1968 Volvo Articulated Hauler Wins Longest Working Contest

As part of Volvo's articulated hauler's 50th anniversary in 2016, the company held a contest to identify the oldest Volvo articulated hauler still actively working on a North American jobsite. After reviewing the submissions, the winner was identified as Tomy Stenvall of Amswede Corporation in Chula Vista, CA, who runs a 1968 Volvo DR860 on almost a daily basis.

Stenvall’s 1968 Volvo DR860 has been a staple in his fleet since the early 1990s and continues to be a daily contributor on jobsites that require dust control or soil mixing.

“If this had been a beauty contest, we wouldn’t have made it very far. This truck has been through a lot over the years,” says Stenvall. “But it’s still going strong.”

Stenvall originally purchased the DR860 because there was nothing like it available in the U.S. at the time. Having grown up in Sweden and worked in the earthmoving business, he was well-acquainted with Volvo articulated haulers and didn’t want to settle for anything less.

“I needed something that was more agile than a typical Gi-series water truck, but not as clumsy as a water wagon,” says Stenvall. So I looked overseas and ended up getting my hands on this DR860 from a tunnelling company in Sweden. I paid $7,000 and they shipped it over in a container. We reassembled it, lengthened the frame and put a water tank and ag pump on it. It’s been with us ever since.”

Today, his customized DR860 is still running the 48-year-old original transmission, and it was only a year ago that he replaced the original engine with another vintage 5-liter TD50 engine from a previously scrapped cab-over-engine truck in his yard.

“If there was an hour-meter on this truck, it stopped working a long time ago,” says Stenvall. “If I had to estimate, I’d say I’ve put at least 1,000 hours per year on it for 25 years. And it was already 23 years old when I bought it — that’s a lot of hours on this truck.”

In addition to not knowing the true hour mark, initially, the exact age of the DR860 was unclear. When the “Still Hauling” contest was announced, Stenvall’s equipment dealer, Mike Burrell of Volvo Construction Equipment and Services (VCES), helped him research the age.

“I knew his DR860 was the oldest I had seen — we just didn’t know how old,” says Burrell. “We couldn’t find any serial numbers stamped in the frame, but after a thorough inspection, we were able to find an identification plate on the transmission. We sent the number to Volvo, and they told us it fell within the range associated with the 1968 production year.”

With that information in hand, he helped Stenvall enter the contest.

“Sure enough, he had the oldest working hauler,” says Burrell.