Was recently visiting an old family friend who has a grain/seed operation. He was harvesting and we took a little ride to the grain elevator in his new to him 1997 GMC. 3116 engine, 5 speed, juice brakes. GVW 25,999 or something. Bare bones but quite a ways ahead of his old 1970 C70 or 1957 C-whatever. Which have always done a good job but a little dated. Well the first gross was 45,000 and the second was 40,000. Just curious if this is the way it is done elsewhere. The truck did not feel like it was straining and we did not go much over 25 mph loaded (short trip). But the front axle per the door sticker is only 8,000 and the rear 18,000 and set way back so you know the front is getting a lot of that weight. I'm not looking for a safety lecture, I know the hazards, just kind of curious if that kind of truck might actually be built a little stouter than the door sticker says or if it is just the infrequent loading that keeps these kinds of trucks alive.
He's just using up ALL of the safety factor. Slow speed takes some of the shock loads out, and if it's flat ground you probably won't burn out the brakes. If he can't stop and hits somebody, he'll lose the farm but that's not what your question was.
Actually, this is typical of agricultural operations...short hauls, seasonal use and significant overloading. A good way to see how much the truck is actually overloaded is by how HOT the tires get. A tire too warm to put your hand is a danger sign!!! I routinely see 3/4 ton and 1 ton trucks hauling 15 to 18 round bales of hay, which typically are about 800-1000lbs. So, 18k of hay, plus truck and trailer, and we are looking at close to 30k... Howard
It's a normal thing during harvest for sure. Fewer trips, less fuel, more potential profit. During wheat harvest I would load my hopper FULL, front to back darn near spilling out. I would be at the elevator and weigh in around 100k, they'd make a 80,000 semi ticket and a 20,000 straight truck ticket. Of course it cost me a couple cases of beer here and there. That's been several years ago. To my knowledge I was one of very few they'd let do that. Even our tandems would be loaded like that from field to the bin. Slow and steady or you'd have a heck of a mess. My old man used to tell me about the old dodge they had when he was a teenager, 1940's, it was a 1 ton and with a full load of wheat on there was one small hill he be in granny gear climbing and those old narrow tires would rut the primitive asphalt road they had. My how times have changed! Junkyard
This was the hydraulic limit on the hoist once for me. I think the gross was 64,000 on that old tired POS. Typical day on the farm. Put a brick on the gas pedal and help the bed up with the forklift. Stay back from "Freedom" (farm) plates on the road, it's probably a 16 yr old kid who got his car license a week ago, and is now legal to haul 105,500 because there's a little letter stamped on his license. Greyson
Most of what I've been involved with has been 28' trailers that if i worked really hard i could get 1100 bushels of wheat in the trailer. Normal scale tickets for us are 90-93k gross, which might as well be legal compared to some of the stuff i've seen. Few years ago we had a bunch of trucks help us haul off irrigated wheat in OK. Most of the trucks were semi's with 42' trailers, but the farmers uncle had a tandem c70 or something. I put 32k in it and went to dump the combines again. I get back up to the trucks and he's still there and waving me down. I get out and tell him he's loaded and he says it's not full. I get back in the tractor fill it fullll. I put another 18k in there and he's happy as a clam. 25 ton net on a tandem. He'd have 3-4 trucks make it back to the field before him, but damnit he was making money.