AxleVaultAXLEVAULT
Free tool · no signup · works in the truck

What do I need on the next load?

Your bills, your miles, your fuel → your cost per mile. Then the load's miles and days → the minimum rate that pays the truck and pays you. Total, per all miles, per loaded mile.

1Your truck

$
What goes in here?
Truck payment, trailer payment or rent, insurance, plates & permits (UCR, 2290, IRP — the yearly ones ÷ 12), ELD, phone, parking, office or software, any factoring minimum — and what you pay yourself as the driver. Skip fuel, tires and repairs: those come in per mile below.
$

Loaded plus empty, in a typical month. Fewer miles means every mile carries more of the bills.

$
$

Tires, PM, repairs, and the rebuild or next truck at the end. Real all-in on a used truck runs $0.35–$0.45.

Your cost per mile — enter your fixed costs

2The load

$

Pickup to delivery, including the wait. Leave blank and we'll figure about 550 miles a day.

Enter the miles to see your floor
Minimum rate for this load—
Per all miles—
Per loaded mile—

Make it live — start free
14-day trial · no card required · your real bills, a ten-second daily mileage log, and this exact math on every load

How the math works

Two numbers decide whether a load is worth taking, and neither one is the rate the broker says. The first is what a mile costs you:

cost per mile = fixed bills ÷ monthly miles + diesel price ÷ mpg + reserve per mile

The fixed bills are due whether the truck moves or not, so the fewer miles you run, the more each mile has to carry. A week sitting doesn't lower your costs — it raises your cost per mile. Fuel is the second piece, and the reserve is the third: money set aside on every mile for tires, PM, repairs and the day the truck needs rebuilding or replacing.

The second number is the floor for the load in front of you. Every mile of the trip — empty to the pickup and loaded to the receiver — costs the same, and every day the truck is committed should earn the profit you decided the business needs to make:

minimum rate = (empty + loaded miles) × cost per mile + profit per day × days

Divide that by all miles for the floor per mile driven, or by loaded miles to compare with what the broker quotes. Above the floor, the load pays the truck and pays you. Below it, you're financing the broker's freight.

One honest caveat: the version above uses a monthly-miles guess. The AxleVault app replaces the guess with a ten-second daily mileage log — every calendar day without an entry counts as sitting — so the cost per mile you price with is the truth for that day, not a number you typed in January.

What is the minimum rate per mile I should accept on a load?
The minimum is the rate that covers every mile of the trip at your cost per mile (empty miles included) and still leaves your profit target for each day the truck is committed. Minimum = all miles × cost per mile + profit per day × days. Divide by all miles for a per-mile floor, or by loaded miles to compare with what a broker quotes.
How do I figure out my cost per mile?
Add up your fixed monthly bills (truck and trailer payments, insurance, plates and permits spread over 12 months, ELD, phone, parking, and what you pay yourself) and divide by the miles you actually run in a month. Add fuel per mile (diesel price ÷ mpg) and a maintenance-and-replacement reserve per mile. The fewer miles you run, the higher the fixed part gets.
Why do sit days raise my cost per mile?
The truck payment, insurance and everything else are due whether the truck moved or not. A month with 8,000 miles spreads those bills thinner than a month with 6,000, so every mile in the slow month carries more fixed cost. The app counts every calendar day without logged miles as a sit day, so the number you price loads with is always the truth for that day.
What is a maintenance and replacement reserve?
Money set aside on every mile for tires, PM, repairs, and eventually a rebuild or the next truck. $0.25 a mile is a common starting point; the real all-in figure on a used truck is usually $0.35 to $0.45. The app can also compute it from the truck's expected life: lifetime maintenance plus replacement cost, divided by the miles you expect to get out of it.
Can the app do this with my real numbers?
Yes. AxleVault keeps your cost profile (bills, fuel, reserve, profit target) and a daily mileage log, then runs this exact calculation live on every load: a sit day raises your cost per mile, a busy week lowers it. $4.99 a month after a 14-day free trial, no card to start.
The app keeps this number live

Know your floor before you call the broker back.

AxleVault stores your bills and a ten-second daily mileage log, keeps your cost per mile honest as the weeks go by, and checks every load against it — in the truck, on your phone.

Start your free trial

Free for 14 days, no card required — then $4.99/month. Now on Google Play, the App Store, and any browser.