How much weight does wet snow on roof add?

Ok, so I picked up a load in PA this morning, supposed to be 42000 lb, but my total weight at cat scale is coming up as 81500. There is a few inches of wet snow on the roof of the trailer - is that enough to account for discrepancy?


I am thinking of just waiting for it to melt off instead of going back to customer for overweight reload.

Did some rough math - according to the internet, wet snow is 20lb per cubic foot. 53 feet × 8.5 feet × .3 feet of snow height × 20lb = 2,700lb. Dang, snow is heavy. If true, that would be enough to account for extra weight.

Thoughts? I don't want to go back to the customer and look like an idiot complaining about too much weight, but I also don't want to find myself 300 miles away from customer and still over 80000lb after it melts...

 

That's actually an interesting topic. What's the weight of your truck and trailer?

 

Usually with that 42000 pound load I would be at about 77000 lb

 

Most of that will disperse as you navigate down the highway.
But, that also opens up another safety issue that is largely out of our hands that some states will still cite a driver for.
Failure to remove snow from vehicle before travel.

Big $$ to be made there if someone could bankroll the bottom line to put the equipment in a few truckstops that adjust in height to knock it off.
It exists.. just not widespread, nor public.

I'm not climbing up there to do it by hand.

 

Blue beacon can get rid of it. The have an overhead sprayer for deicing.

I would guess that is 1500 maybe 2500 lbs of ''ice". Just from what I have seen from ice accumulating on the underside of a trailer from driving through freezing rain.

 

I know what you mean about that. Luckily, my snow is sort of wet and compact, it's neither blowing off nor coming apart in ice sheets. Just hanging out up there and safely melting.

 

When I get to Ohio later today and the snow melts, I'm going to go get another scale ticket and post it here for science

 

Good luck
Driver injured when truck’s ice crashes through windshield

 

If we knew your location we could probably direct you to the nearest scraper which would cost nothing.
We have one in our yard.