Anyone who always dreamed of owning his own Unimog now has the chance to put one in his garage: The first do-it-yourself Unimog U 400 (1:12,5) will be on offer from August on: The LEGO Group, the world’s third largest toy manufacturer, has created a model with 2048 elements – up to now the largest LEGO Technic model in the company’s history. The impressive vehicle which links a combination of electric drive and pneumatics has been produced in exlusive cooperation with Mercedes-Benz as a true adaptation of the original down to the smallest details. As the world ‘ s most versatile workhorse, the Unimog pushes snow away in winter, mows motorway embankments in summer or helps to construct new roads. The so-called ” Power Functions ” run the pump of a pneumatically operated crane with a gripper arm that can rotate almost 360 degrees. With its gripper and the front winch, the Unimog can move any load out of the way. In addition it also has a serviceable control system and an engine which is accurate in every detail right down to the pistons. The gear unit provides good ground clearance just like the portal axles in the orginal, an individual suspension deadens jolts and the four-wheel drive guarantees mobility off-road as well. For winter use, the crane and winch can be converted into a huge snow plough. The LEGO Technic Unimog U 400 will be available from toy retailers from August on as well as from Mercedes- Benz and it costs about 190 Euros.

Mercedes-Benz Unimog celebrates 60th Jubilee

This top LEGO model comes just at the right time for the two big jubilees that the Unimog is celebrating at the moment: 60 years ago, on 3 June 1951 to be exact, the first Mercedes-Benz Unimog was created in Gaggenau and in December 2010 the 10,000th Unimog from product range U 300/U 400/U 500 rolled off the band at the Mercedes-Benz plant in Wörth. A unique vehicle concept had been created with its outstanding off-road mobility due to its four-wheel drive and fast driving features on the road. Since then the Unimog has proved its worth not only for winter services, caring for green areas or for various work in horticulture and landscape gardening – they are also used for fighting forest fires and planting trees, digging ditches and drilling holes in the ground, as well as shunting on railway lines and disaster intervention over impassable country.

Altogether more than 380,000 units of the “Universal-Motor-Geräts (tool)” have rolled off the line. In the early days, the Unimog was produced in Gaggenau, but since 2002 it has been produced in Wörth. Daimler AG is celebrating this jubilee in 2011 with a whole variety of events.

With his Mercedes-Benz U 400 Unimog, Jens Seiner is adept at finding clever and simple solutions. Just like Columbus when discovering America, the owner of Autotechnik Seiner manages to devise simple solutions to problems for which there is no apparent solution. In order to be able to collect timber efficiently from the forest and deliver it to timber specialists a long way away despite rising diesel prices, Seiner uses a combination of two different methods of transport: His Unimog is fitted with a timber crane superstructure to collect tree trunks from the forest, and then a Unimog truck-trailer unit delivers the goods to the customer.

So that he can avoid wasting time reloading, Seiner does not put the tree trunks on stanchion truck-trailer combinations but in roll-off containers. “This solution allows me to kill two birds with one stone,”says the man from Ilmenau. “In this way no difficulties arise when securing a load with two metre trunks lying crosswise to the direction of the road;also it is virtually impossible to overload the vehicle and there are a lot fewer empty runs as there is always scrap metal, rubble or other debris to be carried on the return journey.”In addition he saves fuel. The Unimog U 400 with its 4.2 l four-cylinder 130 kW (177 HP) diesel engine uses a lot less fuel for loading and transporting than a powerful timber truck for long distance trips. The man from Thuringia is more than satisfied with its diesel consumption of about eleven litres per operating hour.

The Unimog with its very ingenious hydraulic system is vital for Autotechnik Seiner. There is hardly any other vehicle which can be used for so many jobs as this comparatively small power pack. Where a normal truck does not even arrive, this sturdy, manoeuvrable four-wheel drive still manages to get through. This is really appreciated by skilled tool-maker and car mechanic Seiner when travelling over snowy or muddy forest roads.

“It doesn’t matter what the weather is like, I can collect timber from any corner of the Thuringia Forest with my tough mate from Mercedes-Benz. But I don’t let the container roll off the fixed centre trailer using the hooking device until my 30-tonne truck-trailer combination has once more got firm ground under its wheels. The roll-off loader with its trailer is there ready and waiting to take on two full containers at the same time which makes the transport by road to wood pulp or chipboard plants, or sawmill very cost-effective,”explained Seiner. He goes all year round with his U 400 to collect wood from the forest district run by the Thuringian Forest Authority Paulinzella which covers a total area of almost 50,000 acres of woodland and provides a harvest of about 78,500 cubic yards of wood a year.

A multitude of attachable implements for various kinds of work

When Seiners doesn’t happen to be using his “Universal-Motor-Gerät” (shortened to: Unimog) for moving wood, he uses his four-wheel drive vehicle for winter services to clear snow from roads, forest trails or the nearby ICE railway track construction site. In addition he uses it to clean roads, mow verges and green areas, build trails, help on construction sites or tow cars. For all these different types of jobs, the enthusiastic Unimog fan has a whole range of implements which can be attached or mounted to his vehicle such as a snow plough, gritter, water tank, cutters or crane. Some of his attachments are produced at his headquarters in Geilsdorf which is close to Ilmenau. The equipment transforms the Unimog U 400 in no time at all into a suitable workhorse which is simply born to achieve.

60 Years Jubilee for the Mercedes-Benz Unimog

Sixty years ago, the first Mercedes-Benz Unimog rolled off the assembly line in Gaggenau. A unique vehicle concept with outstanding off-road mobility due to its four-wheel drive and fast driving features for road use had come into being. Daimler AG is celebrating this jubilee in 2011 with a multitude of events. These include a huge rally of historical and current Unimog models at the Mercedes-Benz Wörth Plant on Saturday, June 4th. Detailed information about the event as well as how to register for it can be found online: www.mercedes-benz.com/unimog-60jahre. On Sonntag, June 5th there will be jubilee celebrations at the Unimog Museum in Gaggenau (www.unimog-museum.com).

Like we have seen across the United States over the last couple of weeks, the old Goethe and university city in Thuringia’s Ilm district, at a height of 1,640 feet above sea level, is a place where snow is definitely to be expected. “We can expect to have a proper winter here from the end of October right up to mid-April,” says Jens Seiner, owner of Autotechnik Seiner. During the last 20 years, Seiner and his modern snowclearing equipment have been responsible for clearing not only motorways and roads but also hiking trails throughout the entire region, including the 2,824 foot high Kickelhahn, Ilmenau’s famous local mountain where Goethe wrote his poem, “Peace lies over all the tree tops”.

“This winter was particularly hard,” confirmed Seiner when talking about the past weeks and he gave his Unimog 400’s steering wheel a grateful pat for not letting him down despite “the incredible amounts of snow”.

The man from Ilmenau is full of praise. “It is perfect for driving through the woods and extremely reliable although it ‘s been working for us for almost seven years.” One glance at the mileage on the mileometer makes this more than clear: almost 9,380 miles (150,000 kilometers).

The Thuringer is quite satisfied with a diesel consumption of about 11 l per working hour. After all, this robust power machine also has to move the entire winter equipment (snowplough at the front, spreader at the rear) which amounts to quite a number of additional tonnes. Despite this load, “it is more economic than a truck and uses practically no oil at all,” confirms its owner. The 130 kW ( 177 HP) strong U 400 also makes sure that the nearby ICE-railway line construction site is kept clear of snow, just like the city’s recreation areas.

A Multitude of Jobs

However, even when winter is over Seiner’s Unimog doesn’t get a chance to rest as it is kept busy fetching wood from the forests, cleaning roads with its mounted water tanks, changing over to its mounted crane to help out on construction sites or simply towing away parking offenders. “I have built a special tandem trailer for this job,” explains Seiner. He also has a quite a lot of other equipment to fit on his Unimog which he made himself. His Unimog is absolutely “indispensable” for him, “because it can be used for almost anything – and especially in places that are not accessible with a truck,” he adds.

Originally Jens Seiner leased the U 400 (built in 2001) as a used vehicle, but then he managed to arrange follow-up financing and for a long time now his sturdy helper has belonged entirely to him. Before that he had already bought a 1974 Unimog. As it only has a small 90 HP engine its main use is for forestry work, but, “it is still very obliging and reliable,” says the trained toolmaker.

And it would be difficult for Seiner, who is in his mid-forties, to have to do without his Unimog in the mountainous and wooded region where he lives. Later, when he needs a replacement, he would like to have, “an additional 100 HP and a Powershift transmission. That would be perfect!”