A Little Help With Weights

wjlapier wrote:
Total weight was 14,020 full tank of diesel but no water in the camper. Just my wife and I. Took it out camping this weekend and it travelled well and so far everything worked fine.

Bomber rig and camper!!

Total weight was 14,020 full tank of diesel but no water in the camper. Just my wife and I. Took it out camping this weekend and it travelled well and so far everything worked fine.

mbloof wrote:

notsobigjoe wrote:
So as usual we went from the OP's question about axle weights to the weight police pulling someone over. The only one who has ever been pulled over is me. It happened in Fayetteville NC and I was pulled over buy the DOT police. He weighed each tire on a portable scale and gave me a 180 dollar ticket. He said you have to pay the ticket but all you have to do is have the truck registered from 13000 LBS to 15000 LBS, problem solved. Came back to Binghamton went to DMV and for 25 dollars they upped my weight on the spot. I even got a sticker for the door. It's amazing what money will do! I'll even put a smiley face as to not offend anyone! :)

So in NC all they care about (if they actually care at all) is the weight your licensed for? LOL!!

I've heard of other states doing that - allow drivers to pick the weight range (and FEE that goes along with it).

BTW: Not trying to be 'weight police' just trying to understand where all these stories are coming from and if they have ANY basis in fact.

I joined in 2001 and the 'stories' keep coming up like a bad lunch every few days for the last 21yrs!!!


- Mark0.

I have no proof and I wouldn't believe it either...

notsobigjoe wrote:
So as usual we went from the OP's question about axle weights to the weight police pulling someone over. The only one who has ever been pulled over is me. It happened in Fayetteville NC and I was pulled over buy the DOT police. He weighed each tire on a portable scale and gave me a 180 dollar ticket. He said you have to pay the ticket but all you have to do is have the truck registered from 13000 LBS to 15000 LBS, problem solved. Came back to Binghamton went to DMV and for 25 dollars they upped my weight on the spot. I even got a sticker for the door. It's amazing what money will do! I'll even put a smiley face as to not offend anyone! :)

So in NC all they care about (if they actually care at all) is the weight your licensed for? LOL!!

I've heard of other states doing that - allow drivers to pick the weight range (and FEE that goes along with it).

BTW: Not trying to be 'weight police' just trying to understand where all these stories are coming from and if they have ANY basis in fact.

I joined in 2001 and the 'stories' keep coming up like a bad lunch every few days for the last 21yrs!!!


- Mark0.

So as usual we went from the OP's question about axle weights to the weight police pulling someone over. The only one who has ever been pulled over is me. It happened in Fayetteville NC and I was pulled over buy the DOT police. He weighed each tire on a portable scale and gave me a 180 dollar ticket. He said you have to pay the ticket but all you have to do is have the truck registered from 13000 LBS to 15000 LBS, problem solved. Came back to Binghamton went to DMV and for 25 dollars they upped my weight on the spot. I even got a sticker for the door. It's amazing what money will do! I'll even put a smiley face as to not offend anyone! :)

In BC I even asked about this in my 5er days about the trailer weight for the extra driving licence deal, and they said they use the axle weight scales if it came to checking for that. They don't even do all the rigamarole to get the truck weight and then derive the pin weight to add to the axle weight for the true total weight of the trailer. So in real life, it seems you get an extra weight (pin weight) they don't count, never mind what the rule is based on trailer total weight.

Of course that has no meaning for a truck camper situation, where they go by appearance to pull you over, if ever.

mbloof wrote:

StirCrazy wrote:

mbloof wrote:


Actually the whole 'more truck then what is needed' all depends on where one lives and travels. Lets face it, different parts of North America have different regulations.

While discussing and attempting to debunk the whole weight thing on another forum we got this information for BC:

"Here are two different documents that outline
GVWR maximums in BC, specifically.

Document #1

Document #2"

The above comes with the mention of two popular tales:

The first being that they regularly have 'weight road blocks' and weigh everyone. While its rather unlikely to happen in most/all USA (they can't do roadblocks for drunks on NewYears Eve for example). No evidence of this actually happening.

The second is that at any accident it is standard practice to weigh all the vehicles involved and drop coverage on anyone that is over their GVWR. (no, I've not seen a actual insurance policy with this)

While I'm told that Alberta cares about the GAWR I have not seen a actual document to support that.

Where I live we have the following: https://www.oregon.gov/odot/MCT/Documents/weight_limits.pdf

I don't have any specifics on GM or Dodge but when it comes to Ford:
- F250/350SRW same axle (9700lbs) and breaks+pads

- F350DRW Dana80 (11K lbs), slightly larger master cylinder then above but the same rotors and breaks+pads as 250/350 SRW

- F450 Dana80 (11K lbs), IDK about master cylinder however larger rotor and pads (odd because BOTH DRW's 350/450 have same 14K GVWR).

While many of us only care what the actual hardware is capable of and will factor in (or not!) our own personal margin of 'safety' I recall a conversation I had with a commercial truck driving friend (+50yrs experience and runs his own trucking company and builds/plays with race cars as a hobby) that he and any of his drivers would/could refuse to haul a load that had <1000lbs margin of safety per tire. (he was rather shocked that I clocked +40K miles with just a few 100lbs margin!)

Lets face it, different people have different ideas/limits to what they consider 'safe'.


- Mark0

you can throw thoes documents out the window. BC only cares about money. if your unit is over 10400lbs you have to get a special licence and they go by the GVWRnot the actual weight. and your truck registration fee is based off the GVWR as well as other factors. there has only been one over weight ticket issued to a rv that we can find and it was grosly overloaded, 1/2 tone with a camper hauling a fishing boat with a quad off some bracket on the back of the camper.

in 40 years I have never seen a road stop, they are for comercial vehicles and the christmas and newyears ones are for drinking. if they see anything obvious they will take it and run, but police dont carry scales so you have to look unsafe not just overloaded befor they will stop you.

So it looks like you live in BC and have actual knowledge of how things operate there.

One respondent claimed that you paid for your registration AND insurance at the same place (Government insurance?) and that the policy would be canceled if you were 'over weight'. They went on to claim that 'weight' was the FIRST thing LEO's looked at after a accident.

I think, just about anywhere you'll get stopped if you are visibly overweight and hence unsafe, even in Oregon.

How does a Peace/Police Officer decide if
a vehicle is unsafe?
Peace/Police Officers will use visual cues to
determine if a vehicle is obviously overloaded.
These cues include vehicles:
• that look unstable when moving
• that have a front end higher than the back end
(the vehicle is not level)
• with tires that appear deflated


- Mark0.

you do pay at the same time, we have only one basic insurance provider so your insurance and registration is tied togeather, optional insurance you have choices like colision. I supose a insurance company would try to deny insurance for any reason they can but it isnt how our basic insurance works here, you as well as the other party still get basic coverage so medical coverage etc. your not allowed to sue here but rather have a maximum pay out of 5600 bucks for muscular injuries, can go higher for more serious stuff but its a process. to deny some one insurance because they were overloaded after the accident would be pretty hard to do to a privat vehicle as how does some one realy know if there overloaded. if you go pick up a load of gravel you might be or might not, there is no scales to weight yourself on aside from the comercial DOT ones but, normal vehicles are not alowed on them when they are open and not all leave the scale active when there closed. visual clues are misleading but I supose they could form a reason to pull them over but then what do you detain them for a couple hours till the understaffed comercial transport department can get some portable scales to you, or do you ask the driver if he will drive out of his way to go to a highway scale, I know I wouldn't spend extra gas to do them a favor. aswell people who know they are going to be overloaded normaly do things like put airbags in, get tires rated for the load and add stabalizer bars and such so they don't apear loaded. so its a big bag of snakes and hence this is why we can't realy give any examples of people who have been nabbed except that 1 that I know of.. probably more though but its a rare ticket.

StirCrazy wrote:

mbloof wrote:


Actually the whole 'more truck then what is needed' all depends on where one lives and travels. Lets face it, different parts of North America have different regulations.

While discussing and attempting to debunk the whole weight thing on another forum we got this information for BC:

"Here are two different documents that outline
GVWR maximums in BC, specifically.

Document #1

Document #2"

The above comes with the mention of two popular tales:

The first being that they regularly have 'weight road blocks' and weigh everyone. While its rather unlikely to happen in most/all USA (they can't do roadblocks for drunks on NewYears Eve for example). No evidence of this actually happening.

The second is that at any accident it is standard practice to weigh all the vehicles involved and drop coverage on anyone that is over their GVWR. (no, I've not seen a actual insurance policy with this)

While I'm told that Alberta cares about the GAWR I have not seen a actual document to support that.

Where I live we have the following: https://www.oregon.gov/odot/MCT/Documents/weight_limits.pdf

I don't have any specifics on GM or Dodge but when it comes to Ford:
- F250/350SRW same axle (9700lbs) and breaks+pads

- F350DRW Dana80 (11K lbs), slightly larger master cylinder then above but the same rotors and breaks+pads as 250/350 SRW

- F450 Dana80 (11K lbs), IDK about master cylinder however larger rotor and pads (odd because BOTH DRW's 350/450 have same 14K GVWR).

While many of us only care what the actual hardware is capable of and will factor in (or not!) our own personal margin of 'safety' I recall a conversation I had with a commercial truck driving friend (+50yrs experience and runs his own trucking company and builds/plays with race cars as a hobby) that he and any of his drivers would/could refuse to haul a load that had <1000lbs margin of safety per tire. (he was rather shocked that I clocked +40K miles with just a few 100lbs margin!)

Lets face it, different people have different ideas/limits to what they consider 'safe'.


- Mark0

you can throw thoes documents out the window. BC only cares about money. if your unit is over 10400lbs you have to get a special licence and they go by the GVWRnot the actual weight. and your truck registration fee is based off the GVWR as well as other factors. there has only been one over weight ticket issued to a rv that we can find and it was grosly overloaded, 1/2 tone with a camper hauling a fishing boat with a quad off some bracket on the back of the camper.

in 40 years I have never seen a road stop, they are for comercial vehicles and the christmas and newyears ones are for drinking. if they see anything obvious they will take it and run, but police dont carry scales so you have to look unsafe not just overloaded befor they will stop you.

So it looks like you live in BC and have actual knowledge of how things operate there.

One respondent claimed that you paid for your registration AND insurance at the same place (Government insurance?) and that the policy would be canceled if you were 'over weight'. They went on to claim that 'weight' was the FIRST thing LEO's looked at after a accident.

I think, just about anywhere you'll get stopped if you are visibly overweight and hence unsafe, even in Oregon.

How does a Peace/Police Officer decide if
a vehicle is unsafe?
Peace/Police Officers will use visual cues to
determine if a vehicle is obviously overloaded.
These cues include vehicles:
• that look unstable when moving
• that have a front end higher than the back end
(the vehicle is not level)
• with tires that appear deflated


- Mark0.

Although I do agree with you BFL, I wouldn't want random internet advice about vehicles and loads form someone who doesn't even understand what ABS braking does either.

BFL13 wrote:
We all have our own attitudes as to what is "safe" for ourselves. It might mean going over what GM says is safe if it is just you in the GM truck.

No way am I going to take "some guy on the internet" 's advice as to what is safe, if it is different from what GM says is safe, for my wife and kids in the GM truck!

I will make up my own mind about what is "safe" for my own wife and kids, thank you very much! :(

I gather the OP is like-minded.

Ummm, where to start….
I’m pretty sure the OP ASKED for opinions. If not wanted then this thread wouldn’t exist.
And if you particularly are only interested in your own (somewhat ill-conceived at that) opinion and you think the oP is like minded, then why are you interjecting your opinion?