BRAVE NEW WORLD

IT’S NOT EASY to suggest that a model still months away from being launched, and even further away from the cold, hard world of commercial and operational reality, will set an entirely new standard for conventional trucks in Australia.

That, however, is the unequivocal conclusion as

Freightliner now puts the finishing touches to its right-hand drive Cascadia, a truck that for the first time will deliver to the Australian conventional market the levels of safety and technological leadership normally the preserve of European cab-overs.

Have no doubt, if all goes to plan – and from what I’ve seen, heard and driven both here and in the US, there’s absolutely no reason to suggest otherwise – Cascadia will take a vast, long overdue leap beyond anything currently available among Australia’s conventional brands.

The concern, if not threat, for Mack and Kenworth respectively, and likewise corporate kin Western Star, is as ominous as it is obvious.

Sure, this isn’t the first time Freightliner has developed a truck with the potential to take the market by storm. The now defunct Argosy cab-over, for example, was unquestionably the most innovative and advanced US cab-over to ever arrive here when it hit our shores in the latter half of the ‘90s.

“The success of this new generation since its US launch in September 2016 is nothing short of outstanding, currently accounting for close to 40 percent of the entire US Class 8 (heavy-duty) market.”

Unfortunately for Freightliner, and more to the point, the legion of truck buyers looking for a modern North American alternative to Kenworth’s long-lived K-series, potential proved to be far removed from fact as durability and quality control issues – created in large part by a ludicrous absence of local testing and dawdling response to subsequent issues – conspired to kill the opportunity and the confidence.

To a lesser but no less evident extent, the same could be said of the factors which have progressively made Century Class, Columbia and even Coronado such poor sellers in a market dominated by Kenworth and Mack.

So, what’s different this time as Freightliner prepares to launch Cascadia, the most successful model in the brand’s history, on the Australian market?

The simple answer is … just about everything, but