What's your excess capacity?

[Bicycle Bob]

Some places, commercial vehicles never seem to move if loaded to under the GVW. I've got about the smallest non-sports car available, but I could have managed every trip this year with a motorcycle, as far as carrying goes. How much of your load capacity do you usually use, and how often do you max it out? Would it make sense to join a co-op, or just rent something for big loads?

[cfg83]

Bicycle Bob -

With the rear seats down, it's got 50 cubic feet, but I made a custom rear trunk hide-stuff cover, so it's almost never in haul-stuff mode.

My car is like a Swiss Army Knife 'O Crap. It always has stuff in it that would be worthless to other people, but helps me get (meaningless?) things done. On the other hand, If I had a CRX, I am sure I would manage.

A motorcycle would wear me into the ground. Too stressful (for me) on the freeway and the streets.

I was going to go to CostCo today but I ran out of time at work, so I lost the chance to fill it with stuff today.

CarloSW2

[bestclimb]

if I can't fit it in the civic, I use an old ford truck I have for the purpose, it is loaded fullish 50% of the time.

I can fit a 55gallon drum in the back of the civic.

The civic is used to commute with me, my lunch and some cold weather gear. on the weekends wife and I are usually riding together in hers or mine.

[Danncomm]

My insight is sometimes completely loaded with boxes, the worst was the back loaded to the ceiling and the passenger seat filled including the floor. Maybe only 200 lbs. but that with my weight puts me well over the weight capacity which is listed as 300 lbs for passengers and cargo, so usually I am at or over 100% all the time.

[Lazarus]

I've got a bicycle and a scooter. If loads require I'll bum my sons truck. So far in 2 + years its only been a few times.

[Christ]

I've got a truck, a 3 wheeler, and several non-atv (but still not legal) motorcycles. At any point in time, I'll use any of them to do what I have to do, but the Truck is at the easiest access, and short of driving my wife's car (which I do often) is my daily driver, unfortunately. I'm a bad man.

[RobertSmalls]

Most of the time, the car is used to transport just one human and maybe his lunch or some other things that would fit in a pair of bicycle saddlebags. That places me just over 50% of my payload rating, so I voted B. That is, unless you account for the fact that I keep the washer fluid bottle almost empty to save 6lbs, in which case I'm below 50% and should have voted A. :-/

[Ryland]

Most of the time it's just me but most of the time my rear seat is also folded flat for hauling cargo but that accounts for maybe 1/3 of my miles, but my passenger seat is also almost always full of tools or parts or groceries.
My electric car is a two seater and that also often has some kind of cargo or tools in it that would be hard to haul with a motorcycle, it also protects me from bad weather.
For shorter trips around town I tend to ride my bicycle and for that I have a rear rack with a wire basket and a cargo net over the top, half my grocery trips I use that instead of my car.

[jamesqf]

How do you define capacity, though? Weight, volume, or ability to get there?

With the Insight, it's usually me (~200 lbs), dog (~60 lbs), and pack (20-40, maybe), which puts it pretty close to its stated load capacity.

Now the pickup ('88 Toyota 4WD) is a different matter. It only gets close to its weight capacity when I go to cut firewood. It hits volume occasionally - a dozen sheets of foam insulation don't weigh much, but they occupy quite a bit of space. The most frequent use, though, is just getting there. Lots of trailheads (or my friends' ranch in the winter) you just don't get to without a high-clearance 4WD.

So the pickup has lots of excess capacity for the miles on pavement, but not for the last mile or five. Unfortunately, I haven't yet built a transformer car that switches modes when the pavement ends. (But I'm thinking about it: something like a Locost built on a Suzuki Samuri chassis...)

[sarguy01]

Right now I am living out of hotels. I have two seabags, a large duffel, a medium suitcase, and a bunch of random stuff. Probably 400-500 pounds of stuff. The Pacifica seats 6 and is rated at something around or over 1000 pounds of people and stuff.

Empty it weighs 4600 pounds. It is a tank.