Daimler Commercial Vehicles (CV) MENA and Mercedes-Benz Trucks have marked the 20th anniversary of the Actros in the region, hosting an event in the UAE gathering some of its oldest customers together with their highest mileage vehicles.
Each of the three UAE customers selected – Al Jaber Leasing Services, Western Bainoona Group and Mubarak & Sons Transport – was named an ‘Actros Mileage Millionaire’ for clocking more than a million kilometres with their Actros trucks.
Stefan Buchner, head of Mercedes-Benz Trucks, said: “We have sold more than 1,000,000 Mercedes-Benz Actros trucks in the past 20 years. This makes our Actros the most successful premium heavy-duty truck in the world.
“Now we are proud to celebrate additional millions: three Actros trucks from the UAE, each with more than 1,000,000 kilometres! This is a great achievement and illustrates the loyalty of our customers based on the unprecedented reliability of our Actros.”
The three milestone Actros trucks showcased at the event have driven altogether 4.7 million kilometres in overall 33 years of operation – equal to 30,000 times the distance between Dubai and Abu Dhabi.
All trucks are ‘first-hand’ and were originally purchased from either Emirates Motor Company (EMC), and Al Fahim Group company and the authorised Mercedes-Benz Trucks distributor for Abu Dhabi, or Gargash Enterprises, the authorised distributor for Dubai and the Northern Emirates.
Mileage Millionaires
The leading ‘Actros Mileage Millionaire’ model is an 1st generation Actros 3848 with a tanker body that has driven 1,910,295km since it entered operations with the fleet of Al Jaber Leasing Services in 2002.
Marwan Seif, GM of Al Jaber Leasing Services, noted: “We have more than 1,000 Merecdes-Benz Actros trucks operating in our fleet in the UAE, Qatar and KSA, from model year 2000 to 2015. The vehicles have proven their reliability and play an important role in our operations in the GCC.”
The two other Actros are of the 2nd model generation (2008), reaching mileages of 1.55 million km and 1.24 million km. The latter Actros has accumulated 33,500 hours of runtime since it began operations with Western Bainoona Group in 2008 – an average of more than 10 hours per day.
20th Anniversary Actros
Daimler CV MENA also took the opportunity to release a 20th anniversary edition of the Actros 3844 S tractor-head, equipped with a six-cylinder engine, Euro III engine delivering 435hp, complete with a 16-speed Mercedes PowerShift automated gearbox and 20th anniversary branding.
The special edition Actros also comes with advanced safety features, including Active Brake Assist, which uses three radar beams to scan a zone of 7 to 150 meters ahead of the truck and provides the system gives visual and audible queues to the driver in case of hazardous obstacles ahead, and if needed, autonomously initiates a braking manoeuvre and emergency braking to standstill.
In addition, the Telligent Proximity Control feature automatically adjusts the speed of the truck according to the traffic situation, constantly analysing the distance to vehicles driving in front, while Telligent Lane Assistant helps the driver to stay in lane by giving audible warning signals if veering.
