Compared to 2009, Class 8 truck sales in the U.S. rose 19.1% in February, according to WardsAuto.com. Canadian heavy-truck sales also 15.5% compared to February 2009 numbers.
Delivering a total of 7,427 Class 8 trucks in February, all current U.S. brands showed gains over their 2009 performance, with Daimler’s Freightliner leading the pack with 2,485, or 86.1% over its 2009 numbers. The only brand to show a decline in Class 8 was Daimler’s discontinued Sterling.
In Canada where total Class 8 sales for February totaled 1,178 trucks, Paccar’s Kenworth and Peterbilt lead in gains, recording 194.7% and 94% improvements respectively over the same month last year.
In medium-duty, U.S. February sales dropped 15.3% in Class 7 (2,771 vs. 3,272), but Class 6 climbed 25.5% (2,247 vs. 1,790) compared to the previous year. International lead both in total volume, recording flat sales for the month in Class 7 and a 52.5% gain in Class 6 over 2009.
U.S. sales in the mid-range Classes 4 and 5 dropped in February compared to 2009, with Class 4 tumbling 33.5% and Class 5 13%.
In Canada, Classes 4 through 7 all showed a 25.9% drop in sales last month compared to 2009. Total February volumes in those classes were 559 units this year and 754 units in 2009.
