From a TRUE legal standpoint, one should look up how their state enforces the legal ratings of how high you can go gvw or gcw wise. Here in Washington state, your door sticker means squat. EVERYONE that buys a truck pays tonnage. Minimum is 1.5 times the tare of the truck to the next highest ton. THAT is the legal amount you get, not the door sticker! I've had many trucks licensed at and over generally speaking what GM says I can run my trucks at. Been pulled over too! As long as I am under the paid for piece of paper I give the LEO, I'm fine.
UNLIKE the other day when I went in to a metals recycle place in my C2500. I was at 8300 lbs going in. I have a paid for license of 8000 lbs, my door sticker says 8600. So from an enforcement standpoint, I was 300 lbs over weight, but 300 lbs under my warranty ratings......If I had been pulled over and weighed by the State Patrol CVEO folks, I probably would have been let go, along with a 10 day letter to up the paid for license to 10k! A whopping $15 or so per ton cost! Had that happen in my Navistar once, at 150% of the manufactures rating!!! So reality is, I am personally not too worried about being over a manufactures rating when going thru weigh scales, or getting pulled over and weighed. As long as I am under the Federal Bridge Law tire patch ratings, ie 20K per axel, or 34K per tandem.....or if they go for lbs per inch width of tire like here, the lowest they can go is 500 lbs per inch. For most of us, that is 4 10" tires, 5000 lbs per tire, or 20K total.
How many of you are over 20K on the four tires on your SW pickups? thought so....
Marty
