Should a dealer in Texas be offering for sale a F-350 DRW with mud flaps that Texas DPS says do not meet specs for inspection?

i am the second owner of such F-350. The first owner and the dealer both agree that the mud flaps that are on the truck now are the ones that came on the truck when it was originally purchased ( hard molded plastic 11" from road surface). According to the inspection guy at the dealer, the mudflaps will pass inspection, however, a DPS officer says they are not legal and a citation is in order.

 

Short answer - YES. Mud flaps are required on dually trucks.

Long answer - HERE

Look for Sec. 547.606. SAFETY GUARDS OR FLAPS REQUIRED.

(a) A road tractor, truck, trailer, truck-tractor in combination with a semitrailer, or semitrailer in combination with a towing vehicle that has at least four tires or at least two super single tires on the rearmost axle of the vehicle or the rearmost vehicle in the combination shall be equipped with safety guards or flaps that:

(1) are of a type prescribed by the department; and

(2) are located and suspended behind the rearmost wheels of the vehicle or the rearmost vehicle in the combination within eight inches of the surface of the highway.

(b) This section does not apply to a truck-tractor operated alone or a pole trailer.

(c) In this section, "super single tire" means a wide-base, single tire that may be used in place of two standard tires on the same axle.

 

thanks for the SEC ref. saved me some time looking it up.
However the question is should they be saleing trucks that do not meet state requirements for safety inspections? The dealer agrees that they do not meet the 8" minimum distance to the road surface, but when i ask them what they are gonna do about it, all i get is shrugged shoulders.

They say no problem, they will inspect it and pass it like that. But will not assume responsibility for my citation from the DPS, who has already said it is to short.

 

The factory flaps on the DRW's suck. So it really doesn't matter.
If you like the truck, either get the dealer to throw how in a set of Duraflaps, or just reserve yourself to the fact that even if you ordered the truck with factgory flaps in another state, you would probably still replace them with something that is actually effective.

I have side by side pictures of the factory and duraflaps here

https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/1...l#post10384461

And the Duraflaps are less expensive.

 

Any idea what the DPS didn't like about them?

 

they are to short. they cannot be more than 8" of the road surface.

 

I personally would shop another dealer is they are not willing to sell you a truck that meets the state safety standards.

 

Or just offer $250 and order the Duraflaps.

 

The truck I purchased in Jan 2015 had non-stock mudflaps with Dealer name from dealer in N Texas. The dealer I purchased the truck from in central Texas changed out the mudflaps to ones with their dealer name. On the passenger side it is 9 inches from ground and on the driver side they were installed 8 1/4 inches from ground. I have never played with removing and reinstalling. They are basically an aftermarket mudflaps that the dealers stocks that is not a "Ford" labeled mudflap. I never have heard about the 8 inches from road surface previously. Good info. On my 20006 6.0 pulling a fifth wheel on 3 trips to Alaska even with mudflaps the lower front of my trailers still receive more damage from gravel than what anyone would want. Anyone tried closer the 8 inches to ground?

 

To avoid frustration, i will probably give up the fight with the dealer and just do my own custom mud flaps. It just irritates me for a dealer to play dumb when it comes to safety and inspection requirements. Even worse they offered to inspect my truck, knowing it should not pass and declined to pay any citations i get from DPS or DOT.

 

Other than the grief of having to deal with a ticket wouldn't it be a fix it ticket in the first 3 days or something like that? I'll have to start paying attention to the Texas tag trucks that are dually and have mud flaps or not.

 

I'm pretty familiar with Texas traffic laws and have always known dually trucks had to have mudflaps. That has been the law forever here in Texas.

The 8" from the ground part I had never heard before. I doubt it is enforced on a regular basis. No mud flaps, probably get you stopped at some point. Being 8" or 10" from the ground.... I seriously doubt you'll get hassled.

Besides, that measurement can change several inches depending on your load. Right?

I wouldn't sweat it.

 

Exactly. The truck has flaps, tell them to get off your back. Tell DPS when the flaps were installed, there was 4000lb in the bed and the flaps were at the exact height, lol