The Truckers’ Report flatbed Hall of Shame.

Carhaul in general is in the toilet. Legal minimum is 2 over-the-tread, opposite corners. 90% of the loads I see every day are 1 strapped (yes, even 7500# Diesels) or 2 strapped with both straps on the same end/side of vehicles. Usually substantially higher than needed because that saves time, too.

But hey, "I'm fast as ####, Boi!"

 

I'm don't do car hauling but why is the minimum legal limit 2 over the tread? That should not even be a thing. 4 or bust. There should be no legal minimum.

 

Big fat F for the driver. A+ for the rr M.O.W. Looks like a swift job. S-W-I-F-T ####! Wha'd I #####' Total?!

 

Big 10 - 4 on that...I've had a Tire Strap get Loose ... Still not sure how it got Loose...Maybe I didn't get it tight when I Loaded but not likely ...Had only driven about 50 miles

 

That's the language from the FMCSA.

Notice it doesn't say anything about load rating in the section. Most of us are using straps rated ~3300#, although one trailer manufacturer uses a low profile hook rated lower, 2500#, IIRC.

The other thing that they don't really point out is that most of the securement force in the lateral & longitudinal directions comes from strap tension increasing friction at the tire footprint and not from the strap itself. Although I guess that's also true about a lot of flatbed freight like lumber & pipe, for example.

 

It's quite easy to not realize the strap isn't in a straight line over the circumference of the tire. That misalignment straightening out leaves the strap loose enough to come off. Start and stop traffic will rock the vehicles enough to help this along quite nicely.

 

Now I Know... Thanks

 

Roughly 20 years ago it started, and really took off about 5 years after that. There are still some chassis with chain holes, but they're getting fewer and fewer, mostly trucks and big SUVs.

The reasoning behind them is twofold. The first being it allows the manufacturers to close up the undercarriage for better aero and corrosion protection. The second is protection from idiot drivers.

Much like the current issue with short-strapping, short-chaining was also a problem. Our chain clusters looked like:



There were oval holes in the frame designed for R hooks, Ford used same hole but allowed the T hook. The R is designed to spread the load of the chain tension, protecting the hole from damage. But it took practice to get good at the twist it took to get the R in the hole, and that was entirely too much work for the less diligent, and the "Any hook, Any hole" gang was born. J hooks being their weapon of choice, which put all the load at a single point of contact and would rip out the holes, especially when they often went in holes not intended for tiedown use. Frame damage is a total on new cars, and a no-sale on used when found in a post sale inspection.

But it actually gets worse. 4 chaining a car puts a balanced load into the chassis, think pulling at 4 corners of a square. You start short-chaining, and now you're trying to twist the chassis. And you'd have guys sliding deck apart to use the hydraulics to tighten the chains, which far exceed the tension one could generate with a tiedown bar. They were literally pulling the frame into parallelograms, and permanently reducing frame stiffness. Chevy discovered it with a police Fleet that they could not keep in alignment, and they discovered one of the shuttle drivers was extremely over tightening with the hydraulics.

Sorry, didn't intend for that to turn into a book!