CarBrandLogos archive · Kenworth · 1984

KenworthT600

The truck that made American haulers care about drag, and got laughed at for it.

Photo: Mr.choppers · CC BY-SA 3.0

The story

A defining chapter in Kenworth history.

Explore the ideas, engineering and context that shaped the Kenworth T600, then continue into its specifications and place in the marque's lineage.

Origins

American conventional trucks had been shaped by tradition rather than airflow: tall square hoods, upright grilles, mirrors and stacks hung wherever they were convenient. Kenworth broke with that in 1984. The T600 had a sloped, tapered hood, rounded corners, a set-back front axle and carefully positioned fairings, and the difference in fuel burn against a conventional square-nosed tractor was large enough to change fleet purchasing decisions.

Triaxle dump truck .km · Photo taken 6 October 2005 by Ky MacPherson (talk · contribs) ; Permission: released to Wikimedia Commons on 6 October 2005 under GFDL. · CC BY-SA 3.0

Kenworth T600B, Marten transportation, Venice CA

Design and engineering

Drivers named it the Anteater, and not kindly. The styling was widely mocked when it appeared, and owner-operators who valued the look of a long-nose rig wanted nothing to do with it. Fleet accountants felt otherwise. At the fuel prices and mileages of a long-haul operation, the savings paid back quickly, and within a few years every North American manufacturer had an aerodynamic conventional of its own. The T600 is the reason modern American trucks look the way they do.

Kenworth T600B, Marten transportation, Venice CA · Patrice Raunet · Public domain

New Zealand Trucks - Flickr - 111 Emergency

In production

The set-back axle was as significant as the bodywork. Moving the front axle rearward improved weight distribution, tightened the turning circle and allowed a shorter, better-packaged front end without sacrificing steer-axle capacity. It became standard practice across the industry.

New Zealand Trucks - Flickr - 111 Emergency · 111 Emergency from New Zealand · CC BY 2.0

Legacy

Power came from Cummins, Caterpillar and PACCAR diesels, with Eaton ten-speed manuals or Allison automatics. Production ran until 2007, when the T660 replaced it with a further refined version of the same idea. Kenworth kept building the traditional W900 the entire time, selling both shapes to two very different sets of buyers.

At a glance