Mercedes-Benz L 4500

The Mercedes-Benz L 4500 is a heavy duty truck by Mercedes-Benz. It was built by Daimler-Benz from 1939 – 1944 in the Mercedes-Benz plant Gaggenau and from 1944 – 1945 by Saurer. The vehicle is a long-bonnet truck and was offered as a rear-wheel-drive truck (L 4500 S) and an all-wheel-drive truck (L 4500 A). The German Wehrmacht used the L 4500 with armoured cabins as Flaks during World War II. Due to the lack of production material, the cabin was replaced with the simplified standardised Wehrmacht cabin and the mudwings with simplified wings in 1943. Also, the L 4500 chassis was used for the Sonderkraftfahrzeug 4.

Description


The L 4500 is a truck with a long bonnet, U-shape ladder frame and both front and rear rigid axle. Each axle has leaf springs. The front axle has single wheels while the rear axle has double wheels. The tyres have the size 10.5—20. A pneumo-hydraulic brake-system is used, each wheel has a drum brake, the parking brake locks the rear wheels only. For steering a ZF Type 721 is used. From the engine, the torque is transmitted to a manual five-speed gearbox with a single disk dry cluth. The gearbox also has a reduction gear. Only the rear wheels are driven. Unlike the L 4500S, the L 4500 A has an offroad gear which automatically switches on the front-wheel-drive as well. The Mercedes-Benz OM 67/4 Diesel engine is used. It is a six-cylinder inline four-stroke precombustion-chamber-injected and water-cooled diesel engine with OHV-Valvetrain.