Kleiber Motor Truck Company

The Kleiber Motor Truck Company was an American truck manufacturer located in San Francisco, California. The company built a handful of fire apparatus in house, and their truck chassis was also used by others to build fire apparatus.

History
Kleiber was established in 1914 building trucks from 1 1/2 to 5 tons. By the late 1920s the company was offering trucks from 1/2 ton to 10 tons. From 1924-1929 Kleiber also offered some automobiles, mostly large touring types. Kleiber developed a reputation for building quality, durable trucks but it remained a fairly small manufacturer only building a few hundred trucks per year. In 1930 the company added a 6 wheel chassis and in 1932 diesel engines became an option.

In the early 1930s Kleiber acquired a Studebaker dealership. Sales of Studebaker cars was more profitable and combined with the effects of the depression on truck sales, more priority was placed on the Studebaker franchise. Kleiber went out of business in 1937 or early 1938.

Fire Apparatus
In 1926 Kleiber built two tractors for the San Francisco Fire Department. These were initially attached to shop built city service ladder trailers. In use these trailer were too heavy for the trucks, and in 1928 they were removed from service with the ladder companies and instead used to pull water towers.

In 1928 Kleiber built two search light units for the San Francisco Fire Department.

In the late 1920s Yosemite National Park received a Kleiber forest fire crew truck.