Was wondering how others mount their signs on truck and trailers. One truck totaled and one in the shop and a used truck purchased, all my signs so far for the trucks were beyond repair and we have to start over with everything new again, can't say I was happy with any of the previous sign so not sure I want to make them over again and hated those vinyl tie on signs and don't want to go back to those either. Anyone have a simple easy setup to duplicate for an oversize load sign to put on both the front of the truck and back of trailers that will be out of the way and not cover up the lights. With some equipment changes we've made, I now need to have hangover off the back of the trailer a foot or so to fit it on the trailer, which is legal up to four feet in my state, not sure about other states as of yet, so something mounted on top of the back deck won't work anymore, so all the signs I have now have to come off the trailers and get mounted somewhere else, was thinking below the lights and partially in place of the mud flaps on the detaches, not sure yet about the deck over trailers, was thinking about mounting the signs somehow to the ramps just haven't figured it all out yet.
I use the mesh ones, with the grommets in the corners and the middle. On my front bumper, I made a bracket that saddles the bumper on each side, with studs sticking out that accept a keeper pin. Pull the keepers, and stretch the sign over the pins and reinstall keepers. My signs are like this: https://www.amazon.com/SafeTruck-Ms...24?keywords=ms.+carita&qid=1657139978&sr=8-24 I have a similar set of studs on the rear of the trailer, below the lights, that my sign pins onto- it then hangs behind the mud flaps. I don't like the vinyl ones either and I'm not messing with bungee straps. A couple of cranes I have the aluminum hinged fold up ones, but they never come off. I'll take a picture of the brackets I made on the front and rear for the mesh ones, I really like them, because they are simple and easy. Didn't find a hood yet for the 359? or you're writing it off?
I like the bungee strap anchored type myself and use the Ms Carita's "Safe Truck" brand. It is mesh and holds up well. This signage is several years old and seen a lot of miles but is still usable:
Not sure what your signage laws are but up here in Canada some guys build solid signs that mount on top of the headache rack on the truck and either flip or slide down when not in use.
the cool lowboy guys around here have them on an air cylinder behind the headache rack and flip a switch when they are loaded.
Run the mesh with bungees. I've seen some plywood painted one's for rear of trailer and considered making one, since removing ramps it's a real PIA to get the sign to hang decently.
Is that legal how your flags are there? Here the flags have to be on widest part of load.
I have hauled many overwidth tractors/implements and all are marked similar. I've never been stopped at a scalehouse or beside the roadways. It could be different with general freight or machinery, but with farm equipment one doesn't even need permits if 12' 4" in width or under.
Thanks for all the replies guys, as for my 359, its still waiting for a spot in the shop to open up and the time to attempt to put it back together again, looking like a winters project at best, but parts are about impossible to find, so most will need to be fabricated. We needed a truck to run so we bought a used one off the internet auctions and then needed a wet kit, remount all the air tanks and do some other repairs to it. The truck that got totaled out, I bought back for the engine, transmission and wet kit that all need to go into one with a blown engine and we also have a lowboy rebuild to do, which has the main frame and cross members rusted out on top of the usual repairs and upkeep on everything else coupled to about the busiest year we've ever had. Some days I wonder if we shouldn't just take a few years off from doing work and just concentrate on getting everything back together again [which isn't economically feasible]. Back to the sign issues, for decades I've had a metal sign with lettering on one side that covered the front bumper of the truck, when needed we'd turn it writing out and when not, just turn it around, 99 percent of the time it was always in use and covered the license plate, been in many states with it even empty and never had an issue with the DOT or scales till this spring, was told when empty it had to be off the truck and not covering the license plate......ok, no problem so I just took it off and strapped it to the trailer bed. Then the local dot got me as well, so apparently we're not going to make a new sign to lug around off and on the truck again and when the steer tire blew up and mangled the bumper, that pretty much did in that sign as well. As far as I know, I need letting somewhere on the front of the truck, needs to be legal height and legal width and not cover the lights, also need flags on the front of the truck and back of the trailer and also on the widest part of the load itself, if it hangs over more than four feet off the back, needs flags on the overhang as well and strobes visible from both the front and back, and a sign on the back of the trailer somewhere also not covering the lights and was told can't cover the license plate either. Never gave it a thought if mess signs constitute covering a license plate or not, might have to ask that question. Oh yea I almost forgot, can't cover up the license plate light either, such a vitally important light to have in the first place, about as worthless as having backup lights on the truck itself, which is hooked to a trailer and nobody ever sees those lights, but they need to be there and working.........but you don't need backup lights on the trailer.....go figure. The only issue we've ever had with hanging things off the back of the trailer and below the lights, basically behind the mudflaps was when a tire blew out, it tended to take whatever was on the back of the trailer off as well, mudflaps, sign whatever are pretty much gone in an instant, but I guess that falls under, pretty normal operations on any given day. What do you guys do for strobes, in the past we always had strobes mounted on top of the cab mirrors hard wired in, thinking about going back to those again on the new to me truck and used to have strobes hard wired in on the back of the trailers as well to the auxiliary wire of the wiring harness but the last few years the wiring has caused issues and too much time spent keeping it going so we've gone to battery operated magnetic mount strobes instead, not my idea of ideal and god I hate those little batteries and buying them in bulk all the time. For a while we just hooked the strobes off the trailer clearance lights and put a switch on the back of the trailer to run them but gave up trying to keep the switch working.
Here's the bumper bracket on my western star, one on each side, I just drilled holes top flange and bottom flange so no holes in front of bumper. I hope they don't change the grommet spacing or I'll have to move bracket next time I need a new sign. I made holders for my flags on the inside of the bumper. I put my red flags on a piece of 5/8" cable- the wood ones always get broken. And I'm too cheap to buy the fancy spring ones. My license plate and light are covered on the rear of the trailer, I've never had it commented on. I suppose I could move the plate over by the taillights to have it visible. I don't have the bottom of the sign attached on the rear of the trailer, I just let it wave in the breeze. When empty I just fold the bottom up onto the top pegs and reinsert the keeper pins. It ain't fancy but it works. We don't have to run strobes here at the 10' width I am, so I don't have strobes.
Sorry about the 359, its hard to replace what you had, given current truck prices. I was looking at a day cab heavy spec KW that sold a couple weeks ago. It was a couple years newer than mine and in good shape. It was a 2005 and it sold for $69,300. I wasn't the buyer. It would have been a nice truck to have, I just don't use it enough to justify that kind of $$$$.
Thanks for the photo's, they help a lot, never gave it a thought to just pin the top of the back flag and let it flap in the breeze. I attach flags to pieces of pipe, with a washer welded to them, so they only go in the holder a certain depth, then use a tarp strap to secure them into the holder, no wrenches needed to take the flags on or off, somewhat bendable if you hit something and really cheap and easy to make. Just attach the tarp strap to each end of the pipe, so my flags match tarp strap lengths, that way the ends of the strap keep them in the holder and once off the truck hook the strap back onto the flag pipe and toss then into the truck toolbox, all self contained. For the spring mounted ones, those are pretty easy to make actually, done a few of them but didn't like any of them, yes they spring, but tended to slide out much easier and you'd lose them. We did the spring flags like we do the bumper risers, take a rod and use a torch to heat it up as you coil it around a shaft, coil it around four to six times then once cool, you have a spring, then weld it to whatever you want, either a pipe or shaft, but what we found was whipping in the wind, they'd work out of the holder and you'd lose them, if your lucky they won't end up in a tire somewhere and take a tire out. Tried the whole cotter clip in the end thing to keep them in the holder, but ended up being a pain to always losing the clip and not having another one when needed, with the tarp strap to the pipe ends, tarp straps seems to always be plentiful and if not a piece of twine or wire does the same thing and since I am constantly moving my trencher, I have an ample supply of strings around if needed, just feed it though the pipe and tie in to itself again, can't work out of the holder ever, cheap and simple. In 20 some years, I've never actually broken a flag pipe, bent a few, but never broke or lost one, those cheap wooden things, you'd go though a dozen a week. To attach the flag to the pipe, we'd just drill a few holes through the pipe and use wire to wire the flag onto the pipe in a few places, the flag would eventually tear itself to pieced and be gone, but the pipe was always ready for a new flag. Now I have had them stolen off the trailer and truck when I'm overnight somewhere before, so any time I'm out of state and going after a wide load, we always take spares and take them off the load at night and lock them up in the truck. For years we'd always hot dip galvanize the flag pipes, but after having some stolen, I tended to give that idea up, that way they'd never rust which worked nice, but it made them get stolen far more than just using 3/8's black pipe. As for trucks, I've been watching those prices as well, was lucky on the one truck I did buy, wasn't exactly what I wanted, but when you don't even have one road legal semi left, you can't be too picky on what you get as long as it gets the job done and can move machines from job site to job site. Had it been the dead of winter and I'd have have more time to go shopping, who knows what I would have ended up with. As for auction prices, that whole topic is a conversation in itself and I don't believe any of them unless I know the buyer and can talk to him or her of what they actually paid. Toss in the internet and that's where fantasy meets exploitation in a real hurry and the major winner is the auction company every time.
I see some guys use the round metal magnets and the flag with the wire in it for their flags on the equipment. The guy who used to haul my crane, has these spring loaded fancy flags. My 5/8" cable works, and I've always got cable laying around. Anything rigid like the wood flags and I'm sure to wipe them out on a tree or something too close to the road. Never thought about making my own spring. https://www.amazon.com/Oversize-War...5P3HHCL/ref=pd_lpo_1?pd_rd_i=B085P3HHCL&psc=1