caterpillar is back -mid 2011

They won't have an engine that meets emissions levels by then unless international totally reverses course and uses SCR. Even the company (MAN Trucks) that international bought all the EGR technology from for their Maxxforce 15 switched to SCR because EGR just doesn't work very well. None of the maxxforce engines currently meet emissions, those banked emissions credits won't last forever.

Unless CAT plans on adding maxxforce support to CAT-ET there really isn't that much of a reason to even bother since you'll have to take the truck to an international dealership to get it serviced.

Overall I see very little future in this partnership. Why bother with a weak chassis and crippled engine when your alternatives would be Mack, Kenworth with a Cummins or you could even get a Peterbilt glider and put a real CAT engine in it.

 

I could have swore I read that Cat was going to resume manufacturing of heavy truck engines in 2014. It was in the WSJ or marketplace, I'm gonna have to look.

 

One other thing against "CAT" is that the trucking manufactureers, will want a certain amount of assurance that the engine is going to be a good seller before they will be willing to do the engineering to put it in their truck.
Just a thought!

 

I'd say that since CAT sold millions of diesel engine over the years there would be a good market for them...

 

There are trucks on the lots with "CAT's" in them and are not big sellers. Go to an auction and the last one I was at there were new Pete's and KW's Very nice units, no reserve bid, and they went cheap.
On the engine is a tag that tells you the number of MM3 of fuel used to make HP. Cat's are higher than a Cummins and Detroit.
Some people will buy a Cat, just because, lots will want the unit to be the best in class, and easy to fix, a lot cheaper, for parts, and a lot lighter.
Once you are out of the market for a while, people run other things and get opinions, many of the biggest buyers, will want proof. If the next engine is not a big winner, how many chances will they get to get it right?

 

Cummins sure was given a lot of chances to 'get it right' when those new ISX's came out... my son's 565 was finally taken back by the dealer after a lawsuit was filed (and they paid him a settlement)...the engine was down for repairs three of the first six months he owned the truck.

There were thousands of early ISX engine that had bearing problems, oil consumption problems, etc. but, except for the EGR mess, the engine is now pretty good.

 

The ISX had lots of problems, I replaced complete units, and that is one of the reason Freightliner stopped using their product, for years.
The thing is that Cat had their own problems at the same time, Cams, rocker arms, studs that came loose and stretched, heads that cracked valve inserts, that came loose. Head gaskets that leaked.
They all had problems, Detroit had wiring, and injector problems, as did Cat.
My point is that it is all well and good to have the independents buy Cat, but if the big customers do not buy them.
According to JD Power the International, and the Detroit's are the least trouble some now.
Time will tell!

 

Freightliner quit using Cummins engines because they wanted to sell nothing but their in-house engines... more money to be made. They pretty much started the whole deal of all the brands selling their own engines...

CAT was #2 in OEM sales behind Detroit for many years... many fleets used them and the LTL guys had Detroit's.

Until CAT built the 2007 ACCERT engines they outsold Cummins by a wide margin in the PACCAR products...

 

I was working at Freightlinner and they stopped because Cummins was not paying their warrenty claims. When the ISX came out they were blowing up a lot, and when they would not pay us to repair or replace them and they could not do it in house, they were dropped.
All Freightliners were engineered to accept the Cummins, and dropping them was not done lightly.
I left in July of 2007 and the Aserts were in the same, boat, they would expect you to do 12 hours work for free. Yet they could not do the job them-self, at the local Cat dealer. They closed on Saturday at 3o PM and would not allow you to buy the intake valve actuator assembly, that was the only way you could get it at that time, Before you had done every last test. Parts were hard to get and expensive, warrenty claims were being refused for stupid reasons, and only if you owned multiple units, would they pay the claims. Just a thought!