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                                                          One real big question --------------If you flip the two top gears, then which one will accept the input shaft. Because only one is machined to accept 

                                                          the input shaft.

                                                           Truck Shop

                                                            Little known fact Kenworth moved it's commercial truck line to Yakima Washington during WWII. It was located on N.Front St.  They built

                                                            a limited amount of trucks at that address from 1942 to late 1945. Any truck alive today built in that time period is fairly rare. The Seattle

                                                            truck plant was converted over to build aircraft parts for Boeing. That same building in Yakima later became Washington Fruit and 

                                                            Produce. I hauled apples out of that building some years ago, but it just looked like any other cold store then. Plus Kenworth threw most of

                                                            it's energy into military vehicles in the rest of the Seattle plant.  I knew a man that  was an engineer for Kenworth from 1938 to 1978 he worked

                                                            in the design department for off road/oil field trucks.

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1 hour ago, j hancock said:

Hmmmm....... that is unfortunate.

                                              I agree, A local fellow used a nice late 30's Diamond T to make a rat rod. Real sad

                                               Truck Shop

                                          Thanks for the info folks and Brocky those are great photos.

                                           Truck Shop

                                       Fuel tanks mounted behind the cab were pretty common on early Kw's,Pete's and many other trucks in the northwest. The off road loggers

                                       were mainly the ones that cooled the drums with water, but it wasn't that common.  Note the fuel tank behind the cab on this 54 Pete that

                                       that belonged to Herrett Trucking Sunnyside , Wa. At one time it was the biggest refrigerated truck line west of the Mississippi.  I use to see

                                       Herrett trucks all the time when I was a kid.

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This thread is going no where.  To each his own.

11 hours ago, TeamsterGrrrl said:

Lots of the "steering wheel holders" that knock cabovers have never driven one. I've driven both, and prefer cabovers. I'm not the only old timer that prefers cabovers, when the big fleets like Continental Baking and UPS switched from cabovers to conventionals in the 80s and 90s, a lot of experienced drivers hung on to their cabovers to the bitter end. Keep in mind too that some of you are comparing obsolete american cabover fleet trucks to modern air ride conventionals... If you compare like specced modern cabovers versus conventionals the cabover wins on most counts, though a conventional might make sense if your loads weigh out before they cube out. The rest of the world gets it- Cabovers are better... When will americans catch up?

I'm not knocking cabovers , In 78 I drove a 352 pete 110 A model cat plus a 362 3408 cat 110 and a 110 K100 B425. 

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COE's are not a truck that you want to live in on the road. A six cylinder is just less moving parts.

Truck Shop     end of discussion 

No I haven't driven a Scania. Throw a set of three railers on it three times in one day or even a set of singles. There is a reason COE's became extinct many years ago in the US. Not trying to argue anything. 500 Hp is a small engine with Electronic logs these days. If your hauling 105,000 a driver needs as much Hp and torque to keep his average time up. 

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If the company I work for bought those they would lose half the drivers plus some mechanics. First thing to go is the double hump fenders, chain up on Cabbage, Lookout, Pipestone,  Stevens, Snoqualmie and White pass would total those fenders out in no time. Plus I wonder what that windshield costs. The way the roads are sanded and rocked we change out two to three windshields a weekend during the winter months.

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Funny story about a C700 Ford.  Had one towed into the shop that had a 391 and an Allison back in 86. Tilted the cab and it broke the crank, chopped up the radiator. The engine fan is attached to the crank on those C models. It chopped holes in the cab right behind and beside the drivers legs and feet. Made a hell of a mess. The guy was moving to Iowa and wanted it fixed. We had a good 391 and radiator in a C model that had a cab fire.

I installed it and took it out for a test drive------------wouldn't shift out of first, the governor took a crap which led to some more questions to the owner.

He was on a grade and the trans tried to down shift and dropped from 4th to 1st at 40 mph. A little to much rpm for that 391.

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This was a KW I refurbished fifteen years ago. The company I worked for at the time sold it to a farmer and he didn't treat it to good. I took these pics this last spring, he really let it go to hell. A before and after pic. 

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                                        What type of trailer is it and how old? How many relay valves and air tanks are there? And how many axles? Have you checked the supply line from the tractor?

                                        Are you talking about service brakes being slow or parking brakes being slow to release. Just some questions to get a place to start.

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                                     Thought I would never say this at my age and years working the floor. But i would have a happy day just doing the dishes{cleaning parts} just to be

                                     able to work around that Honey.

                                     Truck Shop

                                               Looks like another on for CoPart.

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In the early 90's I was on a trip up the Oregon coast on highway 101 near Waldport.  Oregon DOT was doing road work  And they had a day cab Diamond T water truck {same model as that one} parked on the edge of the road. I stopped and asked if I could look at it, they didn't care.

It was Cummins powered with 5x4 and had a whopping 61,000 miles on it. Surprisingly it wasn't rusty being on the coast.

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9 hours ago, kscarbel2 said:

For a time, I owned the very last highway coach manufactured by Kenworth, the XW-1.  It was built in October, 1948 which was coincidentally the same month and year that North Coast Transportation was sold to Greyhound and became North Coast Greyhound, then wrapped into  Northwest Greyhound which consisted of several small regional lines that the hound was buying up.  The XW-1 was a demo that had some features not found on the 25 previous W-1 coaches that Kenworth turned out.  KW was unsuccessful in getting GHL interested in purchasing more W-1's although they did operate the XW-1 (NWGHL unit no. Y1001) for several years on the old North Coast routes, primarily up and down Hwy. 99 between Vancouver BC and Portland.  The W-1's were only sold to North Coast and Intermountain Transportation of Anaconda, MT.  They were powered by Hall Scott 190's which were 779 cubic inch 240 hp "pancake" gas engines, with either a 4 or 5 speed Spicer.  The XW-1 featured torsion bar suspension and 37 reclining seats with underfloor and trunk baggage bays.  The big Hall Scott, although an excellent long life engine only produced around 3-4 mpg and just could not compete with the General Motors Diesel 6-71 which was taking over the industry by that time.  With no further orders, Kenworth dropped out of the highway coach market.  The lucrative school bus division was transferred to Pacific Car and Foundry (the Kenworth Pacific) and a few years later sold off to Gillig.

The excellent picture that you posted is of a deck and a half, or "decker" as North Coast referred to them.  During the '30's Kenworth quite often relied on out of house body builders to furnish the body that went on the KW chassis.  The body on the bus pictured was built by either Heiser or TriCoach and the bus had a Hall Scott 180.  Most of the NCL coaches, including the Kenworth W-1's had the distinctive round NCL light on the upper front.

Kenworth produced buses from 1922 to 1948 (not counting the above mentioned school bus production).
 

http://www.busconversions.com/bbs/index.php?topic=22124.0

Great info Thanks!

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7 hours ago, 41chevy said:

1937 K.W.

I believe that 708 is being restored or is restored now.

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Well when I said oldest product I've seen I mean {not behind ropes or chained off}. That 1925 KS was built in the second year of Kenworth as a company.

It first started as Gerlinger in 1915 then Gersix from 1917 to 1923.  My brother lived next to a retired Kenworth engineer, he worked there from 1938 to 1974. He was an interesting fellow to talk to.

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