Scania has received several truck orders from the Finnish defense, with an initial order of 91 vehicles and an option for more. The customer has stipulated that these be subjected to a broad variety of tests to assess their capabilities.

One of the more spectacular ordeals was the tilt test on the G 420 8×8 with a high chassis, sleeper cab and a hooklift. The test was carried out to determine just how far the truck loaded to 32 tons gross vehicle weight could be inclined before overturning.

“According to the contract with the Finnish defense, we had to demonstrate that we could meet certain requirements,” Heikki Fant at Public and Special Vehicles. “Some of these we can calculate, but for this particular asessment we needed to carry out a physical test, which was done in Finland. Needless to say, it is important that the trucks don’t overturn while driving through woods.”

The contract stipulated that the loaded truck should withstand being inclined at least 30 degrees and the test was interrupted when the guage reached 31.72 degrees. The unloaded vehicle was tilted a full 42.32 degrees, which was the limit of the tiltboard. “In this case, practice outperformed theory, we hadn’t actually anticipated this high figures,” says Heikki Fant.

In order words, we cannot say with certainty just how much the vehicle can be tilted but this is clearly close to its limit.