How much diesel can you haul before needing hazmat / tanker endorsements?

@GasHauler : I'm an Independent (1 truck)- it's all on me, . I was informed by a DOT officer (nicely) years ago that it showed on his screen I hauled machinery interstate and "no HM". Walked me through it & cited the regs and changed it right there (I already had the $1m liab.). Nice guy. I carried the info around in my cab book for a long time just because inevitably I'd get in an argument with someone who said "BS, you don't need to show HazMat for cars, machines, etc."

I think most small companies that haul stuff with fuel/oil/batteries don't know about the reg- "it's not placarded so why do I need to be up on HazMat regs?" I was in the same boat until told different by DOT. Now I try and let others know, because as you said "ignorance of the law is no excuse" when you go to court- if that officer had been a jerk it would probably have had not such a pleasant outcome for me.

 

Correct. No endorsement, no placards, $1m insurance. I will look for that part today, it may still be in my book.
That is for Interstate, if you are Intrastate it's different if I remember correctly.

 

387.9(3) for the insurance
Key words as explained to me are "in any quantity". Intrastate is different.
The placard/endorsement info may be in 173. somewhere

 

Being an O/O is more the reason to have these governing manuals on hand. You then can check a load before you go more to ensure you're within the regs. An inspecting officer will not write a ticket if you
re right there with the requirement in your hand. It happened to me in Bullhead AZ with the city cops just setting up to learn. He was going to write me for something and I said well you can't because here's the regulation. They even asked if I could hang around for sometime and help them.

 

It's all listed in the FMCSR's pocketbook.

 

What I really hate is you'll have the regulation right there ready to show him/or/her and they'll make something up over their head. That's when I just close the book tell they to write and I'll see you in court. I've run into a couple of those but before it was over they had changed their mind and will let me go with a warning.