OM424

In 1980 Daimler-Benz reworked its 90° V-family into the OM 42x generation: bore out to 128 mm, a single 142 mm stroke across the V-engines, rated speed eased to 2,300 rpm and, decisively, a move away from naturally aspirated engines towards turbocharging. The V12 sat at the top of that kit. On the intercooled OM 424 LA the charge air passed through a water-to-air exchanger buried down in the vee beside the injection pump and the intake pipes — a tidy way to add an intercooler without making an already wide engine wider. Output reached 615 PS at 2,300 rpm.

Daimler-Benz never offered it in a standard lorry. The 1981 press material pitches it instead at mobile cranes, heavy haulage tractors, fire appliances, industrial snow blowers and dump trucks — work where 1,265 kg of iron mattered less than 2,400 N·m arriving at 1,400 rpm. In 1988 the company handed sales of its truck engines for non-Mercedes applications to MTU, which ran the whole family as the Series 183. The OM 444 then replaced the OM 424 as the twelve at the top, and inherited the same odd job description.