I'm actually working on this with a 1400lb max working weight (per wheel)- so you could use this to set up your pickup truck if you wanted to. The load cell is basically a surplus industrial single-acting hydraulic cylinder with a gauge stuck in the port. That is then inside a piece of tubing with just a slightly larger ID than the OD of the cylinder. The weight of the wheel functions like a scissor jack to compress the cylinder, resulting in a pressure reading.
Based on what I've gathered from talking to the guys in the lab where I work, I should be able to get around +- 5% readings on the weight, most of the error in the cheap pressure gauge I'm looking at.
I'm eyeballing the total cost of this to be about $50 each, $200 for the set of 4, in materials. Not uber cheap, but heckuvalot cheaper than a set of longacre's.
Has anyone seen or attempted a rig like this? feedback? experiences? any reason you can think of that this is a really dumb idea? I'm sure someone has thought of doing something like this before, and I tend to think there must be a reason nothing like this is commercially available (to my knowlege).
