So Windy has driven/riden on the Citaro with the 6.4 litre
engine before ?
Where would that have taken place ? I don't recall of any Citaro
demo bus for sampling in Singapore or Malaysia before ??
Anycase the original standard engine for the Citaro is 12 litres,
like the O 405 before it. But noteworthy about this newer 6.4 litre
engine is that it's of new generation design with multi-valves,
charged-cooling with advanced management electronics such that
despite it's small size the output can be rated @ 280 BHP with
Euro2 emissions levels ! This can be viewed as adequete as Euro3
buses are not yet the norm in Singapore. Of course if they want the
latest Euro3 or coming Euro4 engines, then i suppose they revert to
using the 12 litre engines rated @ say 250 BHP for rigid bus
deployment & say 300 BHP for articulated bus.
By the way, their new 6.4 litre engine does compare very well with
almost any other the Euro 2 engines of similar or even larger
capacity in performance. 280 BHP from only 6.4 litre how many other
engines produce so much from so little ?? Currently very few.
Going by my personal experiences just yesterday taking Handal
Indah's route 22 from Permas Jaya to JB city in their new M-B with
new generation engines, i'm quite optimistic such new generation
engines although small in cc the acceleration, power torque outputs
can match or exceed older design engines of even double the cc !!
There's limits to what can be done to gearing to boost performance
perhaps, beyond that i'll say engine performance & engine
efficiency takes over. The 'push from behind' was strong, quick
& fairly silent as the bus climbed up the slope near the new
CIQ complex under construction, mainly only the turbo whine with
hardly much gearbox noise from the manual gear (suspect to be M-B
original gearbox with 5-speeds) in fact i'll even say this is more
what should be expected from the buses in Singapore instead !
Those ZF or Voith gearboxes used in Singapore on the whole i find
them too noisy & harsh !
