Road Test: Scania 460P A 6×2/2

The liquids haulage sector demands a specific kind of truck, with the emphasis on a light, unladen weight to offer maximum payload. Trucking took a Scania 460P Super, with a small mid-lift axle, out for a spin to see how it stacks up. Tanker drivers are a special breed, and tanker operators need a special truck.

You see, liquids vary in weight, but as their loads are 'divisible' down to the litre, the more liquid you can carry, the more you can theoretically earn. Also, especially when moving hazardous chemicals, there is a lot of extra equipment needed on both the truck and the trailer, not to mention specialised equipment to discharge the load. So, to offset that, you need the lightest possible 44-tonne tractor unit.

The standard set-up for this sector, therefore, is a 6x2 tractor with a small mid-lift axle, a conservative engine of about 450hp and the smallest day cab; nights out are rare for your average petrol tanker driver. This set-up makes sense, not just for the payload factor. A small cab is easier for the driver to get into and out of - two-step entry is often the norm.

The trucks are easier to manoeuvre at compact petrol stations, often with low roofs and usually full of car drivers. Typically, they are driven by those who are there to do a job rather than have an attention-grabbing truck. Also, these trucks are often double- or even triple-shifted so they can accrue massive mileages in a very short period, so residuals are only sometimes a major concern.

Reliability, however, is. Every manufacturer has a truck in its range suitable for this work. The subject of this article, the Scania P series, is competing for sales with Volvo's FM, DAF's XD (and CF), MAN's TGS, Mercedes' 2443 Actros and - to a much lesser extent - Iveco's S-Way AD and Renault's Range T.

The best sellers tend to be the MAN, DAF and Scania. MAN has always done well in this field - a legacy from its acquisition of ERF, which had always been strong in this sector with its EC and then its MAN-inspired ECS and ECT models. As mentioned, day cabs are often specified because there is no need for a bunk and they save a few vital kilos, but equally popular are 'extended day cabs' offered by MAN, Mercedes and Scania - in the case of MAN, the only alternative to a sleeper.

These are advantageous as they allow the driver extra room for their personal effects - remember they have to carry a lot of additional kit, namely protective clothing, hard hats, first aid kits, fire extinguishers and the like, and so they need some additional storage in the cab above and beyond that of what would otherwise be a relatively cramped day cab. It also gives them some extra space to recline their seat for a rest on the 45-minute breaks. But having said all that, in the last three years or so, some liquid hauliers have opted for fairly basic single bunk sleeper cabs, and on the FM, P series, Actros and TGS they are more common than before.

There are many advantages for even a flat roof sleeper cab; first up, more space for storage for the driver, the ability for them to have a short nap when possible, and a better residual. It is probably not relevant for the big petrol companies, but it is worth bearing in mind, were the truck ever to be redeployed onto other work that did need a sleeper, then it's there. So, even for this market, I would take the hit of losing a few kilos of payload in favour of a better, roomier and more versatile cab.

Scania's team at Milton Keynes has, very refreshingly, I must say, recently put a 460P Super 'pet spec' tractor into its press fleet, and I was honoured to have the first drive of it. And Scania even managed to get hold of a suitable and very typical tanker trailer. We couldn't load it with fuel, but it gave a very good representation of the type of vehicles in this sector.

Technical overview

I'll come onto the driveline details in a bit, but in a rather back-to-front way than usual, let's talk about the cab first.

Now, Scania will, I assume, keep this vehicle for about a year, and so it will be a very attractive proposition on the second-hand market when that day comes, so Scania has opted for a sleeper cab. Good call for the reasons I mentioned earlier! But in fact, Scania effectively has 12 cabs available for this sector!

The P is the most common, but the slightly bigger G cab (which has three-step entry) is also perfectly suitable. Both are available in day and sleeper options - the former can be normal height or low - extended or low with the back of the cab directly behind the seats. The sleeper can be low, normal or high.

That is a lot of choice! Our truck had the normal height sleeper P cab, but the low height, extended day P cab is very popular with Hoyer and others in the sector. It is worth mentioning that the P series cab, despite being the smallest cab in the Scania portfolio for general haulage specs, is deceptively spacious inside.

This 2.5m-wide cab is the normal height, which has a decent raised roof which gives some space for some usable lockers above the windscreen, and if you needed it, I'd say there was enough room on the back bulkhead to fit some proper lockers were you to need this cab for the odd overnight. There is an engine hump, of course, but again it isn't a pain. Well, it wouldn't be if the fire extinguisher wasn't mounted there - although putting it in that position makes perfect sense.

There is also an emergency hammer fotted and the pet spec also features extra buttons on the dash and a rear view camera. There is a rear window in the cab which is helpful, but equally helpful is the blackout blind that covers it when you are resting or sleeping. Remember, drivers are not likely to be clambering across this cab very often, and in fact, the engine hump is useful for keeping paperwork close to hand.

It is a superb cab for this type of work. The dash is fine, as is the positioning of all the controls, stalks and buttons, and I do like the extra control in the side of the door. It will get even better when the new digital dash finally starts making its way into operators' fleets, and surely Scania can't be too far off offering digital mirrors?

Ok, so that's the cab, what about the axles? Well, you can have the 460P as a standard 6x2 full-size midlift or tag axle - the latter are popular for operators with milk and powder tankers - but when fitted with the Hendrickson small midlift saves about 500kg off the unit's unladen weight. That is weight that effectively can be transferred solely to payload.

A small midlift also takes up less length, which frees up valuable space on the chassis for fitting some of the equipment necessary for this work. Blowing equipment for example blower, tipping gear and the like. This truck was on a 3,950mm wheelbase.

The engine is the relatively new DC13-175 'super' 12.74-litre straight six, unveiled in late 2021 and coming into fleets in late 2022 and now a very common sight on Scanias. It uses dual-dosing SCR - selective catalytic reduction - to meet its Euro 6e emissions standards which does mean it does use a lot more AdBlue than other trucks. Under the P cab you can have the 12.74-litre in 420, 460 and 500hp options; the G cab have it at 560hp as well, but no tanker operator is really likely to go for that, are they?!

The 460P is by far and away the best fit for this sector. You could get away with a 420P, but why would you, and likewise, would you need 500hp? Possibly in hilly terrain, which, of course, some of these tankers will cover in some areas.

But let's be honest here, the 460 is the optimum spec. That engine offers a maximum power of 460hp at 1,800rpm and a very usable maximum torque of 2,500Nm between 900-1,290rpm - that's 200Nm more than a 12.9-litre Volvo FM460 and 150Nm more than the 10.9-litre DAF XD450, and that extra torque is a major benefis of having a slightly bigger and heavier engine - Scania only has its 12.74-litre engine as a straight-six on a 44 tonne tractor. The gearbox is the Scania G25CM 12-speed automated manual.

I do like the Scania gearbox, it performs well and never lets you down. The front axle was rated at 8,000kg, the drive axle at 11,500kg and the midlift axle at 4,500kg, so the GVW of the tractor unit is 24,000kg. The rear axle is the new R756 type and the ratio was 1:2.31, this being part of the new Super driveline.

On the road

As a truck journalist, I naturally have to remain impartial, but I have to admit, I have always really enjoyed Scania's New Generation models, but - and in a break from tradition from most transport hacks - I especially like its P series.

As a tool to do general haulage, it's got it all, but that also applies to many specialist roles. It has a nice low centre of gravity, two-step access, good all-round vision, and it handles so well - and being so low, you don't have the rocking of bigger, taller cabs. Of course, it's best suited for day work or the occasional night out - for tramping, you need the R cab - which is probably Scania's best 'jack of all trades' cab - and for the real long-distance trips, then it's understandable why the S cab is so popular.

But for petroleum work, the P cab is bob on. Now, of course, this was a press truck, so it was well-specced, but not overly so - cloth seats, for example, but it was fitted with those all-important armrests! It had an electronic parking brake.

Now, regular readers may know I have never really liked these, thanks, in no part, to a continual fight with this system on some Mercedes trucks, which I have had some bad experiences of them simply not coming off - often in inappropriate times like waiting to pull off from a busy roundabout! So, with that in mind, I had always preferred the reassurance you get with a hand parking brake. But on the Scania, the electronic parking brake works very well and does what you hope and want it to do when you want it to do it!

So once you get used to it - well, once your brain gets used to trusting it - it is really good. It comes off when you pull away and comes on when you stop. The 460P handles like Maradona ((C) Del Boy, 1991), and is effortless to control.

Admittedly I had an unladen truck, but it pulled away like an absolute train. It was also amazing on fuel consumption - I admit I was not doing a proper scientific assessment of its fuel usage, but over my journey, the dash was showing an average of 13.8mpg! That is phenomenal and suggests at least 11mpg if loaded.

But then I was more than aware of the superb fuel economy the Super driveline is delivering on all its models, but especially from the 460hp model. I took it from the Scania HQ at Milton Keynes, up to M1 to join the M6 and then skirted around Coventry and took the A46 to Kenilworth, where I took it round my - now 'common' test route through the town and up and down a couple of challenging hills. That gave me a good chance to try out the five-stage engine brake which was very impressive.

On my left turn, hairpin, straight-into-a-hill manoeuvre the truck coped 'ok' but not as impressively as I'd hoped, especailly given it wasn't loaded. The cruise control worked well, I say this because eon the previous New Gen P series, I often found the cruise control didn't hold the truck back as you'd like when going downhill, but on this this trip, it did, and the truck stuck religiously at 56mph tops. That was one of my biggest bugbears with Scanias, so it's nice to see it has been addressed.

Conclusions

For the market this truck is aimed at, there is a little to fault it on.

With such a huge range of cabs, not to mention three engine outputs, Scania has every base covered for this specialist sector, but this press demo truck was the optimum combination of cab, power and axles. But strip away all the gubbins you need for hauling tankers and the 460P, small midlift is actually a brilliant tool for general haulage as well - remember if you are doing mostly day work, then it ticks a lot of boxes; it's light, superb on fuel and fun to drive. Yes - fun to drive.

Its residual value will be best in class as well, and actually, as you don't see too many of these trucks on the market, it might even be a mildly sought-after buy for those payload-conscious operators. There really isn't anything to fault this truck on at all; it has that Scania build quality, it has excellent fuel economy, it offers great payload. Again, the only things that might make you overlook a Scania in this sector is the location of the dealer, the initial purchase price compared with its rivals or just a simple preference to other marques.

But remember this, for a truck that may be working up to 20 hours a day, six days a week and so piling on the mileage from refinery to petrol station, you know this Scania will almost inevitably give you a million clicks without much, if any cause for concern.

And by then, which m ay be reached in four years, it'll be ready for a holiday in the sunshine, but you'll certainly have got your money's worth out of it.

I have to say, I came home thinking this really was a lovely truck, and so much fun to drive.

We like

• Excellent payload potential
• Superb fuel economy
• Comfortable cab
• Improved engine brake
• Electronic parking brake

We don't like

• Opt for 500hp if on hilly terrain
• Absolutely nothing of note!