When do you scale?

In all seriousness...
There are some loads where the shippers don't have scales.....
Like crushed cars and onions for example......

I picked up a load of crushed cars one time and the nearest certified (on route...I could have doubled back from the "Rez" to Gallup) scale was the drop.....250 miles away....

I have on-board scales but they can be a little off...especially if the trailer is sitting in soft ground or snow......

Plus...the scales at the coops have been wrong......been there done that......

 

Whaddya do? Find the nearest scales, weigh... if illegal you can go back to the shipper and get it reworked, or avoid the coups. If not, go about your business.

 

I find the best way is to load below 68 pounds...that'll keep me at near or below legal......
The problem is I get greedy when I get paid by weight.........

 

I was serious
Check the map and roll clear of the scales,no such thing as "CANT" get around.

 

Most all CAT Scales, Flying J Scales and other Truckstop scales are designed to weigh the axles and truck while sitting on them. A few shippers will have scales, some that weigh each set separately, and you have to add, subtract and adjust. I got a load of potatoes once and they had me sitting on the scale while they loaded me. Then told me what the weights are. We go to a shipper that is notorious for overloading trailers. If it's a few pounds here and there, some companies will pay the ticket, if they are a good customer. However, I did have to take a load back one time. Not only was I overweight on the gross, but also on the drives, and couldn't adjust it out. I went back and told them, take some off and reload the trailer or it was going to sit here. They took alot off and the supervisor reloaded the trailer. Seems the guy loading was new and put 2 separate loads on the same trailer. That thing was so full I could hardly close the doors.

 

There's some good info in this thread so I bumped it....

My brand new Cascadia has an air guage on the dash with PSI increments for the 5th wheel. I notice when my drives are at 34000 the guage is right at 60 psi. Not sure how to use this tool to my advantage. I see that part but what about my tandems? Seems rather pointless as I need to scale anyway for steer, tandems, and gross...unless I'm missing something?

 

Your steers are most likely within a thousand pound-or-so range from empty to loaded, and you can get your empty total weight. Knowing that, and what that air gage equates to...

Empty total weight + estimated load weight from the bills = estimated loaded total weight

Estimated loaded total weight - estimated steer weight - air gage drive weight = estimated tandem weight.

That'll get you in the ballpark on where to set your tandems. Now, that's not good enough for a heavy load and running across the DOT scales - you still need to scale your truck, but it gets you close. With experience, its good enough for lighter loads. I have a right weigh in my cab that's marked off in 500 lb increments, and enough experience with it that unless I'm above 78,000 lbs, I'm good to go.

So... you need the following:

A good handle on the empty weight of your rig.

Knowledge of where your steer axle weight is, and how it varies under load.

A correspondence of drive air pressure readings to axle weights.

 

I scale if over 35,000 lbs. The only exception is the loads we haul for ProTrans International which are regional LTL loads put onto one trailer and sent across country because unlike a truckload shipper, you're taking somebody's word on somebody's word on what the load weighs. Too many somebodies, lol. Besides there have been cases where our drivers picked one up that was way off on the declared weight because one or more of the LTL shippers miscalculated the weight of their load.

 

You can add an air guage to your trailer as well and use them in conjunction with each other. You can pretty much get it to the point, you check it a couple times a year just to confirm things. You don't need to be perfect, but you'll know what's happening with the truck.

I figured at 64 PSI the other day I was running tight on my drives from snow load. The SD POE confirmed that for me. He let me know stuff off to show I was trying to run legal and said have a nice day.