Palm Beach County
Two crossings bind out of twenty-one, and the nearest sign belongs to a city
Within ten miles of the quarry the national bridge file records 21 structures. Four of them carry a load posting and two are coded below legal loads — 9.5 per cent, one of them county-maintained — and the nearest of those two is 3.80 miles out. The quarry itself sits 0.57 miles from the centre of town, so this is a short-haul trade with the constraint close in.
The number that decides a load is the operating rating, and the lowest one here is 17.0 metric tonnes, about 18.7 US tons. That figure is the gross weight of the rating vehicle, so once you take off the roughly 11.0-tonne tare of an empty tandem dump it admits about 6.0 tonnes of stone. That is a part load, not a full one, and it is the honest way to read the sign.
The nearest posted structure is the odd one. It carries NW 5th Street, is rated 42.1 tonnes, and the maintenance code on it is a city agency — the first node in 1,440 rows of this survey where the nearest posted crossing belonged to a city rather than to a county, a state or a town.
So the tier you can actually phone is not the tier that owns the sign
So the ownership matters more than it sounds like it should. Palm Beach County maintains 222 structures and posts six of them, 2.7%, which sits near the bottom of a county tier running past 30% at the other end of this state. But the crossing nearest the gate is not one of its six.
Cities hold 1,249 structures across this state, 9.6% of the total, and a city agency is a different phone call from a county engineer with a different answer at the end of it. The survey reports the county share because that is the tier a haulier can reach; it names the others rather than folding them in.
For a driver leaving the pit the effect is concrete. The sign that stops you first is not maintained by the county at all.
Which is why a single-unit dump truck out here has a harder time of it
Which is where the load rule comes back in. A crossing rated at the commercial floor admits about 6.0 tonnes of stone over the tare, and the trucks that work aggregate around here are the ones the schedule is hardest on to begin with.
A single-unit dump truck in this state may not exceed 70,000 lb gross where a tractor-trailer combination gets 80,000 lb — ten thousand pounds lighter for the same truck in a different configuration. So the body type decides the ceiling before any bridge does, and the crossing 3.80 miles out decides it again on the way there.
That is a life of short heavy cycles on a truck that is never allowed to be full. It wears the frame, the suspension and the brakes, and it barely touches the odometer. We read it that way.
Florida weight law
So the schedule, and the permit written for everybody except this trade
So the schedule is the fact underneath all of that. Florida allows 80,000 lb gross including all enforcement tolerances and 20,000 lb on a single axle.
A single-unit vehicle used as a dump truck, mixer, waste vehicle or fuel tanker may not exceed 70,000 lb gross including the weight of the vehicle. The divisible-load permit adds ten per cent off the interstate system only, and the law records that the increase does not apply to those single-unit vehicles — so the trucks this trade turns over are exactly the trucks the permit excludes.
Fla. Stat. § 316.535 and § 316.550(4). Information, not legal advice.
Florida paperwork
Then the title, and a storage clock that runs faster than people expect
Those are the load. The paperwork is what decides how fast a sale closes. We need a title unless the truck is old enough that it never had one; a lost title has a counter replacement, and where none exists there is a bonded route.
The one worth knowing before you need it is the storage clock. A towing and storage operator holding a vehicle must give notice by certified mail within five business days, and a vehicle more than three years old can go to public sale thirty-five days after storage. The law draws no distinction by weight, so a class-eight dump truck runs on the same clock as a car.
The plate stays in the owner’s name rather than going with the truck — onto a replacement vehicle of the same class, or back to the county tax collector.
Fla. Stat. § 713.78 and § 320.0609(1)(a). Information, not legal advice.
What we buy here
All of it is iron we buy out along the lake edge. Dump trucks and aggregate haulers held to 70,000 lb where a combination gets 80,000 lb, farm trucks off the cane ground, day cabs and road tractors, flatbeds, tankers, rollbacks, service bodies and the pickups that go with a crew — the same up at Belle Glade and round at Pahokee.
Whatever you drive, the offer doesn’t change. We buy all of them.
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. Small things — a missing bumper — are fine.
Straight answers
The questions we get asked in South Bay
- Does it have to run?No. It does have to be complete — if the engine, transmission, doors, rear ends, drive shafts, wheels or anything under the hood have been removed, we can’t buy it. Rust is not a disqualifier.
- The engine is out of it. Is that different?Yes, and that is the line. A tired engine is fine; an engine that has been pulled out and sold means we can’t buy the truck.
- It has never been able to run full. Does a part-loaded life read as light use?No. The nearest restricted crossing here is 3.80 miles out and the lowest rating on it admits about 6.0 tonnes of stone over the tare, so short heavy cycles at a part load are the working pattern around Palm Beach County rather than an easy life. It shows in the frame and the brakes, not on the dash.
- The posted sign near the pit is a city sign. Who do I ask about it?The city agency that maintains it, which is the unusual part — the nearest posted crossing here is rated 42.1 tonnes and is kept by a city rather than by the county. It makes no difference to a sale; we mention it because it is an easy call to make to the wrong office.
- Do you come out?Yes. We can come to you and drive it away, or come to you and tow it. We can also buy it where it stands and arrange the tow with no visit at all, and you’re welcome to bring it to us if that suits you better.
- What about the title?We need one unless the truck is old enough that it never had one. A lost title has a counter replacement; where none exists there’s a bonded route.
- How do you pay?Cash or electronic payment, whichever suits you.
Why people call
Beyond a truck that has simply done its turns, the reasons are personal ones. Retiring. A medical that went the wrong way. Work off the Star Quarries end that went away and left one dump truck standing in a yard 0.57 miles from the middle of town with nothing booked for it.
Most of those aren’t happy reasons, and we don’t treat them like they are. Somebody wants a straight answer and the truck gone by the end of the week. That’s what we’re here for.