Seattle. Peterbilt sign in the background.

Warren, thanks for your comments. You may well be right. The N models are one of the more obscure Sterling models, especially since they so closely resembled the J models. 



Jeff

John Frances and Jeff Lakaszcyck - I am going to modify my position on the J versus N model Sterlings a bit after a little research. In the announcement article of the NWS160 model in CCJ December 1939, Sterling touted the use of lightweight alloys in this new model. In Robert Gabrick's book "Sterling Trucks Photo Archive" he mentions on p81 that they were new lightweight models. Gabrick also mentions that the new sheet metal was provided to allow easy removal and maximum accessibility to the engine compartment as well as shorter length of the fenders ( allowing maximum length of the running board where tool boxes and battery boxes were located}. Also, that up to 1000 pounds of additional cargo might be allowed with the newer light-weight vehicle. Considering that, I am thinking that Sterling might have used the newer sheet metal designed for the N model for their continuation of the J models since it potentially offered some benefits as well as (maybe) cost savings. Sterling always mentioned in their specification sheets that "they reserve the right to modify their specifications without notice" (as did many if not most manufacturers). So why not change the J models to something that added some benefits and saved some cost?  Perhaps the later trucks that had the sheet metal originally designed for the "N" models didn't have the weight saving lighter alloy parts and thus were not really "N" models anyway? I don't know that we will ever know the answer to this speculation, but it does provide a potential way to think about Sterling's nomenclature for the later "J" models (which looked like "N" models).

I don't know either but probably about fees of some kind.

John Frances (1/31/2023)

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I know this one is an N with what looks like a 1939 Oregon Diesel license plate. Would this be a Cummins?





What was the reasoning behind the diesel plate? An online search wasn't much help with an answer, my guess was an additional tax due to noise or possibly smoke.

======================

Scott McKenzie
ProGraph Solutions Ltd.
- Mechanical design and drafting

Thanks Warren. Those pictures are ebay scans from 2015 that I just got around to cropping and fixing. They turned out good.

Warren Richardson (2/1/2023)

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John Frances - Many thanks for posting the excellent images of Sterlings. And, the federal register is a real treat!
As far as the various photos are concerned:
I agree basically with what Jeff Lakaszcyck has reported about all of the photos, but I will add the following:
The Portland -Pendleton truck is shown in the Sterling brochure "As Used By Others" and is listed as a JD135H. I'd post a picture but I don't remember how that is done these days.
Sterling, in my opinion, played a little loose with their annotations in their brochures. There are instances of the same photo used in two different brochures and called two different models. A perfect example is an HC170 owned by California Door that was called an HC170 in one brochure (which I presume that it was) and an HC175 in another brochure. My thoughts on this are that, if you wanted a truck like the photo by the time the brochure was published, it would have been called an HC175 since the HC170 was supplanted by the HC175 over time. In the case of the Portland-Pendleton photo, I think that it is at least a possibility that the truck was listed as a JD135 even though it may have been sold as an ND model because Sterling was doing away with the N model nomenclature and had decided to call all J and N models as J's. I have seen other photos of trucks that appeared to be N models called J models by Sterling. Sterling did something similar with R models - they offered the R model thick radiator and hood with cast grilles as an option on some H models and called them H models. The R model lived on in the RWS160H (and some others) - I would guess - because they sold a lot of them. If you wanted the thick radiator option on an HCS297H they did not call it an RCS297H as far as I know. It was purchased as an HCS297H with the R model radiator option for which you paid extra. So, was the Portland - Pendleton truck a JD or an ND model? If the chassis record or purchase invoice surfaces we will know, otherwise I think we are left to puzzle it out. Having worked for a number of manufacturers of various kinds of machinery, I have seen salesmen sell one product as another to tweak the price and make the sale. I've seen owners of companies do similar things. This kind of activity tends to make some records confusing and make historians scratch their heads. While Sterling stuck to most basic plans about their model names, it is my opinion that they took some license with their own rules in some cases for whatever reason.
The Wesley Metal Treating truck is also shown in the brochure "As Used by Others" and the caption indicated that Sterling had sold both MB65 and MB75 models to Wesley but didn't say which model the truck in the photo was. The photos in that brochure show different photos of the Wesley and the Portland - Pendleton trucks than the ones you posted.


Warren, thanks very much for your comments. As usual you always have a more in-depth answer than I can give. 



Jeff

John Frances - Many thanks for posting the excellent images of Sterlings. And, the federal register is a real treat!
As far as the various photos are concerned:
I agree basically with what Jeff Lakaszcyck has reported about all of the photos, but I will add the following:
The Portland -Pendleton truck is shown in the Sterling brochure "As Used By Others" and is listed as a JD135H. I'd post a picture but I don't remember how that is done these days.
Sterling, in my opinion, played a little loose with their annotations in their brochures. There are instances of the same photo used in two different brochures and called two different models. A perfect example is an HC170 owned by California Door that was called an HC170 in one brochure (which I presume that it was) and an HC175 in another brochure. My thoughts on this are that, if you wanted a truck like the photo by the time the brochure was published, it would have been called an HC175 since the HC170 was supplanted by the HC175 over time. In the case of the Portland-Pendleton photo, I think that it is at least a possibility that the truck was listed as a JD135 even though it may have been sold as an ND model because Sterling was doing away with the N model nomenclature and had decided to call all J and N models as J's. I have seen other photos of trucks that appeared to be N models called J models by Sterling. Sterling did something similar with R models - they offered the R model thick radiator and hood with cast grilles as an option on some H models and called them H models. The R model lived on in the RWS160H (and some others) - I would guess - because they sold a lot of them. If you wanted the thick radiator option on an HCS297H they did not call it an RCS297H as far as I know. It was purchased as an HCS297H with the R model radiator option for which you paid extra. So, was the Portland - Pendleton truck a JD or an ND model? If the chassis record or purchase invoice surfaces we will know, otherwise I think we are left to puzzle it out. Having worked for a number of manufacturers of various kinds of machinery, I have seen salesmen sell one product as another to tweak the price and make the sale. I've seen owners of companies do similar things. This kind of activity tends to make some records confusing and make historians scratch their heads. While Sterling stuck to most basic plans about their model names, it is my opinion that they took some license with their own rules in some cases for whatever reason.
The Wesley Metal Treating truck is also shown in the brochure "As Used by Others" and the caption indicated that Sterling had sold both MB65 and MB75 models to Wesley but didn't say which model the truck in the photo was. The photos in that brochure show different photos of the Wesley and the Portland - Pendleton trucks than the ones you posted.

Here are the Sterling pages from the Federal Register.

Thank you.

On Google books here is a Federal Register from 1945 that lists all the truck models built (with serial number ranges) by the major companies from mid/late '30s to 1942. The Sterling stuff starts at 1935 on page 14001.

The only single axle Ns it lists are two 1939 ND135s and one 1939 NB-90-B.