Michael,

I agree with your assessment of vendors saying "0 permissible loads" is unacceptable. The issue my company seems to frequently have we're never in a position to force the issue.

The client we work for, who ordered the equipment, tells them to provide loads. The vendor will say "thats what it is" or something to that effect, and include the nugget of "well we could run *FEA or some detailed analysis* but that is a cost adder". Then we, the engineers, just have to deal with it. It's quite frustrating.

I imagine if the client/plant engineers were doing the design and were in the position to say "we won't accept it unless you provide the allowable loads per the spec" something may get done.