OVERWEIGHT (1 Viewer)

[Mickey1]

From another forum

Mickey

 

[Munchie]

Quite simply yes.

 

[Boringfrog]

Surely they wouldn't let you proceed until you were down to the legal weight?

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[Electraglide]

I read all those posts it seems they took his money and no ticket?

 

[deleted-member02]

I'm guessing they unloaded the scooter, went for a ride then reloaded once Gendarmes were out of sight...

 

[David and Sally]

Surely they wouldn't let you proceed until you were down to the legal weight?

Maybe they wanted to phone their pals down the road so they could mine another 90€ out of them.

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[pandas]

With a motor scooter on the back I think I would have established what the weight was before I set off. Yes you can be fined more than once.

 

[Ivory55]

It might have been axel weight as a opposed to over all weight, still a nick though.

 

[Speve]

Do they have mobile weigh bridges then as the poster didn’t mention how they were weighed?

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[Cat53]

We took ours fully laden, full fuel and water tanks to be weighed. We have 400kg to play with. So really chuffed.

 

[Mickey1]

Sorry, The point I was making is, they do pull you in for being overweight.

Mickey

 

[Pausim]

Many years ago a friend of mine got stopped and weighed in the UK, he was towing a boat which turned out to be overweight for his trailer. They didn’t fine him but would not let him move off until he had redistributed enough weight from the boat to the car to be legal.

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[mitzimad]

Sorry, The point I was making is, they do pull you in for being overweight.

Mickey

i thought you had already been pulled in for it?

 

[Mickey1]

@mitzimad , it reads, From another forum, not me.

Mickey

 

[mitzimad]

ok thought it was you

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[mitzimad]

i would think theres equal chance of getting pulled in in uk as in france slim but could happen

 

[Cat53]

For anyone looking for a public weighbridge Gablestocks, Long Bennington, Lincs. 5 minutes off the A1 and easily accessible no matter what you drive!

 

[gus-lopez]

Yes is the answer. Pay the 90€ & on you go.

Surely they wouldn't let you proceed until you were down to the legal weight?

Yes they do.

I'm guessing they unloaded the scooter, went for a ride then reloaded once Gendarmes were out of sight...

Doubt it.

I was talking to a transport bloke in Saxmundham where he came from.
He travelled twice a month Uk to France /spain.
Coming back the last time with a trailer on the back & crossing the Millau bridge he was pulled for being overweight on the luton van.
Apparently they have wim in the road.
90€ fine , he said that he asked the gendarme if he "redistributed the load would that be ok" Hoping to get out of the fine.
Gendarme replied that it didn't matter what he did with the load it wasn't actually going to reduce the 750kgs excess.
His wife said she just paid the fine & on they went.

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[OldAgeTravellers]

Yes they do carry portable scales in France, we were stopped in a roadside aire having a coffee when a police van pulled in followed by a hire van. The police pulled two platform scales out of the van and weighed each wheel of the hire van then wrote out a ticket. I suspect that they would only pull you if you looked tail heavy for example.
I have only ever once seen a roadside check setup but they were only pulling HGV's
Moral of the story, check your weight regularly when loaded at the start and possibly at the finish of a holiday when you are full of cheap French wine and Spanish Scotch.
I am very lucky that I have an old Vigneron weigh bridge near to my house that I can work myself, so check before every journey. Because with a scooter in the garage I am right on the limit on the rear axle.

 

[Tude]

We got done at the last service station in Belgium before France. Belgium police weighed us I didn’t have my v5 with me but it’s upgraded to 4tons the plate was on the front of vehicle with the svtech logo rear axle cud weigh 2240kgs but wouldn’t accept it cos no v5 so he went on original plate 2000kgs we was 106kgs over he did us 400 Euro . When we payed he just said drop your water and go. I told him it was full earlier.

 

[OldAgeTravellers]

We got done at the last service station in Belgium before France. Belgium police weighed us I didn’t have my v5 with me but it’s upgraded to 4tons the plate was on the front of vehicle with the svtech logo rear axle cud weigh 2240kgs but wouldn’t accept it cos no v5 so he went on original plate 2000kgs we was 106kgs over he did us 400 Euro . When we payed he just said drop your water and go. I told him it was full earlier.

Moral of that story is always carry your V5 if your vehicle is at all strange, better still carry it anyway.

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[OurMoreloLife]

View attachment 266011 From another forum

Mickey

How do they weigh it at the roadside?

I was stopped for speeding in France about 10 years ago. I was about 50m from the petrol station where we had stopped for fuel. A young Gendarme with a very basic old-fashioned speed gun pointed it at me and pulled me over.

He claimed I was speeding; doing 69kph and I said: "no way, I've just stopped in that petrol station and couldn't possibly be going that fast in 50m".

He showed me the display and said in broken English 'yes you were".

I said, "prove it".

He showed me the display on the speed gun and said: "here it is; the proof, is here!"

I said, "prove that was MY speed and not the last poor mug you had pointed the gun at, show me the speed showing against a photo of my car"

He said, "it doesn't have a camera, but it was you"

I said "prove it"

He said, "how can I"?

I said, "that's the point; you can't".

He said "you must pay"

I said "how much"

He said "100 euros"

I said "you must be out of your mind"

As my partner is Belgian, she speaks perfect French and I told her to speak to him as I was about to lose it.

She told him the story of how it couldn't be us travelling so fast and he said, in French, "I am a policeman, I cannot lie. You must pay"

I told her to tell him we don't have any cash and could only pay by card (to which my little one in the back of the car piped up "I have 100 euros Christmas money from Grandad you can have" - bless him). I declined the offer of his loan though.

The policeman said, "you must go to a cash machine and come back ( I started to think of a plan to say I would but just not return but then thought about a French prison and changed my mind). I told him that if we paid, I wanted an official receipt or ticket.

Just then, the Gendarme Sargeant across the other side of the road typically with a Galloise cigarette in his mouth shouted in French "what's the problem" to which the other one beside my window replied in French of course, "he wants a ticket and won't pay without one"! The old cop just waved his hand in the direction of our departure and told him to let us go. Which we did, very slowly!

Moral of the story. Don't top up their pensions!

If they will only take cash and don't actually issue a ticket, it's a scam. They only seemed to stop us because of the UK number plate as they clearly had no legitimate reason and he knew it. Insist on an official ticket if you were actually speeding (that stops them pocketing the cash).

 

[2657]

Moral of that story is always carry your V5 if your vehicle is at all strange, better still carry it anyway.

As you are obliged to in most countries in Europe.

 

[2657]

How do they weigh it at the roadside?

There are many roadside fixed weighing places and there are now available accurate portable weigh pads that can be used, not sure if these are good enough for a prosecution in the UK yet but in the rest of Europe maybe.

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[tacr2man]

DVSA have mobile weigh pads , and yes they are legal
ps if you start being awkward about it , hope the rest of the vehicle is perfectly in order as well !

 

[nicholsong]

We got done at the last service station in Belgium before France. Belgium police weighed us I didn’t have my v5 with me but it’s upgraded to 4tons the plate was on the front of vehicle with the svtech logo rear axle cud weigh 2240kgs but wouldn’t accept it cos no v5 so he went on original plate 2000kgs we was 106kgs over he did us 400 Euro . When we payed he just said drop your water and go. I told him it was full earlier.

That sounds like very dubious operation of the system. Certainly in UK DVSA will go on the latest dated weight plate, whether that has been to up-plate or down-plate and not the V5C.

I think I would have taken timed/dated photos of the SVTech plate and appealed. Did you get a receipt? Maybe it was a scam.

Of course he could have done you for not having the V5C.

I believe the law in France requires one to prove ownership of the vehicle, or owner's permission to drive it. Of course the V5C does not do this. I carry the Bill of Sale from the previous owner.

Geoff