The folks at the scalehouse have more than axle weights on their minds. They’re also concerned about how your load is secured to the vehicle–and now more than ever. New rules for cargo securement have been in place in the United States for nearly a year and the clock is running out on a Jan. 1 deadline for enforcement to begin.

The American rules are based on the North American Cargo Securement Standard, jointly developed with Canadian transport officials and industry groups over the last 10 years. Jurisdictions in Canada have no formal timetable for their own rules to take effect. It’s expected, though, that they will adopt the final draft of the standard “by reference,” a legal manoeuvre designed to bypass the time-consuming, costly, and unlikely task of officially processing an identical regulation through each government.

While the rules on both sides of the border would not be exactly the same, they’d at least be more uniform than what exists now. The North American Cargo Securement Standard provides detailed instructions for determining how many tie-downs you need as well as the load limits of securement devices when they aren’t labeled by the manufacturer. It establishes guidelines for transporting general freight and for commodities determined to be the most difficult to secure, including logs and dressed lumber; metal coils and paper rolls; intermodal containers; cars, light trucks, and vans; heavy vehicles, equipment, and machinery; flattened or crushed cars; roll-on/roll-off containers; and large boulders.
In other words, if it doesn’t sit on a pallet, there ought to be specific procedures to follow in securing that piece of cargo.

But the North American Cargo Securement Standard is not law, and the American rules that will come into force in January differ in several important areas.

The most glaring is in the treatment of unmarked tie-downs. The North American standard states that all anchor points, tie-downs, friction, blocking straps, chains, and other securement devices must be rated and marked with a working load limit (WLL) as well as the identity of the manufacturer.

Inspectors look for those rating indicators–in pounds or kilograms for most components, in a grading system for chains–when trying to determine the WLL for each tie-down assembly, and when tallying up the sum of the WLLs for all the tie-down assemblies used to hold a piece of cargo in place.

In drafting its rule, the U.S. Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration decided the prohibition of any unmarked tie-down equipment would be an economic burden to manufacturers and their customers. So the requirement was omitted from the final rule.
However, in view of the potential safety hazards of motor carriers misidentifying unmarked tiedowns, the final rule includes a provision that unmarked welded steel chain be considered to have a working load limit equal to that of grade 30 proof coil, and that other types of unmarked tiedowns be considered to have a working load limit equal to the lowest rating for that type in the table of working load limits.

The FMCSA also determined that a treating direct and indirect tie-downs separately could be confusing for carriers and enforcement officials. As a result, the final U.S. rule doesn’t make any distinction between the two. The North American Cargo Securement Standard says otherwise (see sidebar).

You can find more information about the North American Cargo Securement Standard online at www.ab.org/ccmta/ ccmta.html. You can download a copy of the American rules at www.fmcsa.dot.gov. In the Rules & Regulations section look for part 393, subpart I. Inspection requirements are found in 392.9. Printed rules also are available from J.J. Keller & Sons,
1-800/327-6868. Driver training programs are available from Keller and from the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance, 202/775-1623.In rules that come into force in January, the U.S. Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Administration says there should be no distinction between direct and indirect tie-downs. Be that as it may, the forces applied by a strap or chain that’s passed over an article and anchored on both sides versus a direct connection between the cargo and the trailer take advantage of the forces of friction in very different ways.

First consider the indirect tie-down, where you’re
looping a chain or a strap over the article and securing both ends to the trailer. The idea is to increase the effective weight of the cargo by bearing down on it with tension. That tension creates friction which has a restraining effect. The angle of the tie-down is important: generally, the higher the angle, the more downward force you can generate. And, consequently, the more the freight will tend to stay put.

The second method is a direct tie-down. Here, you’re attaching one end of the chain or strap to the freight and the other to the trailer. In this case, the shallower angles are more effective at restraining the cargo