Vehicle dimensions
Contents
The Routing APIs take into account a truck’s size, weight, and physical and legal road restrictions in order to generate safe and legal routes—from avoiding low bridges and sharp turns to following roads designated as truck routes. There are a few different ways to select your vehicle’s dimensions in the Routing APIs, depending on where in the world you are routing.
The Routing APIs use vehicle dimensions to generate safe and legal routes for the type of vehicle being driven.
How to set vehicle dimensions
Choice 1: Do nothing and use the defaults
By default, the APIs are set up to select truck routes based on the following vehicle dimensions. (That is, the route should not take any roads that are unfit for a vehicle of the default size.) These dimensions are based on the default vehType (POST: VehicleType) of Truck.
| Region | Height | Length* | Width | Weight | Axles | Max Weight per Axle |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| North America | 13 feet, 6 inches | 48 feet | 96 inches | 80,000 pounds | 5 | 34,000 pounds |
| Europe | 4 meters | 16.5 meters | 2.55 meters | 40 tonnes | 5 | 11.5 tonnes |
| Oceania | 4.3 meters | 19 meters | 2.44 meters | 42.5 tonnes | 6 | 11.5 tonnes |
| South America | 4 meters | 18.6 meters | 2.6 meters | 45 tonnes | 6 | 11.5 tonnes |
*Trailer only for articulated or tractor/trailers
Choice 2: Select a vehicle routing profile
A Vehicle Routing Profile is a preset collection of vehicle dimensions and other routing options that ensure the routing algorithm knows the type of vehicle being driven so it can generate a safe, efficient, and legal route.
The best way to select a routing profile is by setting the profileName parameter when making a call to one of our routing APIs. Read more about how to select a profile.
Choice 3: Set your own dimensions
Custom vehicle dimensions can be set in the Routing APIs using the parameters in the tables below.
The Routing APIs also include a vehDimUnits (POST: Units) parameter, which allows you to decide whether to pass vehicle dimensions in your API requests in English/US Customary units or in metric units. It defaults to English for ALL worldwide regions.
We recommend setting vehDimUnits to Metric for regions outside of North America. Each parameter has an acceptable range of values. In North America, those ranges use English/US Customary units. In every other region, the ranges are in metric units.
Setting vehicle dimensions can result in errors if:
-
You only set vehicle dimensions, and they are out of range for the default Truck vehicle type.
-
You also choose a Vehicle Routing Profile via
vehProfileorprofileNameand the dimensions are out of range for that particular profile.
North America
Use vehDimUnits default of English
| Parameter | vehWeight (POST: Weight) | vehHeight (POST: Height) | vehLength (POST: Length) | vehWidth (POST: Width) | axles (POST: Axles) | trkMaxWeightPerAxleGroup (POST: MaxWeightPerAxleGroup) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| North America Range | 26,000 to 156,700 pounds | 60 to 180 inches | 96 to 840 inches | 60 to 102 inches | 2 to 12 | 800 to 45,000 pounds |
| Example (Data type and sample JSON value for POST requests) | String"132000"
| String decimal inches "162"
| String decimal inches "638.5"
| String decimal inches "96"
| Integer8
| Double34000.00
|
Europe
Set vehDimUnits to Metric
| Parameter | vehWeight (POST: Weight) | vehHeight (POST: Height) | vehLength (POST: Length) | vehWidth (POST: Width) | axles (POST: Axles) | trkMaxWeightPerAxleGroup (POST: MaxWeightPerAxleGroup) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Europe Range | 20 to 60 tonnes | 2 to 5 meters | 5 to 25 meters | 2 to 3 meters | 2 to 14 | 1 to 20 tonnes |
| Example (Data type and sample JSON value for POST requests) | String kilograms “25000”
| String decimal meters “4.11”
| String decimal meters “16.15”
| String decimal meters “2.5”
| Integer5
| Double kilograms 11498.0
|
Settings in the UK
While the UK officially uses the metric system, a truck’s height, length and width are still usually measured in English/Imperial units. To set dimensions in the UK:
- Leave
vehDimUnitsset to the default ofEnglish. - Enter dimensions in English units. The available range of values is calculated by converting the metric values in Europe to English units.
| Parameter | vehHeight (POST: Height) | vehLength (POST: Length) | vehWidth (POST: Width) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Converted Range | 79 to 197 inches | 197 to 984 inches | 79 to 118 inches |
South America
Set vehDimUnits to Metric
| Parameter | vehWeight (POST: Weight) | vehHeight (POST: Height) | vehLength (POST: Length) | vehWidth (POST: Width) | axles (POST: Axles) | trkMaxWeightPerAxleGroup (POST: MaxWeightPerAxleGroup) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| South America Range | 20 to 60 tonnes | 2 to 5 meters | 5 to 30 meters | 2 to 3 meters | 2 to 12 | 1 to 20 tonnes |
| Example (Data type and sample JSON value for POST requests) | String kilograms “25000”
| String decimal meters “4.11”
| String decimal meters “16.15”
| String decimal meters “2.5”
| Integer5
| Double kilograms 11498.0
|
Oceania
Set vehDimUnits to Metric
| Parameter | vehWeight (POST: Weight) | vehHeight (POST: Height) | vehLength (POST: Length) | vehWidth (POST: Width) | axles (POST: Axles) | trkMaxWeightPerAxleGroup (POST: MaxWeightPerAxleGroup) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Oceania Range | 20 to 68 tonnes | 2 to 5 meters | 5 to 26 meters | 2 and 3 meters | 2 and 18 | 1 and 20 tonnes |
| Example (Data type and sample JSON value for POST requests) | String kilograms “25000”
| String decimal meters “4.11”
| String decimal meters “16.15”
| String decimal meters “2.5”
| Integer5
| Double kilograms 11498.0
|
Not routing a truck?
The ranges above are based on the default vehicle type, Truck. Smaller dimensions can be entered if you set vehType (POST: VehicleType) to LightTruck or Auto. If you are only ever routing trucks, you never need to set the vehicle type.
Things to keep in mind
-
If the vehicle is transporting hazardous materials, separate hazmat settings are required to ensure safe and legal routes.
-
While setting vehicle dimensions ensures a safe and legal route, there are many other route options available that allow you to customize how a vehicle is routed.