problems with being overweight

[BoFuller]

My dump truck is rated for 27,500 lbs max. What would be the potential problems if it was to be loaded such that the scales said 33,000 lbs? Besides being illegal, I am wondering about possible damage to the truck. If I was never going more than 15 mph and only on back dirt roads, what should my biggest concern be? Tires? (They are brand new). Springs? Engine load? Transmission? Nothing at all? (1980 Ford F8000 with CAT 3208 engine - if that makes any difference.

thanks,

 

[Diamondpilot]

Drive line will not know the difference. Biggest issue will be the suspension and frame components. Wheel bearings will also take a beating. Not much difference in the brakes from your truck and a heavier one but will take longer to stop.

Chris

 

[bcp]

...only on back dirt roads...

Biggest issue will be the suspension and frame components. Wheel bearings will also take a beating.

Especially if those roads have potholes.

Bruce

 

[salopez]

even with brand new tires, which might not be rated to 33k you could have a problem. depending on your truck, the frame, axles...just not worth it in my opionion. how much would it cost to hire out a truck if the job is that big?

 

[slowzuki]

Depends on the truck, my friend had a single axle dump they would overload all the time. Was great until they cut an axle off trying to get the truck up over a curb to dump a load. Also wore the brakes out in no time trying to stop all the weight.

Have also seen overloaded single axle dumps bend the frame, but thats partly from dumping on uneven ground while overloaded.

 

[Toddao]

Your weakest part will break first, springs , wheel hubs, are the most common. Have seen many overloaded plow trucks they put on side boards and heap the wet heavy sand as high as it can go. Stopping becomes an problem the heavier you get . Make friends with a parts guy at the truck shop

 

[Soundguy]

i'd say biggewt concern will be DOT

it's common to see trucks leave 2-4 tons heavy between mini wheelers to trators with dump beds ( 18-21 yds ), leave the pits around our areas.. see it all the time.. dot loves it when the haulers try to gget away with it.

then you see piles of dirt ont he side of the road.. or they have to call another truck to offload before they let em move..

not good either way IMHO...

soundguy

 

[LoneCowboy]

Tires!!!!!!!!!
Tires are only rated at X. (add it up, it should be right on GVW)
wheels. You can crack and break wheels (esp 30 year old wheels)
axles.
frames

brakes.

Is it really worth it???

we're not talking 500lbs, we're talking 5000lbs!!!!!!!!!

In your case 20% overloaded.

Hire it out, or buy a bigger truck.


and yeah, DOT gets understandably pretty grumpy.
Around here it's about $1/lb over. Plus you're OOS til you fix it and don't think of dumping it on the road. Plus it goes on your CSA score.

 

[MoKelly]

If I was never going more than 15 mph and only on back dirt roads, what should my biggest concern be? Tires? (They are brand new).

If you are willing to take back roads and go no more than 15 MPH, seems like you are not very far away. Why not just make 2 trips?

MoKelly

 

[crazyal]

I've done it more times than I care to mention. My IH is also rated for 27,500 but the pit I use to go to about 10 miles up the road didn't have a scale. They would often put in about 5 yards of crusher run and say it weighed about 1.5 tons per yard. Since they didn't have a scale and it was a pit they were working the dirt was cheap.

Now I have to go to their main location, about 2 miles away, that does have a scale. I now know my truck weighs 14k unloaded and if they fill it and the gravel is a little wetter than normal I'll easy break 32k. Since I now know I have them load it light but looking at the load I'm sure I was over lots of times.

My IH has axles that are rated for much higher weight. The rear tires are rated for over 24k. I've purposely stopped with just the front tires on the scale so I could read the weight, about 8k when (over)loaded. But my truck is 4wd so it has a lot of extra weight up front. You could be adding 3k or 4k on your rear tires.

Could you do it while going slow, most likely. But what if you do blow out a tire? You'll now have a lot of weight on the one remaining rear tire on that side. Are you going to able to leave your truck where it sits so you can change the tires (you really need to change both on the side that blows)? If not or if something else breaks can you afford to have a tow truck come out and move it?

Now that being said I have yet to see a farmer around me who doesn't run their trucks overloaded (by a lot) when bringing in crops. They do exactly what you are talking about, drive slow with flashers on. I don't think I've ever seen one have a problem.

 

[flyingcow]

If you're not on a public way, don't worry about DOT.

If you were doing this 6 trips a day for a year? You might have some problems. But if it's a few loads once in a while, i wouldn't sweat it. You own it, means you fix it out of your pocket. just go easy.

 

[BoFuller]

They loaded it that full one time and asked me if I wanted to dump some. I said no, that I would go ahead and go for it. No DOT on these roads (cowpaths). And if I had to dump some along the way, the people living around there would jump for joy, as there would be some nice gravel on their old dirt road. I didn't plan on making a habit of it, but wondered how much damage could occur. In a couple weeks I will be making two trips a day for a week, trying to finish my drive. It's a 90 mile round-trip, almost 2 hours each way, so I like to get as much as I can to make it worthwhile. But I don't want to breakdown either, so I'll try to get it closer to the right amount.

Thanks for the input! :thumbsup:

 

[MarkV]

At first I thought you were going a short distance because you mentioned a 15 mile per hour travel speed. If you are doing that on a 90 mile trip, as you mentioned on your last post, I would look at you as a target for my local law enforcement. No way you are traveling 90 miles at 15 miles an hour in two hours.

MarkV

 

[BoFuller]

At first I thought you were going a short distance because you mentioned a 15 mile per hour travel speed. If you are doing that on a 90 mile trip, as you mentioned on your last post, I would look at you as a target for my local law enforcement. No way you are traveling 90 miles at 15 miles an hour in two hours.

MarkV

It's 90 miles round trip and two hours each way. I guess that averages out to 22.5 mph. There are a couple of streches where I can get 'er up to 45 for a minute or two, but mostly it is 15 to 20 mph.

 

[Diamondpilot]

Have you looked at paying to have it hauled in? Example, my neighbor has 2 dump trucks. One is a 76 Ford F700 with a 391 with a 5 speed that can haul 8 tons legally. The other is a 78 GMC C60 with 350 4 speed that can haul 6.5 tons legally. We only live 4 miles from the gravel pit but here is the kicker. When having my drive paved last year I needed fill. He would let me borrow either one like I have many times before. The Ford gets 5mpg and and the GMC about 4mpg so in round number I can do each round trip with 2 gallons of fuel @ $4 per gallon thats $8 per trip.

Here is the kicker. There is a guy with about 5 dump truck that are all Cummins Powered Quads that can haul 23.5 tons legally. He works by the hour and is very honest on his time. He charges a flat $75 per hour. So he can haul in one load what would take 4 loads in the GMC and 3 loads in the Ford. If you figure it cost me $8 per round trip that would cost me $32 in the GMC and $24 in round numbers in the Ford. He can easily do two trips in a hour and he once did 3 so that makes him about a wash plus I can do something else while he is running back and forth. Plus, whenever I borrow a piece of equipment I return it better than I got it. I am not going to use something for free. I changed the oil on the Ford the last time I used it for example. It holds 9/10 qts @ $3.50 per and the filter was $9 so there is no savings.

He has caught on also and even though my neighbor has 2 dump trucks he now realizes its just cheaper to let someone else to do it. Plus, with old equipment like this a issue is likely that only cost more money. Don't get me wrong, these trucks are great and have a place. Nothing beats them for mulch, top soil, and are great for fire wood because they are small enough to get into tight spaces and the yard without tearing it all up, but they are limited. No way I would drive one more than 25 miles.

Chris

 

[BoFuller]

I had some larger gravel hauled in for my base layer, but I have been hauling the limestone chat for the top. It cost about the same for me to do it either way, but I bought the dump truck because I enjoy driving it over to get the chat. If I was going to have it all hauled in, then I would never had bought the truck.

To me, making the drive is somewhat similar to the way I look at life - it's the journey, not the destination! :thumbsup:

 

[some zilch]

shouldnt he be down shifting a truck that size, and not relying on his service brakes to do all his stopping? if you are worried about wearing out brakes doing a couple of 6klb overweight runs in an L8000, you are driving it wrong.

 

[joemd11]

Well I find that my jeans don't fit and I haven't seen my knees in ...oh, this is about overloaded trucks. Sorry, couldn't resist

 

[bcp]

It's 90 miles round trip and two hours each way.

I thought Arizona was made of gravel, with no one living more than a few minutes from some.



Bruce

 

[BoFuller]

shouldnt he be down shifting a truck that size, and not relying on his service brakes to do all his stopping? if you are worried about wearing out brakes doing a couple of 6klb overweight runs in an L8000, you are driving it wrong.

Where did this come from?
I probably downshift a hundred times on one of these round trips, and maybe use my brakes for about 5 seconds when I have to open a gate.