Adventures in weighing

I thought I was going to have a fairly easy day today. I would cover three or four hundred miles of a five-hundred mile run today, and finish it in a leisurely fashion in the morning. Instead, I covered about 140 miles, and if I'm lucky I may arrive barely on time tomorrow.

Why? Well, I tried to find a scale...

I'm sure you've seen the weigh stations scattered up and down the interstates in every state of the Union. (I assume they're in Alaska and Hawaii, too...) They exist because the various states (and the Federal government, which makes the states act with a little consistency) have very specific rules about how much trucks can weigh, and how that weight is distributed among the different sets of wheels. The trailer's "tandem wheels"* can be slid back and forth, to put more or less weight on them. That's usually enough to let you get the weights where you need them.

(Unless the shipper overloaded you, of course. It hasn't happened to me yet, though a couple of times I've had so much freight in the front of the trailer that I couldn't balance the load with the tandems. I had to mess with the fifth wheel then.**

(But that's another story.)

Anyway, many truck stops have a scale that you can use--for a price***--to find out about weight-and-balance problems. In this case, though, the nearest truck stops with scales were thirty miles east or thirty-five miles west of where I picked up the load. And I was going south.

This might not have been too bad, but this particular load is about as heavy as my truck can legally pull. And when it's that close to the max, guessing where to put the tandems is a BAD IDEA. You need to know. Which means finding a scale before you find a weigh station. And most of the weigh stations I've seen in Pennsylvania aren't on the map. So I either make a thirty-to-sixty-mile detour, or just drive south until I find a scale--or a weigh station, whichever comes first--or find a scale that isn't on my list.

Someone at the company checked the records and said a nearby truck stop was listed as having a scale. Well, the list I use isn't right 100% of the time. Worth a try, right? So I ran up the road a few miles, found the truck stop--and its lack of a scale. After a painful amount of time looking for a place to park long enough to ask a question, I rushed in and say "Are there any scales around here?"

One of the nice ladies told me about a place that sells landscaping material. They frequently ship truckloads of stone and have truck scales to keep themselves out of trouble--and don't mind letting other people use them. So off I went, down the interstate, around a fairly tight set of streets, and into their yard. Where they told me they don't let other people use their scales anymore (they've been having problems keeping them working). And there was no place to turn around. So I slowly threaded my way through a maze made of stacks of expensive decorating stone, to a back gate that opened onto a tiny residential street. I missed a light pole by an inch and a quarter while gently stroking a traffic sign (no damage--I was watching it carefully), then brushed a few leaves off a low-hanging tree.

(Yes, they have semi's coming in and out. Shorter, tighter-turning semi's. Flatbed semi's with stone on the back--which means they aren't nearly as tall. Sigh.)

The nice lady at the landscaping place told me about a scale just a mile or two down the road. A more industrial place, where I wouldn't be in as much danger of trapping myself. So off I went again. The new place's yard was indeed bigger and easer to get around in. A little. And they had a scale, once I threaded my way through more stacks of building material (and piles of gravel--the scale was at their asphalt plant). After many interesting adventures I got to the scale. Its operators had gone home an hour or so before I'd left the last place.

At this point I realized I would have lost less time (and maybe less fuel) if I'd just bit the bullet and taken a detour. And the nearest scale to the south wasn't THAT far out of the way. Okay, time to suck it up and go.

And here I am. With a tale to tell. And four hundred miles to go in the morning. At least I'll be legal.

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*The wheels/axles on a tractor-trailer rig are usually referred to as follows: The front wheels/axles are the "steering wheels," or "steers." The ones on the back of the tractor are the "driving wheels" or "drives." The ones on the trailer are the "tandem wheels" or "tandems."

**The "fifth wheel"--the platform on the back of the tractor that acts as a "trailer hitch"--can also be slid back and forth, but it's a lot more hassle and it's usually not necessary.

***A legitimate business expense. My company reimburses me for it in many cases.