OM366

Tightening emissions law in the early 1980s was pushing truck engineering towards fewer cylinders with forced induction rather than more displacement, and in 1983 Daimler-Benz reworked its smallest four and six accordingly. The OM 364 and OM 366 shared a 97.5 × 133 mm bore and stroke, the six coming out just under six liters, and the OM 366 took over from the OM 352 that had served since 1964. Naturally aspirated it gave 136 PS — but the point of it was what came after: a turbocharged A version, then from 1991 the intercooled OM 366 LA at up to 240 PS to Euro I.

Work found it everywhere. At the 1988 Hanover fair Daimler-Benz showed revised heavy Unimogs, the 427 and 437 series, with the OM 366 and OM 366 A replacing the older 424, 425 and 435; trucks, buses, the MB-trac, forklifts, generating sets and combine harvesters took it too. In South Africa, Atlantis Diesel Engines had been licensed in 1979 under a state program meant to blunt the UN arms embargo, and built this engine among the rest; ADE finished its hundred-thousandth 300-series unit in 1997. Euro II and Euro III finally made a clean sheet unavoidable, and the 900 series succeeded it.