There’s a new ute coming to Australia, called the LDV T60. LDV stands for Leyland DAF Vans. DAF stands for Van Doorne’s Aanhangwagen Fabriek, or Van Doorne’s Trailer Factory. So it’s a combination of a British and a Dutch truck company, which is now run by Chinese State-owned company SAIC. But I digress…
The T60 is going to come with a few different configurations: 2WD and 4WD, automatic and manual gearboxes, and a couple of trim levels. Not much has been confirmed yet, including prices and specific specs.
A 2.8-litre diesel engine is under the bonnet, which the press release says makes 110kW. A bit of digging indicates that this is an old tune of the VM Motori R428, which was used in the diesel KJ Cherokee between 2001 and 2004 (making 110kW and 360Nm) in Europe.
The Australian KJ Cherokee made 120kW and 400Nm at the same time; and interestingly, the same R428 engine is used in the current Wrangler and Holden Colorado/Trailblazer where it makes a fairly stonking 147kW and 500Nm.
We aren’t sure if there’s been massive changes to injectors and turbochargers, over the years, to this engine – but this does show that the LDV engine will be relatively under-stressed from factory, and could be a great candidate for tuning.
