purposely & regular overweight loads....

It’s not that simple when it comes to the ports. Comes down to buying overweight permits for each city you’ll travel through, at least from what I’ve read. There’s a radius around the port where overweight containers are allowed and they’re supposed to be reworked to legal before they leave. But it probably doesn’t happen much.

 

I understand and thats unfortunate.

Maybe I had been spoiled by a standing Maryland and Virginia Permits listing Norfolk and Baltimore as the two ports.

Thank you for clarifying, its been way too many years since I dealt with that. However it's made a mark.

 

Some thing bothering me about overweight permits. Are you saying you can get a ''legal'' permit that allows you to exceed the safety requirements of your equipment.
Doesn't sound reasonable.

 

Here in the state of Va. milk haulers can get permits to allow them to haul 94,000 lbs. without any improvement to the equipment. You take it from there. I think it is a dangerous practice.

 

Not to be an **** but this is a stupid thing to even think of.

You are not a contracted owner with the company, the fmcsa and the state won’t consider investigating it unless you are, and on top of that, this is completely on the owner operator and their drivers, not the company.

Those owners are at fault to allow it to happen, they are at fault for not terminating their contact, it is their problem and only their problem ... not yours,

 

As long as the rig is specked for it OK

24VAC20-81-60. Legal weight allowed based on axle spacing. Legal weight in pounds for any group of two or more consecutive axles. A hauling permit is required when a vehicle configuration exceeds the weight limitations according to axle spacing. "L" is defined as the distance in feet between any group of two or more consecutive axles, when measured longitudinally, from the center of the axle to the center of the axle, with any fraction of a foot rounded to the next highest foot as set forth in the following table: L 2 axles 3 axles 4 axles 5 axles 6 axles 7 or more axles 4 34,000 5 34,000 6 34,000 7 34,000 8 34,000 34,000 9 39,000 42,500 10 40,000 43,500 11 44,000 12 45,000 50,000 13 45,000 50,500 14 46,500 51,500 15 47,000 52,000

 

No. It's that the standard legal limits are under the safe limits of the equipment. Example: I've got drive axles rated at 40k lbs but in many states i need a permit to load over 34k on them.

 

It seems like some on here think that even with a 34/34/12 rated equipment think they can just get a permit to go over 80,000 lbs. In your case you arn't exceeding the safety requirements of you axle till you go over 40,000,on that axle. Can you get a ''legal'' permit to put 50.000 on that axle?
Is a permit available for 105,000 on a tandem tandem.
IOW those port guys a permit is not available for some of the loads they haul,

 

Depends on the individual state regs. Florida for example will permit 92k on a regular 5 axle set up. Also the heavier containers will be put on 3 or 4 axle chassis for even more weight. I've even seen a few 3+2 configuration chasis. Got no idea how much they can permit for. Got no idea what they are used for but I'm guessing not the typical freight container. Bulk maybe?

Also two things to keep in mind.
1: unless you are climbing under the truck and checking the id plate on the axles you've got no idea if a guy has 34k axles or 40k.
2. Those axle ratings also have a tolerance built in. A 40k drive set can load more than 40k. If staying on good hard roads I wouldn't think twice about putting 48 on them with a valid permit. It won't hurt a thing. But start taking that 48 or 50k on a 40k axle off road climbing up a steep rough grade full of bumps and things will start breaking.

 

This where I'm having a problem. I don't believe you can get a ''valid'' permit to put 48000 on a 40,000 lb axle.