Doc- you hit the nail on the head, none of them can agree on what the rules actually are, and they are all undereducated. The problem with your specific case, is the clerk of courts is not the guy that is going to be rolling a creeper under your rig at a roadside stop, and I doubt he is going to go to court with you and say "yeah, I told him it was ok". Unless you got all that in writing. That would be a cool thing to have in the glove box to show the dot cop. As an example of under informed public servants, at my roadside stop the Ohio State Trooper had mistakenly listed my trailer gvw on the ticket as 10,000 gvw (it was only 7,000 and under class A cdl) which I pointed out and asked him to correct it as I only had a class B cdl at the time, and his reply was "you're ok anyway, you don't need a class A unless you are over 26000 combined". Which is flat wrong. Just an example of even the law enforcers don't know what's what. But Doc, back to your tools, what I was specifically told is that if you are carrying those tools in the furtherance of a commercial enterprise (i.e., you are making money with the tools), you are a commercial vehicle. Otherwise no business would need to follow dot rules unless they were actually carrying goods for sale. Construction companies, utilities, excavators, etc. are all examples of people that only carry "tools", but they certainly fall under dot (and also usdot). If you are under 26000 you don't need a CDL, but if you are over 10000 you do fall under dot regs as far as licensing and logs and insurance, etc., and you would only need a USDOT number if you cross state lines. As another specific example, a buddy of mine (from here in Ohio) with a construction company got busted in Pennsylvania last week taking his tool trailer to a jobsite with his pickup truck. Got the same wringer run through as me, armful of tickets. Your theory of taking your tools to work aren't going to save him. You MIGHT have a case for that if your do not have your own business, and are strictly employed by someone else, so then the truck really is your transportation to your place of employment and then that argument might fly in court. But I am doubting that is the case, and the dot guy is not going to listen to it, he is just going to write the ticket(s) and let the court figure it out.
Believe me, I'm all for skating, I did it for a long time and wish I still could, but I just think those days are past. It's just a matter of how long, not if, everybody is going to get caught. And you are right, it is all about the money right now. The state is short of it, and we are an easy target. And I am now spending a moderate amount of money and LOT of time on useless paperwork that does not make me or anyone else any safer than they were before.
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