A weight citation is not a moving violation, is not counted in the federal disqualification tables, and is not written only against the driver. It runs on a separate body of law with its own defenses.
20,000 on a single axle. 34,000 on a tandem. 80,000 gross. Those are the Texas limits under Section 621.101 of the Transportation Code, and the statute says they include all enforcement tolerances — the tolerance is inside the number, not added to it.
The fine is not the whole exposure. Section 621.506 sets tiered penalties that climb with the overage, doubles the maximum on a third conviction inside a year, and adds a separate five hundred to one thousand dollar penalty for operating without a required permit.
Sadovsky & Ellis defends weight and permit citations written on the I-35 and I-10 corridors, on the Eagle Ford ranch roads, and at the fixed and portable scales in between.
Texas sets a single axle limit of 20,000 pounds and a tandem axle limit of 34,000 pounds, both including all enforcement tolerances. Overall gross weight on a group of two or more consecutive axles may not exceed 80,000 pounds, again including tolerances, and is further constrained by a bridge formula that ties allowable weight to the distance between the outermost axles and the number of axles in the group.
There is one modern exception worth knowing: a vehicle powered primarily by natural gas or by electric batteries may exceed the gross limit by up to 2,000 pounds, to a ceiling of 82,000 pounds. Enforcement does not always account for it.
Local limits sit on top of the state ones. A commissioners court may set load limits on a county road or bridge, but only with the concurrence of the Texas Department of Transportation, and a vehicle operating under a permit issued under Section 623.011 or Section 623.321 may run the permitted conditions over a road where the county has set a maximum weight.
Section 621.506 makes operating or loading an overweight vehicle a misdemeanor. The base band runs from one hundred to two hundred fifty dollars, with tiers above it that rise as the overage rises. On a third conviction under those tiers before the first anniversary of a previous one, the maximum doubles.
Permit violations are charged separately and cost more. Operating without a permit that was required carries an additional five hundred to one thousand dollars, rising to twenty-five hundred to five thousand on a repeat, and the same band applies to a non-dismantleable load moved over eighty-four thousand pounds without authorization.
The statute also carries an express defense. Where the vehicle was registered for its maximum allowable gross weight and did not exceed it, the court may assess a fine below the stated minimums. That provision is worth reading carefully against the registration actually on file, because it is frequently overlooked at the roadside.
The federal rule that forbids states from masking a commercial driver’s conviction — 49 C.F.R. § 384.226 — expressly excludes parking, weight, and vehicle defect violations from its reach. That exclusion is the practical reason weight citations occupy a different negotiating posture from moving violations.
They are also not serious traffic violations under 49 C.F.R. § 383.51, so a weight conviction does not feed the sixty-day and hundred-twenty-day disqualification counting that follows two or three speeding or lane-change convictions.
None of which makes them harmless. The violation is recorded against the motor carrier’s DOT number at the roadside, the fines escalate quickly on repeats, and a pattern of weight violations is exactly the sort of thing that surfaces in an audit or in discovery after a crash.
The offense reaches operating or loading an overweight vehicle, which is why a weight citation is not automatically the driver’s problem alone. Depending on the facts, exposure can extend to the owner of the vehicle and to whoever loaded it.
That matters most in the oilfield and aggregate work that moves through South Texas, where a driver is handed a sealed or already-loaded trailer and has no practical opportunity to verify the weight before pulling onto a public road. It also matters for shippers and pit operators who assume the ticket ends with the driver who received it.
The citation, the weight ticket, the registration, any permit, and the bills of lading — the defense usually lives in the documents rather than in the driver’s memory.
Axle weights against the bridge formula, gross against registration, and the charged overage against what the ticket actually shows.
Equipment, method, surface and calibration, and whether the reading was taken in conditions that support the number written down.
Dismissal, reduction, or the statutory below-minimum assessment where the registration supports it, with written confirmation of the outcome.
It is not a serious traffic violation under the federal disqualification tables, so it does not feed the two-and-three convictions counting that produces sixty and hundred-twenty day disqualifications. It is still a conviction, it still costs money, and the roadside violation still attaches to the carrier’s record.
No. Section 621.101 states the limits as including all enforcement tolerances. The tolerance is built into the 20,000, 34,000 and 80,000 figures rather than allowed above them.
Yes, and so can others. The offense covers operating or loading an overweight vehicle, so responsibility can extend to the vehicle owner and to whoever loaded it. Whether that helps in a particular case depends on the documents.
A vehicle powered primarily by natural gas or electric batteries may exceed the gross limit by up to 2,000 pounds, capped at 82,000. Enforcement at the roadside does not always apply the exception.
Then the question becomes what the permit authorized and whether the route and conditions were followed. A permitted vehicle may operate under the permit’s conditions even over a road where a county has set a maximum weight.
On a third conviction under the tiered provisions before the first anniversary of a previous one, the maximum fine doubles. Permit violations carry their own escalating band, from five hundred to a thousand dollars up to twenty-five hundred to five thousand on a repeat.
Moving violations, which run on entirely different rules from weight citations.
Learn moreWhat happens when the roadside inspection ends with the truck or the driver grounded.
Learn moreChallenging the roadside violation on the carrier’s record after the citation is resolved.
Learn moreScale tickets, registration, permits and bills of lading decide most weight cases. Bring them and we will read them with you.