I found this 79 W900a long hood amongst a bunch of other W900's on a farm. 3408 cat, 4sp Spicer twin counter shaft brownie with 13sp in front and real tough dt480p rear drives. It got laid over in a ditch with a loaded lowboy and bent or kinked the left rail and distorted the top of cab. 48,000 lb suspension. Big gun in her day. Truck Shop
How many horsepower was that engine?
Are they going to fix it or transplant the power train? Grill looks good to me if it fits a 71.
Thanks for sharing, that is one skookum truck! For sale?
450 stock but with some changes 550 plus, very expensive to repair a 3408. This one runs. He actually bought it to use the 3408 as a spare for other equipment. Then he had the accident with it and bent the rail and hurt the cab It could be repaired, replacing the rail and repairing the cab is all doable. Yes he will sell it-but not for a nickle. And the floor boards are covered in cotton tail bunny rabbit crap. Truck Shop
I know a guy who wants one pretty bad, not sure I want to show him this one because I would wind up doing lot of work on it and I don't need a project right now!
There are two long hood Kenworths for sale on Craigslist. One is in Norther Cal and one is in east Idaho. They are both projects that are in good shape if some one wanted to mix parts with that one. I have a cab from a 72 that is in good shape if that helps this truck. I would hate to see it get parted out.
I would also consider rolling bearings in that engine. You never know how long it ran on it's side.
I will take a look, he is looking for an A model longhood with a 3408, thanks for the heads up!
Neither of those trucks have 3408's but they are a good start. The one in northern Ca has new rails and is pretty clean. I don't remember what he was asking for it. The one in Idaho is complete and runs but it needs some attention mechanically. It has a 400 cummins but I would be curious what it had originally.
Or one could go this route for $48,000, A reman 3408 can set a wallet back 35 to 40K.
The guy with that truck, does he run it all the time? Hard to imagine that on some of the grades in the woods here. Working in the bottom of the canyon you can hear them Jake braking down grade for half an hour before you see them at full RPM and 5 mph the whole time. Hard to imagine doing that with no Jake.
That truck is equipped with a retarder in the flywheel housing. The retarder on a 3408 caused some pretty serious braking force. The oil cooler is a monster on a 3408 with a brake saver. Truck Shop
Interesting bumper on that w9.
I thought those were bad and leaky and everyone by now had thrown them away, retarding force or not. Maybe just truck driver stories.
The biggest gripe was the added weight. I operated several trucks that had them and for heavy loads there great. Truck Shop
I love a brakesaver. Yes they dribble a bit of oil. I liked how smooth you could apply the retarding force, not jerky like jakes could be in lower gears. Having the big oil cooler helped when the motor was pulling its *** off too, helped keep things cool. When retarding you could sure heat the oil up. Also, it's kind of a built in dyno and preheater! I had one on my 400 JWAC and a C-16 600. Love them. Junkyard
I know several of the Cat guys around here ran them for heavy haul with jakes. You almost didn't need brakes to stop.
On the later model engines they'd actually reduce the available retarding power if you had both as you could exceed the capacity of the input shaft! Those were my favorite engines except for the 1693 in my C500. Having both is a great thing.
For some serious retarder braking on a 3406 use the turbine-stator out of a 3408. Oil temp will climb fast though with the smaller oil cooler Truck Shop
I just bought an 81 w900a, it was the first truck I ever drove, got my CDLs in it. Been sitting for a while. Gonna be a project but I'm excited about it.
Two enthusiastic thumbs up! I love me an A model.
Hard to go wrong with an early 80's KW W-900 . Good quality trucks built for the long haul of time.
Myself, I preferred an old Pete 359... The clutch pedal was my biggest bitch with the KW, Way too high and too far to the left. Sounds weird but that was my dislike of the KW.
Good for you those are classics for those years. One I drove in 1979, it's a 78. Took this picture at Dunnigan rest area north of Sack-a-Tomatoes, Cal. Truck Shop
Drove a similar '79 with an 8V-92 that was running at 500 HP, first couple of trips I got into big trouble over the fuel consumption. What's the fun of having good HP if you aren't allowed to use it?
My favorite is the clutch peddle on a GMC .......
It's funny... I don't remember any clutch pedal complaints with my old 9500, of course with the Detroit I only pushed it to get rolling, after that it was full auto.
Thats my only complaint of the pete. Goofy pedal angle into the floor. Hard to use your heel as the hinge.