Who knows the Bridge Law....or thinks they do?

If I find out something about the 41' axle distance I will post it on here. I have a couple of friends that drive that I will ask about it.

 

Has nothing to do with weight (replying to the empty wagon comment). Makes me crazy how guys will run with their tandems all the way back because it makes the truck ride smoother... an older trailer may not be able to handle being run down the road like that, and then you have the deal like we saw a few weeks back where the center of the trailer collapsed and beer hit the freeway.

Also makes it a PITA to get around tight spaces when you have the tandems back as far as they'll go - just shows laziness to me, and maybe some ignorance.

 

I think what is confusing is this is a two part deal. For the states that have kingpin laws you will have to be compliant with that in addition to the federal weight laws. What Ronin said makes sense. It has nothing to do with weight. You can be weight compliant and still in violation of the kingpin law if I am looking at this correctly.

 

Come into florida with your empty 53' trailer,

and tandems all the way back................

We need your money !!!!!!

 

There ya go





American Trucker

 

There ya go... and for newbies, or folks that don't get the kingpin setting vs weight thing... when leaving the shipper, set your tandems for the states you will be running through - ie, if you're going to CA, set them for 40'. I've known of people scaling the load, then getting to the CA border and trying to scale again, and couldn't - after moving their tandems - evidently, they didn't want to drive cross country with their tandems that far forward.

Sure, you can run with them at 41-42' until you get to CA, provided you can scale BOTH at that setting and at the 40' setting.

I ran into a CRE trainer in Barstow.. I'd just been at the same shipper with him, we'd gotten to talking... and he rolled into the Pilot in Barstow with his tandems all the way back. I jumped out, asking him what the heck he was thinking... he said "that's where I had to put them to scale the load". I asked about the 40' setting - he said he couldn't scale that that setting...

He was 75-80 miles from the shipper, and still had 150 of CA to go - I wished him luck, and walked away.

 

So what about a case of running between Indiana and Illinois or vice versa (I think it would only be a problem going one way but not sure which)? Those states are next to each other and have different kingpin laws. You could be legal in one state and drive over the line and become illegal in the next.

For clarification, I am understanding this as the kingpin law is the closest you can have your rear tandems adjusted towards the front of the trailer, measured from the kingpin back to the last axle. Say you were in a state that had a 41' kingpin law and you were at 40', you would be in violation correct?

 

Always scale for the shortest kingpin rule. If one state is 42', but the other is 41', set it at 41' and scale the load, and you don't have to worry about either one.

These are all MAXIMUM settings - you can run the tandems all the way forward if you want, if you can scale your load like that.