While the Tatra 138 caused a revolution, the Tatra 148 was just an evolution of a successful concept. There was actually no reason for a fundamental departure from successfully tested solutions. Designers also focused on fine-tuning a number of details, increasing reliability and also increasing the performance of the eight-cylinder diesel engine.
At the beginning, let’s briefly recall the Tatra 138. The successor in the 1950s, the already slowly aging T111, brought a completely new cabin and engine on a typical Tatra chassis with a central support pipe and swinging semi-axles. The design was significantly rounded, and the cabin received the necessary dose of comfort. The driver’s seat could be adjusted, the steering and the clutch received a power booster, and the electropneumatic gear shift ensured the necessary comfort for changing gears.
The five-speed gearbox was in one block with an additional gearbox, and under the hood was a new eight-cylinder diesel with a volume of 11.8 liters and an output of 132 kilowatts. All wheels were driven – the T138 had a 6×6 drive, but the trailer tractor was also made in a 4×4 version. There were several different versions, from tippers and flatbeds to tankers or cranes. The military versions differed from the civilian ones in details. Production began in 1959 and ended in 1972 in the number of over 48,000 units.
So short recap. The latter is important for understanding the T148, as it was an evolution of the previous type. As mentioned by many publications and in his autobiography Life with the Tatras coat of arms, Milan Galia, the former chief designer of the Kopřivnica brand, recalled it, the aim was to increase the service life of the heavy truck, strengthen the engine and sort of catch some of the flies of the popular predecessor.
The biggest design interventions, by which you can safely distinguish the T148 from the T138, required the modification of the engine. The T2-928 forked eight-cylinder diesel with direct fuel injection received an extended stroke and also increased its volume to 12.7 liters. Thanks to this, the hood was more angular and the front mask was enlarged for better air supply to the engine (the mudguards were also modified). Along with these modifications to the engine, its output also rose to 156 kilowatts. The use of a five-speed manual transmission in one block with a two-speed auxiliary transmission has not changed from its predecessor.
Comfort continued to be aided by electro-pneumatic shifting, as well as power clutch and steering. All wheels with attachable front axle were still driven. To reduce tire wear on both rear axles, the T148 received a new inter-axle differential. The rear axles themselves were also modified, all in the name of increasing the service life. However, the Tatra truck was also tested in difficult conditions, including in the Soviet Union.
Development of the modified T138 began already in the mid-1960s, originally under the designation T2-138, until trucks from Kopřivnica with the designation Tatra 148 appeared at the Brno engineering fair in 1968, reminds the publication of Karel Rosenkranz Tatra trucks. Subsequently, production of the verification series began, after which series production started in Kopřivnice. For a while alongside the T138, but since 1972 completely independently.
Similar to its predecessor, the offer included a number of different versions for both civilian and military use. You can easily recognize military models by the angular bumper, the round creature in the roof above the passenger seat or the wipers positioned differently. Their engine was also modified and capable of burning various fuels, including jet kerosene.
When you open the original Workshop manual for the repair of Tatra 148 series trucks, you will find several different variants. The basis was a one-sided or three-sided tipper with a length of over seven meters and a load capacity of up to 15.5 tons in the first case and 14.94 tons in the second. The total weight of the set was a maximum of 38 tons for tippers. For example, a military flatbed truck could transport up to 40 people on its bed.
Other versions include semi-trailer tractors with 6×6 and 4×4 drive, mounted cranes, excavators, mixers or tanks on the T148 chassis (with different lengths and load capacities, with or without a fixed or tilting frame). Modified versions of the truck were also used by firefighters or public safety. A more comfortable cabin with power steering, an adjustable seat, an ergonomic dashboard or independent diesel heating was common to all.
For particularly cold regions, naturally especially in Siberia, a version of the single-sided tipper called Arktik was created. It had a heated driver’s cabin, double windscreens, a body with a double floor heated by exhaust gases to prevent the cargo from freezing to it, or a matte black hood to absorb sunlight and better warm the engine.
In 1978, the T148 received partial improvements. Among other things, a new design of the driver’s seat, glued glass, windshield washers, mudguards connected to the cabin or a modified body with a single enlarged telescope for folding instead of the previous two. The designers also reduced the noise of the engine and slightly reduced fuel consumption – before the modernization it was around 30 liters per 100 kilometers.
At the end of the 1970s, Tatra continued to build and expand the polygon in Kopřivnica and slowly developed the successor to the T138 and T813 models with the designation T815. The novelty was definitively shown at the engineering fair in Brno in 1982, and a few months later its serial production began. The Tatra 148 was no longer produced. First, it reached a milestone in January 1982 – the one hundred thousandth produced piece of a single model series. This happened for the first time ever.
Subsequently, on December 14 of the same year, production stopped at 113,674 units. As Milan Olšanský points out in the book Tatra neśmrtelná, this is still the second highest number in the model range of the Kopřivnica manufacturer.
Although no expedition with the Tatra 148 was as famous as the Lambaréné student expedition, this evolution of the T138 was not missing on expeditions to different regions of the world either. For example, in January 1976, two T148 cars traveled from the Old Town Square in Prague to Nepal on the fifth largest mountain in the world Makalu. Two Czechoslovak climbers from the expedition finally managed to climb the peak, but one of them died during the descent. Between March and July 1977, T148 took part in the third natural science expedition of the National Museum to Iran.
It is also worth remembering that a popular plastic toy was created in the 1970s and 1980s with the appearance of the Tatra 148. In 2014, its production was resumed and continues to this day, with a length of 72 centimeters and a load capacity of up to one hundred kilograms. There is also a smaller thirty-centimeter version.
