Sorry for the massive necro-bump, but I'm hoping to tag onto some expertise from others that posted in this thread.

I'm trying to sort out the whole commercial registration issue for myself...

Obviously, there are penalties of some sort if your not running commercial plates; but what are those penalties? There sure is a lot of BS involved in commercial registration, so the temptation is to avoid the issue.

Assuming one goes to commercial plates, you are supposed to have company name/tare/gross weights on the sides. What's the penalty for not having those displayed?

I prefer NOT to advertise on my vehicles/trailers; also, the last thing I want is some nosy idiot calling parking enforcement on me for parking a commercial vehicle on my own street...

Thoughts from those of you in the know on these sorts of things?