I believe you, but you are comparing apples to oranges, class 8 to light duty pickups. The GVWR on a class 8 can be increased by adding extra axles. The limit (other than tire ratings, which I have never argued) is enforced to prevent road damage. It would be impossible to load a pickup to 16,000 or20,000 per axle without crushing it. Picups loaded over their GVWR are evident on the roads everyday and never get tickets. I'm talking about 150s squatting on their rear axles with a load of dirt in the bed and 2500s haulng 38 ft 5th wheels. Since they are not commercial they are not regulated and unless they are posing an obvious threat to safety they are ignored. If exceeding GVWR was illegal all those 3/4 ton pickups you see on the highway pulling huge RVs would be a cash cow.

Your overweight ticket falls into place with what I said. You bought a permit, which is a fee just like vehicle weight registration, and proceeded down the road.

In your last sentence I assume you are talking about CSA 2010. It really doesn't change anything for a driver. Tickets always went against our driving records. I know that because I got one 5 years ago for bypassing an Idaho scale.

 

I intimated that it might not apply. Also just because it happens doesn't make it legal or OK.

True, but I was also over the axle weight which I neglected to mention and I put this in because of the following statement. I was allowed to leave but only to the closest truck stop. The load was a non-divisible load which may have had something to do with it.

It may not where you are from but does here. This ticket, prior to the law change, would have been allowed to be transferred off my record to the company since it was technically their fault. Can't do that now. Plus I now have points against my license which we never had in the past in OR and WA. It did go on your record but the point system is something new here. So, yes it does change things for us.

As far as not being an issue with RV's and pickups, that is not true here. Dad got stopped back in the 60's and nearly got an overweight ticket for 200 lbs with his '67 W200 which I now own. I have occasionally seen others stopped. It certainly isn't a priority as I have seen some double RV's around that are OR plated and they are NOT legal in the Northwest. If it were, I would be pulling my boat behind my TT.

IMHO, at least in the NW, it would not be legal to be over the weight plates on your rig if you were to be checked. They do not do that very often but it would not be worth it to me. Especially having a CDL.

 

Weight plates, as you know, have nothing to do with the manufacturer's GVWR. I grew up in Oregon and have some knowledge of registration there. Did you know that if you keep the vehicle weight below 10,000 pickups are registered as passenger vehicles?

CSA 2010 is nation wide and is conrtrolled by the FMCSA. What happens in the NW happens in TX. There are a lot of rumors about it's impact on drivers, but the truth is that if you were operating legally in the past there is no reason to worry about it. Trucking companies are going to feel the brunt of the new regs. In the past a driver paid the price for infractions that were beyond his/her control, like your overload. Under CSA 2010 the company will also receive "points" when tickets are issued to drivers. From what I can determine, the focus is to disuade companies from forcing drivers to operate trucks that won't pass roadside inspections and pressuring drivers to exceed the hours of service regs.

 

When I wrote weight plate, I meant the GVWR on the rig. I didn't intend to mean what it was plated for. I know that about the registration and it used to be 6,000 lbs.



True, but you still get points against your CDL which is new here.