On Tuesday, Aug. 30, Freightliner announced it was eliminating 260 employees at its Mount Holly, NC, medium-duty truck manufacturing plant.

The daily production rate at the plant will be trimmed to 100 trucks per day on Sept. 26 – a reduction of 17 percent from the current 120 per day.

The layoffs will not have an effect on Class 8 truck production, Freightliner Chief Operating Officer Roger Nielson said in a press release.

Currently, 1,540 employees represented by the United Autoworkers assemble the Freightliner-branded line of Business Class M2 vehicles designed for a variety of urban, short haul, and vocational applications. The furlough of these 260 positions will return the plant to the employment level of August 2004.