Metal Recycling, Scrap Processing & Salvage worked example

Truck Scale Capacity at 65% scale & traffic uptime: a worked example

Suppose scale & traffic uptime falls to 65%. This page works the full calculation at that level so you can see exactly which result moves and by how much. Estimate truck scale capacity for metal recycling, scrap processing and salvage using production-ready inputs so teams can confirm whether capacity can cover demand before committing the schedule.

The inputs for this scenario

  • Trucks weighed per scale cycle: 4 units / cycle (held at the documented default)
  • Available weighing cycles per shift: 480 cycles (held at the documented default)
  • Scale & traffic uptime: 65 % (the input this scenario stresses; the baseline uses 90)
  • Clean-ticket first-pass yield: 97 % (held at the documented default)

Working through the calculation

  • The calculation starts from the formula this tool documents: Gross truck scale capacity = truck scale capacity output per cycle × available truck scale capacity cycles.
  • Good truck scale capacity works out to 1,211 units at these inputs, and this is the headline figure for the scenario.
  • Gross truck scale capacity works out to 1,920 units at these inputs.
  • Truck scale capacity downtime loss works out to 672 units at these inputs.
  • Truck scale capacity yield loss works out to 37.44 units at these inputs.

How this compares with the baseline

  • Against the tool's baseline example, where scale & traffic uptime sits at 90% and the headline result is 1,676 units, this scenario comes in 27.78% below the baseline at 1,211 units.
  • It computes good truck weighings per shift after derating gross scale capacity for uptime and clean-ticket first-pass yield. When the numbers land here, the stressed input is the lever to work; the walkthrough above shows exactly how much each output recovers as it climbs back toward the baseline.

Results at a glance

  • Good truck scale capacity: 1,211 units (headline result)
  • Gross truck scale capacity: 1,920 units
  • Truck scale capacity downtime loss: 672 units
  • Truck scale capacity yield loss: 37.44 units

Run it with your numbers

  • To rerun this with your own numbers, open the live Truck Scale Capacity calculator, set scale & traffic uptime to your actual value, and adjust the remaining inputs to match your operation.

Last reviewed 2026-05-12.