How to Read a CAT Scale Ticket

You pull onto the scale, push the button on the intercom, and a few seconds later a printed slip slides out of the kiosk with three weights stacked on it and a gross at the bottom. The numbers are accurate and certified — but the ticket does not tell you whether your rig is legal. It is a receipt of raw axle weights. The pass-or-fix is the arithmetic you do after you drive off, mapping each line to the rating it tests and working out the one number the scale never measured.

How do you read a CAT scale ticket?

Read each axle line against the rating it tests, add the steer and drive lines for the truck's GVWR, then back out the tongue weight the ticket never prints — the gross alone tells you almost nothing. The slip prints in platform order: steer axle, drive axle, trailer axle, then gross weight. CAT guarantees those axle weights and the gross to be accurate, so you can trust every line you map. What the ticket will not do is judge you. It hands you measured numbers; you supply the limits.

Work it in this order:

1. Steer and drive — the truck's front and rear axle lines, each read against that axle's GAWR.
2. Steer plus drive — add them to get the truck's own loaded weight, read against the truck's GVWR.
3. Trailer — the load carried by the trailer's axles, which is the trailer's weight minus the tongue weight sitting on your truck.
4. Gross — steer, drive and trailer summed, read against the GCWR for the whole combination.
5. Tongue weight — not on the ticket at all; you derive it from a second weigh (below).

Throughout this guide one illustrative rig keeps every number honest: a half-ton truck (GVWR 7,100 lb, front GAWR 3,900 lb, rear GAWR 4,100 lb, GCWR 17,000 lb) pulling a travel trailer rated to 11,000 lb GVWR. The ticket figures are an illustrative composite, not a real VIN — read your own ticket against your own ratings.

The four lines: steer, drive, trailer and gross

A CAT scale weighs your rig in one pull across three platforms — steer axle on the first, drive axle on the second, trailer on the third — and the gross is the three lines added, not a separate measurement. That is the detail that makes the gross misleading: it is a sum, so it can sit comfortably under one ceiling while one of its parts is over another.

The internal check is quick: 3,560 + 4,040 + 8,900 = 16,500 lb, which matches the printed gross. If your three axle lines do not add up to your gross, something was misread or mistyped. A CAT scale gives you axle-group weights and that gross; it does not weigh each wheel, so there are no individual corner weights on the slip — for the truck-and-trailer, the four lines above are the whole ticket.

This works the same way for an RV or a travel-trailer rig as it does for a tractor-trailer. A motorhome with no trailer leaves the third platform empty; a truck-and-trailer fills all three. CAT scales handle anything from 2,000 lb up to 200,000 lb with no appointment, so a light rig is well within range. Getting the rig onto the platforms in the right order is the weighing job itself — our companion guide on how to weigh a travel trailer at a CAT scale covers the drive-on sequence that produces this ticket.

Map each line to a rating: GAWR, GVWR and GCWR

Each line on the ticket tests a different manufacturer rating, and clearing one tells you nothing about the others — so you check the steer against the front GAWR, the drive against the rear GAWR, the two added against the truck's GVWR, and the gross against the GCWR. These ratings are federal terms the manufacturer sets. The pillar guide on towing weight ratings defines each one in full; here they are the targets you read the ticket against.

The GVWR and the two GAWR figures sit on the Safety Compliance Certification Label in the driver's-side door jamb, where federal rules require the Gross Vehicle Weight Rating and a Gross Axle Weight Rating for each axle, listed front to rear. Your vehicle-specific payload — what is left for occupants, cargo and tongue weight — is on the Tire and Loading Information placard on the driver's-side B-pillar. Read the ticket with those two labels open and each line has a number to answer to.

The number the ticket never prints: backing out your tongue weight

Tongue weight is the download the loaded trailer puts on your hitch, and it never appears on a CAT scale ticket — you derive it by weighing the truck hitched, then weighing the truck alone, and taking the difference. The trailer's tongue weight sits on the truck through the hitch ball, so it shows up in the steer and drive lines, not the trailer line. The trailer line only carries what stands on the trailer's own axles.

Here is the two-weigh method on the illustrative rig. The first ticket, hitched, gives steer 3,560 + drive 4,040 = 7,600 lb on the truck. Pull forward, unhook the trailer, and weigh the truck alone — that is a cheap reweigh, and it reads 6,300 lb. The difference is the tongue weight:

Tongue weight = 7,600 − 6,300 = 1,300 lb

Watch this step, because the obvious shortcut is wrong on a CAT scale. On the commercial scales that towing guides usually describe, you weigh the combination with the trailer wheels off the scale, so "combination minus truck" returns the tongue weight directly. On a CAT scale the trailer axles are on platform 3, so the same subtraction — gross 16,500 minus truck-alone 6,300 — returns the full trailer loaded weight, 10,200 lb, not the tongue. The tongue is the truck-side delta: how much the truck's own two lines drop when you unhitch. Both numbers cross-check: gross 16,500 − truck-alone 6,300 − trailer-axle 8,900 = 1,300 lb of tongue, the same figure the two-weigh method gave.

That 1,300 lb matters twice. It is part of the trailer's real weight, so the loaded trailer is the trailer line plus the tongue: 8,900 + 1,300 = 10,200 lb, comfortably under the 11,000 lb trailer GVWR. And as a share of that loaded trailer it is 1,300 ÷ 10,200 = 12.7%, inside the widely-used 10–15% band. The trailer line alone understates your trailer by exactly the weight resting on your truck.

When the gross is legal but the truck alone is over

On this rig the gross passes GCWR by 500 lb, yet the truck by itself is 500 lb over its GVWR — the single gross line hides it, because gross only ever tests the combination ceiling. This is the trap the whole page exists to make concrete, so walk it slowly. The gross is one test. The truck's GVWR is a different test. Each axle's GAWR is a third. A line that passes one says nothing about the other two.

Run the three checks on the illustrative ticket:

Read the gross alone and the rig looks fine — 16,500 lb under a 17,000 lb GCWR. But add the truck's own two lines and you get 7,600 lb against a 7,100 lb GVWR: the truck is 500 lb overloaded on its own, carrying part of the trailer's tongue weight that the gross folds invisibly into the total. Both axles pass their GAWR — the steer with room, the drive with only 60 lb to spare — which is what makes this so easy to miss. The axle ratings sum to 3,900 + 4,100 = 8,000 lb, above the 7,100 lb GVWR, so you can clear each axle and still be over the whole-vehicle ceiling. The fix here is not a heavier truck; it is moving load off the hitch and forward into the trailer until the truck's own weight comes back under 7,100 lb.

Is your gross legal? Your ratings vs commercial bridge limits

Your personal limits are the GVWR, GAWR and GCWR on your labels — not the big numbers that come up for "cat scale weight limit," which are the federal limits for heavy commercial trucks on the Interstate, not your travel-trailer rig. Those federal limits, set in 23 CFR 658.17, are 20,000 lb on a single axle, 34,000 lb on a tandem axle, and 80,000 lb gross. You may also see a "12,000 lb" steer-axle figure quoted around scales — that is a practical loading figure tied to common steer-tire ratings, not a federal cap. The same regulation actually bars a state from limiting a steering axle below 20,000 lb.

So for a light-duty rig the question is never "am I under 80,000 lb" — you will be, by a wide margin. The question is whether each of your own ratings holds, which is exactly the three-test check above. Treat the commercial numbers as context for why the scale exists, not as a target you have to clear.

How much does it cost to weigh at a CAT scale, and what is a reweigh?

A first weigh is a small flat fee — around fifteen dollars — and a reweigh is only a few dollars, as long as it is the same vehicle on the same scale within 24 hours and you present the original ticket. These prices are current as of mid-2026 and CAT can change them without notice, so treat the figures as a guide rather than a fixed number.

The reweigh is the part most owners miss, and it is exactly the tool you need for tongue weight. You take the full-price first weigh hitched, then unhook, pull back onto the scale, and the cheap reweigh gives you the truck alone — two passes, the second at a fraction of the cost, and the difference is your tongue weight. You can also handle the whole transaction from the cab with the Weigh My Truck app rather than walking to the fuel desk; it emails you a PDF of the ticket once the weighmaster has checked your position on the platforms. (The app is how you get the ticket; reading it is still the job on this page.)

Is a CAT scale ticket proof that my rig is legal?

No — a CAT scale ticket is an accurate, certified measured weight, backed by CAT's guarantee, but it is not a compliance certificate, and legal responsibility for staying within your limits stays with you. Owners often over-read the guarantee, so it pays to be precise about what it actually covers.

CAT guarantees that the axle weights and the gross weight on the ticket are accurate. The guarantee goes further on enforcement: if you get an overweight fine from the state after the scale showed you legal, CAT will check the scale, reimburse the fine if the scale was wrong, and send a representative to court as a witness if the scale was right. That is a strong promise about measurement accuracy. It is not a statement that your rig is within its ratings — the scale measures, you compare against your limits, and the road authority enforces them. A certified weight is a measured fact you can trust; turning it into a pass-or-fix is the reading work this guide walks through.

How loadmate helps you stay under your ratings after a weigh-in

You have decoded the ticket and found the line that bites — the truck 500 lb over its GVWR even though the gross passed. The harder thing is keeping that finding useful once you have driven home and the slip is in the glovebox, because the next time you load differently every line moves.

That gap is where Can I Tow It? starts you off: enter your truck and trailer and it applies the line-by-line logic you just used — each axle against its GAWR, the truck against its GVWR, the combination against its GCWR — and returns a plain verdict, pass (well matched), caution (careful) or fail (no), naming the binding limit so you see which line ran out first. It reads the figures you type as a spec-based estimate, free in the app and with no account.

When you have a measured CAT ticket in hand, the next step is to carry those numbers across so the rig stops running on estimates. Saving your own rig and recording a weigh-in — the gross, the axle split, and the tongue weight you backed out, all in pounds — is the loadmate Pro step. It turns your estimated baseline into a measured one that drives your live margins and resets the drift, and you can attach a photo of the ticket to the record so the measured day is kept alongside the math. loadmate is a live rig system for decision support, not a calculator and not an AI score.

loadmate provides decision support for towing safety, not legal weight certification. Score, compliance checks, and trip readiness are based on the data you enter and the regulator information current at the time of release. For legal weight evidence, use a certified truck scale. Towing remains the operator's responsibility. See /safety-disclaimer.

Related guides

The rest of the Wave-1 guides are live; the US vehicle hub is publishing as the US set rolls out. This spoke links up to the pillar and across to each sibling:

• Towing Weight Ratings Explained: GVWR, GCWR, GAWR & Payload — the pillar that defines every rating you read the ticket against
• How to weigh a travel trailer at a CAT scale — getting the rig onto the platforms in the right order to produce the ticket
• Payload vs towing capacity — why the two are different numbers and which one limits your trip
• Tongue weight vs payload — how the trailer's tongue weight spends your truck's payload
• Weight-distribution hitch and front-axle load — restoring the front-axle weight a heavy tongue takes off
• Towing capacity by vehicle — your model's real numbers: tow rating, GVWR, GCWR and payload, by vehicle (US vehicle hub — publishing soon)