The story of the Western Star X-Series is a story of bringing new levels of safety and efficiency to the brand, without compromising the qualities the brand had been built on over the last 40 years, as the new trucks passed through the design process.

The requirements for the winner of the Truck of the Year Australasia 2024, included meeting the latest regulations which were expected to be mandated, as well meeting the expectations of the trucking industry in the coming decade.

Also included in the process were deliberations needed in starting work on any new truck, designing and integrating trucks for as many applications as possible and enabling ever more efficient logistics.

It was also important to include the latest and greatest technology and design being developed for the Western Star brand by Daimler Truck in North America in anX Series range specifically tailored for the Australasian market.

At that time, when the design process began the date for the next round of exhaust emission regulations to be implemented had not been finalised, but the team also new it was inevitable. As it happens the design process was able to get trucks able to meet the ADR 80/04 limits well ahead of the mandated date for the introduction of November 1 2024.

There was clearly a need for a new engine platform and after treatment to meet the ADR as well as taking Western Star into the fuel usage levels being asked for by the trucking industry at this time. Any new driveline would also have to meet the durability expected in Australasian operations.

The CANbus now fitted in the Western Star brings the brand right up to date, in terms of electronic architecture. It offers a new level of sophistication, the system is programmable and will enable body builders to interface effectively with the truck.

Image: Prime Creative Media

It also means the large bank of switches can be utilised for many of the independent body control functions without the need for the body builder to cut and shut anything in the wiring harness. The solution is a simple plug-in interface.

“We can program the functionality in this system, it’s dealer supported and we can even have the factory drill the subframe to suit the requirements in length and overhang in Australia,” says Kurt.

“Going forward, it’s exciting what we can offer in that piece.”

Sophisticated electronics and design, alongside the right power and torque figures, fuel consumption and durability was also going to be required from the driveline. This is where the Detroit development program came into play.

“So much of the truck, is not so much about what we develop for Australasia, it’s about getting the requirements in early and making sure that the teams which are designing the driveline for a global market are taking the Australasian requirements into account, so we don’t end up, late in the piece finding that something is not suitable for us,” says Bob Gowans, Detroit Business Manager.

“We feed those requirements in early, seven or eight years before we see the first real trucks. That means that our specifications are on the slate, alongside the Canadian, Mexican and North American requirements, and taken into account.

Image: Western Star

“On the engine side, it’s been known for a while that, at some point, the Australian emissions regs would get tightened up. Although we didn’t really know when, it was pretty much a shoo-in that it was not going to be something bespoke in Australia and it would follow the usual route for exhaust emissions legislation.

“On the engine side, the platform since 2007 has been designed to take into account exactly where we’re going emissions-wise in the long term and it was designed with that in mind.

“We made the block stiff enough to cope with high compression pressures and made the cooling system capable of removing the waste heat that you end up with in certain operating modes.

“In the US there are three versions of DD13, there is a low revving fuel saving version, an extreme fuel efficiency engine and a fuel efficient version designed provide the torque, pulling power and longevity that is needed for, what in the US they’d call, extreme vocational applications. In Australia, that’s just a normal truck.”

This means the X Series here can get the range of ratings needed out of the 13 litre to be able to perform in trucks from rigids all the way up to B-double operation with a mechanically identical engine, with the same injectors, turbo and other components across the engine regardless of rating.

And in a country where where we have a decent number of trucks but they’re fairly spread out having the same mechanical parts the same sense of the same wiring harness the same everything makes it an awful lot easier to look after around the national network.

“In the US the DD 16 is not seen as a normal line haul engine,” says Bob.

“It’s used for what the US regards as extreme applications, heavy logging, heavy haul, moving large pieces of machinery around. That’s what it’s used for over there. Over here it’s an absolutely normal engine to use and it puts you right up there with the most fuel efficient engines on the market, that can cope with those weights.

“It’s only with the introduction of X Series that it’s available in the Western Star and that engine is designed to give really good usable amounts of torque and power. The feedback we’ve had from customers that the DD15 is great on fuel and it’s reliable.

“However, when you move to the DD16, which is a very closely related engine, you’ve still got the fuel economy in a newer design. It’s still got the reliability we’re not over stressing the engine. We’ve got more power out by adding another litre of displacement to the engine.”