Allison Transmission Makes Technical Delivery of the First Series-produced Automatic OF 1721 Buses for an Urban Transportation Company in Rio
Five Mercedes-Benz OF 1721 buses equipped with Allison 3000 Series automatics were supplied to the urban transportation company named Auto Viação Tres Amigos in Brazil. These are the first buses manufactured by the German company in Brazil. The second set of 5 buses will be distributed among two other local companies.
The purchase of Allison-equipped buses was
confirmed by Brazilian companies after they had a chance to test two prototypes
of these buses, running them 1.1 million kilometers without any serious
maintenance or repair issues. These 10 Mercedes buses were the first in the
series manufactured with front-engine and Allison automatic transmissions.
OF 1721 buses equipped with Allison 3000 Series transmission
These new automatic buses will be operating on
one of the most challenging roads of the country’s capital in terms of topography,
distance and loading. Here lie the busiest routes in the city, and it is the
best place where city buses can benefit from robustness and other operational
characteristics of Allison transmissions.
Allison’s solutions outperform other bus
gearboxes in terms of productivity, which is based on better speed-up and
cruising capacity, reduced noise level in the cabin as gears get shifted at
lower RPMs, and smoother operation.
Drivers of the new buses should also receive Allison-specific
training to ensure the most efficient bus operation when referring to performance
and fuel economy. This can be of great importance for spending optimization, as
the company control claims that diesel costs take up to 30% of fleet
maintenance expenditures.
Allison 3000 Series transmission
When we are talking about vehicle maintenance and non-failure operation time, Allison’s solutions will also contribute to significant reduction of costs. In practice, a bus with a manual transmission usually needs clutch replacement after 60-70,000 km, which is excluded with automatic buses. All three companies put high hopes on new buses, because apart from automatic transmissions, these buses come with air suspension, which also contributes to greater passenger comfort. New buses should become a key argument in competitive struggle with other bus companies.
