What is the purpose of the truck scales on the highways?

Question

Is it a safety thing? Or maybe a taxation thing? Why exactly are they weighing the trucks?

Answer 1

truck scales make sure that the vehicle's load are in accordance with the required legal weight, thus, preventing damage to the road  wherein taxpayers' money help build

Answer 2

All trucks have a weight limit.They weigh them to make sure they are not running overloaded.

Answer 3

saftey, and regulation

some roads cant handle the weight of a exceptionally heavy truck....it can cause them to crack and damage

Answer 4

I've always believed it was to catch trucks loaded beyond the weight their registration allows.  No doubt the law was passed as a safety measure, but its enforcement does provide revenue.

Answer 5

Its a little of both,the highway is taxed to help support DOT in an effort to maintain safety(not to be confused with fuel taxes,thats for fixing roads...supposedly),and good equipment.There is also a regulation on the weight per axle,type of truck,etc.

Your regular van single tandem axle(U haul type) can only weigh 26,000 gross per vehicle.As you go up on axles on the vehicle,so does the weight ratio(as it evenly distributes the weight) a 18 wheel tractor trailer combination vehicle can weigh up to 80,000 lbs gross.The scale house and DOT have what they call the bridge law,which means how the weight is distributed on the vehicle,it goes like this...

front axle/steers =12,000lbs

drives/power wheels= 34,000lbs

rear trailer tandems= 34,000lbs

You can be less on any axle but anything over breaks the bridge law and you can be fined(unless you have an overweight permit)(and extra axles)(Also you can only be 40 feet from kingpin to rear trailer axle in some states,and 41 feet in others.

You can also run a 14 ft high trailer in the western states,but only a 13'6" in the rest of the states

As for the kingpin to trailer tire ratio ,this can make it hard to balance the truck.Most rigs can slide the trailer tandems,and the fifth wheel(trailer attachment) can slide also to adjust the weight accordingly.

The scale houses were put in place to ensure the safety of trucks on the road,along with making sure the equipment is in good working order.This started in the 30's as trucks began to get bigger.

By the way DOT(dept of transportation) was created and is run by the railroads,due to the fact that as trucks got bigger,they became a threat to trains and freight,so they(Railroads) got control of the DOT.

Answer 6

Ignore everybody else who seems to be misguidedly answering.

If politicians cared about freeway safety, they'd push to fix potholes and add lanes as traffic demands required.

Scales are strictly to tax and harass the trucking industry, and, hence (trickle down bad-economics theory), we consumer citizens at the bottom of the food chain  must pay for the government waste and hindrance to free domestic commerce.

It's all about taxes (confiscating money from honest working people.)