The quarry
Eight people, two miles out, in the foothills
MSHA records 8 employees at the Cool Cave Quarry, 2.17 miles from the centroid of this place. A small stone operation in foothill country, close enough that its trucks are part of the local road pattern rather than a distant industry.
Foothill haulage is grade work by definition. Loaded down, empty back up, repeatedly — and brakes and driveline carry that in a way flat running never does.
That county holds some of the tightest crossings in the state
Those grades come with restrictions. Within ten miles the 2025 National Bridge Inventory records 85 structures, one posted for load and one coded below legal loads, county maintained, with the nearest 9.64 miles away and a lowest operating rating of 14.6 metric tonnes.
El Dorado County posts five of the 80 bridges it maintains, and this quarry carries one of the three tightest commercial floors measured anywhere in the state. A statewide average is no guide at all in country like this.
What runs here
Stone, timber and a long way down to the valley
So whatever you drive, the offer does not change — we buy all of them. Around the Cool Cave Quarry it is dump trucks, aggregate haulers and flatbeds; the timber ground adds log trucks and timber rigs; day cabs run the loads down to the valley.
Pickups and work trucks are everywhere, and a light truck that has spent its life on El Dorado County grades has worked harder than its odometer suggests. Auburn, Placerville and Georgetown carry pages of their own.
California weight law
The weight table here is not the federal one
That is state law rather than anything local, and it is the rule truck sellers misquote most often. CVC sections 35550 to 35558 set a statutory range of 34,000 to 80,000 lb by axle count and spacing, and § 35551(a) is a table rather than the federal Bridge Formula — no formula is declared in the statute at all.
The California table does not exactly match the Federal Bridge Table, including at three and four axles. So a configuration that is legal under one can be over under the other, and “it makes bridge formula” is a claim about which table you mean. If someone has told you your truck makes it, that is worth knowing before you repeat it.
Questions we actually get
The four that come up every time
Does it have to run? No. But we buy complete trucks — if the engine, transmission, doors, rear ends, drive shafts, wheels or anything under the hood have been removed, we can’t buy it. A missing bumper is nothing.
Do I need the title? We need a title, unless the truck is old enough that it never had one. If it is lost, that is a replacement through the DMV and we will walk you through it. If there is a lien on it, say so on the form — that is why the question asks whether the title is in hand rather than whether you own the truck, because those are different situations and they go different ways.
What if it has been in a wreck? Tell us what happened and we will look at it as it is. California sets no percentage: CVC § 544 makes it a judgement about whether repair is economical, so nothing is decided by a formula before we have seen the truck.
How does it get collected, and how am I paid? There is no clock on any of this. We come to you and drive it away, we come to you and tow it, we buy it remotely and arrange the tow, or you drive it to us. Payment is cash or electronic payment.
Sell your truck in Auburn Lake Trails
Auburn Lake Trails, Auburn, Georgetown and the foothills around them. Tell us what you have and we will take it from there.
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