest internal combustion engine that mankind has ever produced, or ever will.” Completely indestructable.
Should have added, about the lack of torque which worried some people, the Germans used to say that if you ran them on 10% petrol they pulled as well as a 111, and it didn’t bother the engine at all. Never tried it personally, just keep it reving, and you will always catch 'em up down the otherside.
acd1202:
Never tried it personally, just keep it reving, and you will always catch 'em up down the otherside.
Thats true, and I allways found you would catch anything where it really counts…
In the Back Pocket!
They laughed at my 28, till their motors broke down and mine didnt,
I earned as well as any of the O’D’s and better than most
regardless of the low pulling power.
acd1202:
Should have added, about the lack of torque which worried some people, the Germans used to say that if you ran them on 10% petrol they pulled as well as a 111, and it didn’t bother the engine at all. Never tried it personally, just keep it reving, and you will always catch 'em up down the otherside.
I never tried a 10% petrol mix myself, but after my boss consulted with Mercedes, we did use a 5% petrol mix in Sweden and Norway in Winter.
TBH, I didn’t notice any difference in performance in either a 1626 or a 1628.
This horrendous contraption is a 1626 (with the back-to-front gearbox, range change and splitter on a bizarre collar on the lever shaft) plated at 32 tonnes.
I actually have fond memories of grappling with the controls of the beast in the late '80s and even went over the water to Germany a few times in it.
The same firm owned this 2033 twinsteer example with the ZF side-by-side with splitter box. This was better.
This is a more “modern” 1834 with 12 Corsas loaded on the trailer. Plated at 31 tonnes this one and with EPS, I loved it dearly (until the boss bought us all a brand new FM 380 each!).
This picture was taken around 8 years ago.
Shrek:
This horrendous contraption is a 1626 (with the back-to-front gearbox, range change and splitter on a bizarre collar on the lever shaft) plated at 32 tonnes.
Hi Shrek IIRC I think you’ll find that, if it had the side-by-side range cange and a collar that operated the splitter, then it might have been a 1628.
IIRC, the 1626 had a 12-speed splitter, but no range change. Not sure how your describing the garbox as “back-to-front” unless it was LHD. In the RHD version of the 1626 the gearbox was logical in that the higher gears were nearer to you in the gate. I regularly drove both 1626s and 1628s during the 80s, not only to Germany, but also Spain, Austria, Switzerland, Italy, Sweden and Norway. (Pics above and in the “SK” thread.) Both were extremely reliable and had the unburstable feel to them, but they did lack power as neither was turbo’ed.
Doing a split to tackle a particularly steep manhole cover was the norm back then. 
1626 was a 6 speed with splitter, the knock across didn’t appear until 1628. The 1632 had a range change and could be specced with the optional splitter giving 18 speeds, but was all on the collar.
Dieseldave, I’m affraid your memory is plying tricks on you, the 1626 box was definitely back to front. 5 3 1 forwards and 6 4 2 R back. It was because the gearbox was mounted on its side, rather than stood up. If I remember correctly the gearbox top was on our nearside. This arrangent had nothing to do with RHD, they were all like that. Very interesting if you forgot. Several early demos got bent pushrods, by drivers forgeting and going from 4th to 1st instead of 5th.
Thanks for the responses guys…it was definately a 1626 but I concede to Dave that it may not have had a rangechange 'box.
I definitely remember the 'box being back to front in that you started in 1st where you would expect 5th to be and so forth. The splitter was a lateral twist of the switch on the lever shaft rather than an up/down thing.
You’re not wrong about the lack of power either!!! At 32t the truck was the slowest machine I have ever experienced!
It was one of the first trucks I drove during my fledgling year as a class 1 pilot. Other beasts on the fleet included a really ratty Scanny 111 with broken power steering and rust holes in the cab (double manned that one to Germany and back a few times), A 112 wendyhouse 6 wheeler unit and acouple of R cabbed Scanias which were more modern and much sought after to drive. We also had a lovely 2035 EPS twin steer (I truly learned my reversing craft in this one), and a couple of LHD MAN wagon and drags in Westermann livery.
I have lots of very fond memories of this wagon (the 1626) though and I don’t remember it ever breaking down on us! Happy days were those!
acd1202:
1626 was a 6 speed with splitter, the knock across didn’t appear until 1628. The 1632 had a range change and could be specced with the optional splitter giving 18 speeds, but was all on the collar.Dieseldave, I’m affraid your memory is plying tricks on you, the 1626 box was definitely back to front. 5 3 1 forwards and 6 4 2 R back. It was because the gearbox was mounted on its side, rather than stood up. If I remember correctly the gearbox top was on our nearside. This arrangent had nothing to do with RHD, they were all like that. Very interesting if you forgot. Several early demos got bent pushrods, by drivers forgeting and going from 4th to 1st instead of 5th.
We had a 1632, definitely an 8-speed with knock-over box, no splitter fitted. IIRC, it was a non-turbo V10.
As for the 1626, I honestly don’t think my memory is playing tricks.
I’ve thought long and hard about this too.
TBF, this was all 20ish years ago, so I’d be very interested to hear other people’s memories on this point, and I’d make the point that maybe we’re both right. In my own mind, the jury is out for the time being… Let’s see what the guys say 
The one I’m talking about is reg No: UCD 324 S. I have a pic of that somewhere.
IIRC, the thing had had several rebuilds engines/gearboxes and may have had a mod done to the gear linkage for all I know-- I’ve no idea though… I used to do basic servicing, greasing and brake adjustments, so I was fairly familiar with the underneath of it too. I don’t recall the gearbox looking any different to any other either…
The only oddity I do remember was that, after having had a clutch fitted, somebody connected the airpipes to the splitter the wrong way around, so the switch would have to be in “low” position to be driving in “high” split.
The only truck I’ve driven with a “strange” gearbox was some sort of Atkinson. (Best forgotten )
That had this interesting arrangement:
1 4
I—I
2 3
Shrek:
Thanks for the responses guys…it was definately a 1626 but I concede to Dave that it may not have had a rangechange 'box.I definitely remember the 'box being back to front in that you started in 1st where you would expect 5th to be and so forth. The splitter was a lateral twist of the switch on the lever shaft rather than an up/down thing.
Yes Shrek I remember that type too!!
So at various times and on various models, there was either a 12-speed splitter with either a lateral twisty thing, or an up/down switch on the side of the gearstick.
For 8-speed range changers, there was the knock-over box, sometimes with a splitter to give a 16-speed.
Do we all agree that the gearboxes were from ZF 
(Apart from the early EPS)
After that came the EPS, which did its own range-change as you went from 4th to 5th, all of which also had a splitter to also make it a 16-speed.
Shrek:
You’re not wrong about the lack of power either!!!
LUXURY!!! Our 1626 and 1628s were plated for 38t 
I always dreamed of driving them at “only” 32t.
Let’s see whether Denis F, Inselaffe and biggusdickusgb spot this hehehe 
Shrek:
I have lots of very fond memories of this wagon (the 1626) though and I don’t remember it ever breaking down on us! Happy days were those!
Absolutely agreed mate, same here.