DRIVING A PAYSTAR WITH ULTRASHIFT PLUS MXP

The International PayStar is back in business. This workhorse was effectively sidelined for a spell when Navistar was without a 15L engine, however with Cummins back in the fold, the PayStar is enjoying a fresh lease on life.

paystar unloading

C&G Haulage in Ajax, Ont. has taken delivery of a batch, swapping out some Petes in the process and is happy with the performance of the trucks since they were placed into service earlier this year. They let me drive one, grossing 63,000+ lbs, to get a feel for the truck and the 18-speed Eaton UltraShift Plus MXP transmission.

We were hauling a load of gravel from the Dufferin pit near Mosport. Eaton has convinced me that today’s automated manuals aren’t just built for mainstream linehaul applications. The MXP has no published GCW limitation and it has handled payloads of close to 200,000 lbs in Canada.

It’s important to note this transmission was built specifically for heavy-haul applications.

C&G is an interesting and progressive company. They were among the first Canadian fleets to deploy automated manuals into heavy-haul applications and those transmissions have worked out well for them, winning fans among the driver pool.

I had fun with this drive and the review. You can check it out here.

And look for more news soon…very soon…on automated manuals in heavy-haul applications. I have a morning flight to Allentown tomorrow, where the new Mack mDrive HD will be demonstrated.

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James Menzies is editor of Today's Trucking. He has been covering the Canadian trucking industry for more than 20 years and holds a CDL. Reach him at james@newcom.ca or follow him on Twitter at @JamesMenzies.


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