MAN » Phoenix Truck Racing

In 1988, a small company Bickel Tuning (they were doing fiberglass spoilers and sleeper cabins for trucks) built for its owner - truck driver Gerd Korber - the own model based on MAN chassis, but with a hood. The chassis was lengthened and the cab was moved back. Square nose made of fiberglass. Instead of the serial engine was installed a V10 MAN engine, forced to 1350 hp and automatic transmission ZF. In addition, the truck was equipped with disc brakes on all wheels (that time there was no disc brakes on serial trucks in Europe!), with water cooling. So, they got a great race truck, which received an own name: Phoenix 01. At the first race in 1989 in the UK a bright yellow Phoenix made a real splash. And the Korber company received many orders from competitors! The assembling of racing Phoenix was started. In 1991, Korber became European champion in class "C". By the next year 16 Phoenix trucks were built - first of all racing. These trucks were used by Swede Blomqvist, French Crozier, Germans Lenz, Heuser and Kruger. One racing Phoenix belong to international transport organization (IRU). But then, times had changed. In the mid-nineties Gerd Korber moved onto racing DAF - and lost interest to its project, which must have been very costly.