North American Class 8 production increased in July, boosted by the continued strength of orders. “After cutting 3,000 units from the Class 8 build plan last month, the OEMs added back nearly 6,000 units in July,” said Steve Tam, ACT Research’s Vice President. He continued, “This brings the OEMs’ full-year expectations to over 252,000 units.”

Despite a sequentially slower July build rate in the North American medium duty market, year over year Classes 5-7 production was 15% higher. “With orders below build, the medium duty backlog declined to about 54,000 units of unbuilt vehicles,” noted Tam. He continued, “Similarly, medium duty inventories declined as July retail sales outpaced production.”