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Mercedes MBE 926 good, bad?

90plow

Senior Member
Joined
Mar 22, 2006
Messages
371
Location
Northern New Jersey
Looking at a 2006 sterling hooklift truck 33k gvw but has room for a drop axle. Truck has mbe 926 with an 8ll trans says it’s rated for 330 hp 1100 ftlbs. My question is will this motor be equal or better than my mack with E-7 275 and 8ll? I pull my cx130 on a 20 ton tag, haul dirt and gravel and hopefully would use this for dumpsters on some of our sites. Would this do the heavy work or am I kidding my self with that engine?
Thanks!
 

funwithfuel

Senior Member
Joined
Mar 7, 2017
Messages
5,518
Location
Will county Illinois
Occupation
Mechanic
I would think that Mack would edge out the Mercedes in torque, especially off idle. That said the Mercedes is no dog. They push gradalls around at highway speeds after all. And those things are overweight to begin with. The torque and horsepower are so close. I dont think you'd notice unless one truck has junk suspension or really tall gears.
 

crane operator

Senior Member
Joined
Mar 27, 2009
Messages
8,274
Location
sw missouri
I'm not going to comment on the mercedes, I've only been around the 9000 mbe and in my area that's a instant $5,000 off the asking price because no one wants them. I don't think that's necessarily because they are a bad engine, just because they aren't a cat, cummins or detroit, and nobody likes oddball in a older used truck.

I will however say, that the sterling interior will not hold up to the daily pounding that a mack will. The dashes bust up, switches go bad, etc. etc. I've recently looked at quite a few boom truck cranes with sterlings as the chassis. The boom trucks tend not to get the pounding that a concrete mixer truck or hooklift truck will get, and even in the "light" use of a boom truck, I find very few that are in good shape inside.
 

90plow

Senior Member
Joined
Mar 22, 2006
Messages
371
Location
Northern New Jersey
Thanks for the replies. Probably why this truck has been sitting. Always contemplated making my current truck a hooklift but I don’t think it’s cost effective.
 

hvy 1ton

Senior Member
Joined
Jul 24, 2006
Messages
1,942
Location
Lawrence, KS
With the way sterling specific parts are going I'd look at it as buying a hooklift and getting a free truck. The price would have to reflect that to some extent.
 

rondig

Senior Member
Joined
Jul 24, 2013
Messages
517
Location
fort macleod alberta
Occupation
excavation
I have an mbe 900 with 330hp...it is no power house...i think it is actually a detroit engine though...it is in a 2007 m2 106 freightliner with allison auto...very good on fuel though.
20140424_145805.jpg
 

Muffler Bearing

Senior Member
Joined
Mar 26, 2009
Messages
512
Location
Colorful Colorado
Occupation
Truck Mechanic
I'm glad yours is working out. I had to mess with plenty of MBE's the 900s and 4000s when I was at Freightliner. I don't think they are bad motors. And it was interesting to see little design ideas they took from MBE to use on the DD15. The only really dumb thing I didn't like about MBE was the plastic trim they thought needed to be on the engine, oh yeah and the plastic fuel lines that all had to be replaced with metal
 
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