Mack rolls out MP8 at N. American Performance Tour

LAS VEGAS — Mack Trucks is bringing its 2007-2008 product line up to its customers on the Mack Performance Tour.

Beginning this month, 20 Mack Granite and Pinnacle trucks will fan out across North America, visiting dealerships in the U.S. and Canada so customers can get a first-hand look at the latest from Mack.

The Performance Tour kicked off in Las Vegas this past weekend with a special event where selected dealers and customers were invited to drive the trucks and see for themselves how Mack has met the EPA 2007 challenge.

“Nothing beats a hands-on experience to get customers excited about new products,” said Tom Kelly, Mack’s vice-president of marketing. “Customers have told us they really want to see the ’07 engines, and experience their operation so they can get comfortable with the emissions technology.

“So we are sending these trucks on the road to demonstrate the quality, productivity, reliability and performance of our trucks and new engines.”

Headlining the Performance Tour is the newest of Mack’s MP series engines, the MP8. It’s a 13-liter in-line six with horsepower ratings from 415 to 485, and torque ratings from 1600 to 1700 lb ft at 1200 rpm. The advertised dry weight of the MP8 is 2,560 lb.

Mack says the MP8 will be available in all three of the company’s engine power-map configurations; Econodyne — for maximum fuel economy in steady-state on-highway applications; MaxiCruise — for high-performance on-highway and vocational applications; and Maxidyne — best suited for vocational applications only.

The MP8 joins the MP7 (11 liters, 325 – 405 hp, 1360 – 1480 lb ft) rolled out in mid-2006 in an EPA ’04 configuration. Both engines are available for order now.

The Mack MP7 and MP8 engines offer customers a broader range of engine offerings than the previous generation of Mack engines, with more horsepower ratings. The engine ratings are also more precisely matched to customer applications. This means better efficiency. And the engines’ higher power density makes it possible for customers in some weight-sensitive applications to select the smaller displacement MP7.

The Mack Performance Tour will be coming to dealers across Canada between
late June and September with a fleet of trucks spec’d for almost any
customer application — vocational, on-highway long haul, day-cab, manual
and automated/automatic transmissions, and MP7 and MP8 engines.

Mack dealerships will publicize their own events locally, and Mack Trucks
will unveil a website on June 15 with tour schedules for customers.