hi all, hope everyone is having a great December and driving safe today we picked up a load in L.A. our steers weight was 13,350 drives was 27,900 and rear tamdems was 30,900. we can not move the fifthwheel as it is non-movable
the terminal said that the steers was our problem and they would not rework load, our company told us take the load and they would not commit to paying the ticket, now my question is???? the steers can only be 12,000 right ???? or am i wrong on this? our steer tires max weight is 7,120 LBS please advise us as what should we do!!!! we can't quit as we are trying to buy our own tractor and have no yet qualified for the loan :shock:
thanks

If each of your steer tires are rated at 7,000 lbs you are OK as far as that goes.

Now how much is your front axle rated for. If it is a 12,000 lb axle you have a problem.

Most states actually allow up to 20,000 lbs on the steer axle or up to what the tires and axle is actually rated for.

If the truck is not rated for that much weight on the front end then the only thing you can safely do is to slide the tandems on the trailer all the way forward. It won't effect the steers much but it may reduce the weight just enough.

The unsafe option is if the load is not clear to the doors is to drive in reverse and slam on the brakes to slide the load to the rear.

Other than that you are techinically obligated to refuse the load.

California has a 20,000lb steer axle limit ...Arizona has the same....nevada is 600lb per inchm of tire width....I would take the load , and depending if you are delivering some place that only allows a 12k steer weight I would just fuel accordingly to keep my steers no heavier than about 12,500 when you hit the scales pretty much every gallon of fuel you put in the tank goes straight to the steers ,and fuel is abbout 7lb per gallon , so after burning off some fuel just add accordingly to how many miles you get per gallon how far it is between scales .

thank you for the info .... when i took the AZ CDL it stated 12,000 on the steers, so I guess things have changed ... one thing we have learned is THERE IS SO MUCH TO LEARN :shock: truck driving is more then just driving a rig down the road .... and now that we are looking into becomming O O's we will have even more to learn
again thank you

The front of your MC atlas has the info on what states allow per axle, as well as the gross weight.

If you are staying on the federal highway system be sure to use the section dealing with interstates and US routes and not the section the deals with state routes.

the dot man will be happy to tell you what the legal weight limit is. he will even write it on the ticket

If you go through Nebraska, you'll pass the scale with 13,000 on the steers, but be kicked off the Interstate, and only allowed to continue on secondary roads. But good thing is Nebraski's secondary roads are not bad.

The 12,000 on the steers typically only applies if you are grossed out at 80,000 lbs, which is the most the majority of states will allow. Also the majority of states will only allow 34,000 on a set of tandem axles, so 34,000, 34,000 and 12,000 equals 80,000.

Around 99 or 2000, I think it was, most states upped the steer axle limits but as I said before it also depends on what your tires and axles are rated for and you are actually limited to the lower of the two even though a state may say you can go to 20,000 lbs on the steers.

his tires are rated up to 7,120...so he is fine in california .

His tires are fine, but if his steer axle is only rated at 12k, then he is over the limit of what it is rated for.