We buy trucks in Oxnard

Naval Base Ventura County is one base made of three operating facilities, and two of the three labels in our data are crossed. The row named for Port Hueneme is the one filed under this city, and the row named for Point Mugu is filed under Port Hueneme. Both resolutions are arithmetically defensible, and a reader matching a name to a label gets the wrong facility twice.

We are saying it out loud because it is the kind of thing that quietly makes a page wrong. One rail row filed here has a coordinate falling inside Port Hueneme city, which carries a page of its own.

That neighbouring harbour is Ventura County’s only deep-water port and consistently ranks among the top ten United States ports for both automobiles and fresh produce — two trades that rarely sit in the same place. The Oxnard Harbor District holds vehicle-handling contracts with BMW of North America, Wallenius Wilhelmsen Logistics and Glovis.

Those two trades want opposite trucks. Cars come off a ship and go out on car haulers and rollbacks; produce comes off a field and goes out in refrigerated trailers on a clock. A yard in this county can be running both in the same week.

So whatever you drive, the offer does not change — we buy all of them. On the produce side it is farm trucks, flatbeds and day cabs pulling refrigerated trailers, and a reefer unit that has worked a coastal growing season carries hours the odometer does not show. Both trades leave through Port Hueneme, a few minutes down the road.

On the vehicle side it is car haulers and rollbacks, and around both of them the ordinary work of a large city: box trucks and straight trucks on distribution, dump trucks on construction, and pickups and work trucks everywhere. Ventura County has both economies inside it and they barely touch.

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.

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.