Are mercedies truck engines durable

Answer 1

I don't know about their European or other motors, but the American MBE series.. not exactly a life changing powerplant, but they're sufficient, although they suffered some serious problems when Daimler A.G. introduced them into the North American market for the 2003 model year. I ran a 450 horsepower MBE in a 2005 Sterling 95 series straight truck for six months from May to November of 2010, and never experienced any problems with the motor, and we'd normally run the motor for 10 - 12 hours straight; when we weren't going down the road and the truck was stationary, it was usually in high idle in order to operate a truck mounted boom and grapple.

If I remember correctly, the Mercedes Benz MBE motor is, at its core, a Detroit Diesel motor, albeit with Mercedes-Benz electronic controls, rather than the DDEC system. However, it lacks the provision common in Detroit Diesel motors to be able to read fault codes from the dash - a computer must be hooked to the vehicle in order to read off fault codes.