Let me be the first to throw a giant rock at Daf.
edited poll; I forgot MB 
34 years of driving trucks ,I’ve come to the conclusion that Iveco are the worst followed by MAN.
Definitely no problems with Mercedes (admittedly, I’ve never driven a basic spec.truck from them) or Daf. The last Daf I drove was a CF 450, & was quite nice.
Iveco’s just fall apart. Build quality is atrocious.
In my view they are all very good these days. Have driven all the makes listed and although some are better equipped than others they are all very reliable apart from faults that can occur on any truck.Bottom of my list would probably be the Iveco.
I would like to hear some of the younger generations views after spending time with Atkinson,AEC,Scammell or a Guy Big J.
The appreciation of modern trucks may grow a litte. 
Having over the years put many many miles on vehicles of all of the above marques, with the exception of Scania (I’ve only ever had one on demo for a fortnight) I’d say IME none of them are better or worse from a reliability POV than any other. Sure they’ve all had niggles, but when you consider their working environment that’s only to be expected.
I will say however that experience has taught me that no matter what the make of vehicle if you want reliability then it has to be one driver one truck, simple as that.
ETS:
Let me be the first to throw a giant rock at Daf.edited poll; I forgot MB
No need to list owt with a â– â– â– â– â– â– â– in
jakethesnake:
In my view they are all very good these days. Have driven all the makes listed and although some are better equipped than others they are all very reliable apart from faults that can occur on any truck.Bottom of my list would probably be the Iveco.
I would like to hear some of the younger generations views after spending time with Atkinson,AEC,Scammell or a Guy Big J.
The appreciation of modern trucks may grow a litte.
You couldn’t be more wrong ,after yrs of working on ERFs amongst others and running a Foden the fear of a so called modern lorry is growing .
In my experience Dafs seem to have the most niggly faults now, MAN have made giant strides and have got their act right again, Volvo surprisingly troublesome, Scania good overall, Iveco haven’t had anything to do with one for more than a decade, Merc reliable enough in my experience which is just as well given the varying dealerships.
As Maoster, if you look after the vehicle it usually pays you back.
*Dafs to be fair tend to be on fleets that get more than their fair share of non-drivers abuse and neglect.
As for the older lorries, i always found them more reliable as not so much electronic tat to go wrong, never had any trouble with Volvo FL10s or 12’s or early FM 12s, or Scania 111 through to 113, square Daf’s 2800 etc were bomb proof, older Ivecos not so good, and anything with a (14 litre especially) ■■■■■■■Eaton Rockwell drivetrain would give years of trouble free service so long as it was serviced decently.
As with cars the sweet years were the 80s and 90s leading into the early noughties (before wagon auto boxes came on stream), reliable vehicles all round and most problems could be sorted by any competent mechanic.
Half the trouble with the latest vehicles is the fad for stopping the engine anything up to 100 times a day to save a pint of fuel, keep the thing running and the engine warm with fully circulating oil and coolant unless the stop is for an appreciable period is better, ie who unless they are being assessed by a box ticker turns the engine off whilst connecting up only to have to rev the â– â– â– â– â– â– â– â– off it soon as to build up the air again, just let the sodding thing tick over gently.
You couldn’t be more wrong
Yeah maybe for you but not if a young un went from old to new! I reckon they would pick the latter. Personally I only drove auto’s for a short period before retiring and give me gears any day but I do prefer the comfort of a modern truck.
Saying that I prefer an auto car these days.
But there are older ones like RR who says he would never go back (if my memory is correct) so we all have our own opinions. 
getting back on topic,
everything nowadays is an electronic aid assisted unreliable bag of crap compared to older basic trucks so theres no comparison between the two.
as far as the modern ones go,then daf and iveco are well up there in the worst of the worst stakes.
the older stiff will run forever compared to the newer counterparts though you cant whack the comfort aspect.
if i had to run back to the middle east with a choice of truck then old school would be the choice,but not for driver comfort of the risk of getting bogged down.
its the same with light commercials and cars.
theres nothing more reliable than a 1995-2000 smiley transit and a 1998 vw diesel golf,anything after that just got progressively more unreliable right up to todays efforts.
car wise,then a land rover will go places that a land cruiser wont,but at least the land cruiser wont fall to bits and break down, and will get you home again.
hows that for topic variation>â– â–
The fact is, much as old timers hate to admit, is that modern trucks are more reliable than ever. Rare these days to see one broken down on side of road. Electronics have a weird and undeserved reputation for being unreliable, they really aren’t in general. I started my working life as an apprentice mechanic on busses and coaches from 70’s/80’s and 90’s and they threw up plenty of problems, often ones that could take an age to diagnose when they were intermittent. Unlike now when a diagnostic machine will usually pinpoint what’s wrong. The only reason drivers don’t like / think unreliable modern trucks is they can’t fix them with a hammer, adjustables and a bag of cable ties.
dieseldog999:
getting back on topic,everything nowadays is an electronic aid assisted unreliable bag of crap compared to older basic trucks so theres no comparison between the two.
as far as the modern ones go,then daf and iveco are well up there in the worst of the worst stakes.
the older stiff will run forever compared to the newer counterparts though you cant whack the comfort aspect.
if i had to run back to the middle east with a choice of truck then old school would be the choice,but not for driver comfort of the risk of getting bogged down.
its the same with light commercials and cars.
theres nothing more reliable than a 1995-2000 smiley transit and a 1998 vw diesel golf,anything after that just got progressively more unreliable right up to todays efforts.
car wise,then a land rover will go places that a land cruiser wont,but at least the land cruiser wont fall to bits and break down, and will get you home again.
hows that for topic variation>â– â–
Hmm I had a 98 transit with delivery mileage only was a demo model top spec ,paid £15,000 spent £10,000 on it in 18 months 3 fuel pumps 3 gearbox’s 2 diffs no labour charges either did them me self ,sold it for £5,000 with 100,000 miles on at 2 yrs old bought a 98 sprinter for £6,000 that had already done 150,000 never looked back .
theres always the pig in a poke friday afternoon motor but even nowadays im buying old smileys and sprinter campers with no hesitation,even the auto ones whereas i would dream of touching an auto transit newer than 2000,
dieseldog999:
theres always the pig in a poke friday afternoon motor but even nowadays im buying old smileys and sprinter campers with no hesitation,even the auto ones whereas i would dream of touching an auto transit newer than 2000,
Any Transit post 2000 built in Southampton as they rust faster than a Banana engine’d transit can go
2.2 euro 5 have chocolate oil pumps and pistons
Iveco will always have a reputation for been cheap and unreliable.
I think it’s richly deserved too,
In 2003 I started a new job and the boss said if you have this T plate Iveco eurotech for 6 month I will give you a brand new 04 plate scania.
So I took it,literally every week there was a problem,electrics failed and blew fuses everyday,it shook and rattled and smoked and in 6 month it was recovered 8 times.
I stuck with it and boss man did give me the new topline which was pure luxury compared to the Iveco.
Thing is I can sit in the latest iveco stralis and see things in it that remind me of that terrible old truck,
No such thing as an ‘‘unreliable’’ modern truck, but you will always get the odd fault , in fact you get faults on any mechanical and/or electrical machine whatever it is…you also always get a dog amongst a fleet, but you can not condemn an entire marque of truck because of that dog.
So no point filling in the survey…at the end of the day it’s down to preference rather than degree of reliability.
It amuses me when inexperienced drivers moan on about this that or the other marque of truck is ‘‘bad’’, when you think of some of the crap we once had to drive when they actually were unreliable rubbish.
Some trucks are a bit better or marginally worse than others in terms of comfort, build quality etc (I know, I drive an Actros ffs) but a modern truck is a reliable bit of kit, and just like (and as easy to drive as) a big car, …which is why we get so many inept d/heads ‘‘driving’’ them. 
Give me a modern big cabbed, comfortable automatic truck any day, as for all the electronic crap that can go wrong, …ain’t my problem, I’m just a driver.
blue estate:
dieseldog999:
theres always the pig in a poke friday afternoon motor but even nowadays im buying old smileys and sprinter campers with no hesitation,even the auto ones whereas i would dream of touching an auto transit newer than 2000,Any Transit post 2000 built in Southampton as they rust faster than a Banana engine’d transit can go
2.2 euro 5 have chocolate oil pumps and pistons
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
well its planned obsolescence.
the same engine is in boxers,ducatos,relays,jaguars and mondeos? no doubt its also in others,but every second one i try to buy no matter what its in then its either knocking with injectors,smoking,tapping,or about to go bang bigstyle if its not.
made in china from chocolate is right enough.
any one i buy to consider playing with before converting and punting on gets a new pump as a matter of course.
I agree with above comments about electricals on newer gear. Our fleet is entirely scania and whilst they are all very good in terms of reliability, helped by our excellent mechanic (a proper one with all the tools not just a fitter with a laptop!) he has often been heard to say that ‘the older ones are built better’ less cost cutting back then and far less electrical stuff to go wrong. Case in point my 114 with 950k on her spends less time off the road than any of the r series with half the miles on em. It’s not that they’re bad wagons but understandably have more issues with minor electrical gremlins, sensors etc. I fully agree that newer gear is better for comfort but we ain’t earning if the wheels ain’t turning so I’ll stick with old faithful long as I can
robroy:
So no point filling in the survey…at the end of the day it’s down to preference rather than degree of reliability.
/shrug it is of course voluntary…the survey is titled ‘Truck you’ve had the most breakdowns with’, you have had none - fine; there are drivers out there who have had some, obviously if one has only ever driven X all their breakdowns (if any) would be in an X but hopefully they will exercise discretion and abstain from voting.
I’ve had 1 actual breakdown and 2 ‘soft’ ones in a DAF, once a technician had to come and eventually take it to a workshop. In general DAFs will have all kinds of electrical faults, most often in heavy rain the distance sensor will fail so will the lane departure camera (which will often go bad even in good weather) and I’d be fine without those if it weren’t for that horrible DAF FAULT sound coming constantly from the dashboard. EML on is almost a non-event as it happens daily even on 2017 DAFs, as does failure to engage the starter. Different companies, too, common issues so not all maintenance related I think.
ETS:
robroy:
So no point filling in the survey…at the end of the day it’s down to preference rather than degree of reliability./shrug it is of course voluntary…the survey is titled ‘Truck you’ve had the most breakdowns with’, you have had none - fine; there are drivers out there who have had some, obviously if one has only ever driven X all their breakdowns (if any) would be in an X but hopefully they will exercise discretion and abstain from voting.
I didn’t say I’ve had no breakdowns.
I’ve driven just about every type of modern European truck, and had breakdowns with them all, minor and major, but not had any more problems with any particular type than another…that was my point, compared with older trucks a few years ago, they are all much the same in that context, with no particular ‘‘bad’’ truck as such…imo.
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Mm, obviously somebody hasn’t got any homework, to do, or is it to cold to hang around the skate park, these threads, are becoming tedious, why not have what bedding do you have, moving on.(1980’s TV show)