Fuso Shogun 510 Tipper 2023 Review

The Fuso Shogun 510 was launched with a modicum of fanfare in October 2021. It was hailed as the most powerful Japanese truck in the country, and a truck which is unique to the Australian market.

The Shogun 510 was born, we’re told, from customer demand for a more powerful heavy-duty Japanese truck. It was developed following a request from Daimler Truck and Bus Australia Pacific, and in particular from the company’s President and CEO, Daniel Whitehead.

“We pushed hard to get the 13-litre engine into the Shogun for our market because our customers made it clear they wanted a Japanese heavy-duty truck with serious performance,” he said at the time of the launch.

And when he asked, he got. The 510hp version of the Shogun sits atop the range which includes 8-litre, 11-litre and 13-litre engines, with 360, 400, 460 and now 510hp power ratings.

Configurations include 6x4 and 4x2 prime movers and tippers as well as 8x4, 6x4 and 6x2 rigids, including the recently introduced 14-pallet Shogun 360. There is a mixture of air and steel-spring rear suspension options and limited-slip differentials are also available.

We’ve driven the Shogun in single-trailer (455hp) and B-double form with the 510hp powerplant, so we were eager to see how it performed as a tipper. Unfortunately, we couldn’t hook up a dog to the back of the 510, but we did get a near-full load of sand which brought our GVM up to near the maximum of 26 tonnes.

The test truck, which incidentally was the actual truck that was on display at the Brisbane Truck Show, was built up by Jon Hamilton at Daimler Truck Gold Coast to a specification that seems to hit a sweet spot in the market.

It features a Hardox steel tipper body produced by AA Diesel Truck Bodies and would usually be followed by a three- or four-axle dog trailer. The tipper has a capacity of 11.5 cubic metres.

Prior to our drive, we ran the tipper over a weighbridge with full tanks to get an accurate tare weight which came out at 11,240kg. We put in around 11,080kg of sand which brings us up to 22,320kg – just shy of the 26,000kg GVM. The total GCM for the 510 is 63,000kg.

The Fuso 510 is powered by a 13-litre OM471 engine from the Daimler Truck family, which belts out 510hp and 2500Nm of torque. The package also includes a DT12 fully automated manual transmission, which is well-suited to the potent engine.

In a press release for the Brisbane Truck Show, Fuso Truck and Bus Australia Director, Alex Muller, says he was pleased to present the 510 Tipper for the first time.

“The Shogun 510 Tipper has been embraced enthusiastically by Australian customers who are thrilled to have a Japanese tipper and dog with more than 500hp as well as the aftersales support that comes with every Fuso,” he said.

“Our Shogun 510 customers absolutely love them and you can see the passion with the amount of 510s that are being customised with stainless steel and extra lights,” Mr Muller added.

Our test truck certainly had the bling treatment with a hefty polished bulbar and some extra lights to give it that custom look and a colourful wrap leaving no doubt as to its power output.

The Shogun is a big, full-size truck. There are three big steps up to the cabin with plenty of hand holds along the way. Once up there, the driver gets a commanding view of the road from the suspended seat.

The dash spreads out in front of the driver in a logical and easy-to-read way. The screen in between the speedo and tacho gives useful information and is managed through the buttons on the left-hand side of the steering wheel. Cruise control, speed limiter and phone are controlled by the buttons on the right-hand side of the wheel.

Gears are selected on the left-hand column stalk and it’s here that you can select manual or auto modes and operate the three-stage engine brake.

To the left, in the centre of the dash, is a seven-inch touchscreen that includes full truck-spec navigation, Bluetooth audio, phone connectivity, rear camera (with up to five in total), a USB port and more.

Fuso, as with all the Daimler products, is big on safety and the Shogun range gets the full treatment when it comes to safety features.

Standard on the Shogun includes Advanced Emergency Braking System (AEBS) radar/camera technology that uses camera and radar camera technology to provide enhanced pedestrian-sensing capability, making it able to completely stop for a moving pedestrian in the event the driver does not respond to an audible warning. This system is standard on all Shogun models, as is radar adaptive cruise control.

Shoguns also come standard with Active Attention Assist (AAA), lane departure warning, a driver airbag, Electronic Stability Program (ESP) and a Hill Start System (HSS).

Other standard features include Intelligent Headlight Control, which automatically turns on and off the truck’s high-beam function in response to traffic. Daytime LED running lights, positioned below the main headlight assembly, are also standard.

Our test drive took us from the Daimler Truck dealership in Burleigh Heads out through the Gold Coast hinterland to Cunungra. Anyone who knows that area can assert that it’s a great place to test a truck. It’s full of hills and tight, twisting roads that offer everything to give the vehicle a thorough test.

With our loaded tipper, we found that on the steeper hills, the truck kicked down smoothly and sat in around ninth gear and powered up. It was really doing it easily and could have handled a loaded dog trailer without fuss.

Down the hills, the Shogun was equally impressive. A push forward on the left-hand stalk brings in the three-stage engine brake which handled the loaded tipper admirably. Push the engine brake right forward and it’ll kick down hard and offer a heap of retardation, holding back the 22-tonne truck on the steep roller-coaster hills of the hinterland.

On the freeway, life in the Fuso is easy. It glides along at 1600rpm with the speedo sitting on 95km/h, while on the downhills the eco-roll will kick in automatically and then seamlessly transition back onto power when it detects it needs to.

The safety features are not intrusive. Sure, if you stray out of your lane, the lane departure warning will bark out its displeasure, but if you keep it straight, it’s hard to know that the features are there.

It is, however, nice to know that when you’re in the Fuso, you are in one of the best-equipped trucks on the road in terms of safety. And you’re also in the most powerful Japanese heavy-duty truck available in our market.

In the final wash-up, we all know what we’re getting here. It is basically a European truck, under the skin at least, for a Japanese-truck price. With all the cross-pollination going on with brands like Fuso/Mercedes-Benz/Freightliner and Isuzu and UD, and now even the recently announced Hino and Fuso ‘merger’, there’s more of this to come.

But it’s not a bad thing. We’re getting the best of each brand blending into the other brands in the stable and the ultimate winner out of that is, of course, the customer.

The Fuso Shogun 510 is a blend of all that’s good from Daimler Truck. It’s powerful, smooth in operation, safe and strong. It’s a truck that’s well suited to multiple applications, not the least of which is as a tipper. You can be sure that we’ll see many more of these on the road in the years to come.

Specifications
Engine: Fuso OM471-T9 Diesel
Configuration: DOHC, four-valve, asymmetric turbocharger, air to air intercooler in-line six-cylinder turbo-diesel
Displacement: 12.8-litre, 12,809cc
Bore: 132mm
Stroke: 156mm
Power: 510hp (375kW) at 1600rpm
Torque: 2500Nm at 1100rpm
Max engine speed: 2100rpm
Compression ratio: 18.3:1
Emission Control: Diesel particulate filter (DPF) plus SCR after-treatment system
Emission Level: ADR 80/03 Euro VI
Injection System: common rail direct injection with pressure booster
Fuel capacity: 400L
Tank type: Rectangular alloy tank with locking cap
AdBlue: 60 litres, Tank fitted with locking AdBlue cap
Speed Limiter: Speed limited 100km/h
Front suspension: Taper leaf with double acting shock absorbers
Rear Axle: Full floating hypoid type tandem drive with inter-axle diff lock. Optional limited slip differential to both axles
Axle type: Fuso R12TT/R12T. Capacity 21600kg
Ratio: Standard 4.222:1 (Optional 4.625:1)
Rear suspension: Four-bag air suspension. Trailing arm with double-acting dampers and ECAS with two memory positions
Brakes: Full air, dual circuit with Fuso taper rollers
Engine brake: Jacobs brake with three levels of retardation