New mot failure items from march 20th

[Manicminer]

Negative Creep said:

SO could "another immobilisation device" be interpreted as a Disclock or similar?

I don't know, I use a stoplock on my 85 MR2. If thats ok i'll stop whinging on about it

[chrisw666]

Manicminer said:

I beg to differ, when a drunk driver piles into you head on in an 80s Escort or Astra chances are it might sting a bit. In a modern car you have a higher chance of wearing an airbag for a few milliseconds and walking away (not always).

Same goes for ABS, that doddery old codger behind you or young buck with his eye down his passengers top is more likely to stop before smacking you up the arse when they're caught by surprise on wet road.

People still find new and interesting ways to use cars to kill themselves but I'd rather have the idiots driving around with ABS than not.

We will have to agree to differ on that. I for one don't want to live in a world sanitised against the stupid when the stupid should be weeded out by natural selection.

[Manicminer]

I know what you mean Chris but if you can still buy lots of nice old cars and still have fun. The advances in safety can only be a good thing for the majority of the population.

If you still crave danger just go on a driving holiday in Morocco or west Africa or Croyden

[lestershaw]

problem solved. Get a TVR, mine doesnt have most of the items on the list anyway let alone thw arning lights for them!

[chrisw666]

Manicminer said:

If you still crave danger just go on a driving holiday in Morocco or west Africa or Croyden

It's not danger I crave as such, but the last accident I was involved in was caused by a guy overshooting a junction because the road was sheet ice, his car had cheap summer tyres on it and he claimed that he wasn't going to fast as he was doing just less than the 30 limit, it never entered this mans brain that the speed limit isn't a target and was set for a dry road.

Extra safety devices just seem to take people one step away from being personally responsible for their actions.

[John87]

Put my car in for MOT this morning

I'm not expecting any failures on the new items because my car is too old to have most of the electronic bits and I have no warning lights showing.

I was speaking to my tester when I dropped the car off and he reckons that there could be some cars written off on their first MOT under the new rules despite being mechanically sound. His thinking was that if something relatively low value but new enough to have all the fancy electronics comes in and fails on a couple of warning lights being lit, it could cost several thousand to repair. That could easily be more than the value of a 3 year old Korean hatchback.

[Gareth79]

andyiley said:

You seem to have missed the point mentioned earlier that all warning lights must come on & then go out & remain out.

An MOT tested doesn't just look to see that they are off, they stop the engine, turn on the ignition & check that all come on & then go out, so removing the bulb is no good to you.

I suspect there will soon be a market for a device that emulates the exact ignition-on warning light sequence of various vehicles. Sure it's a hassle to remove the instrument cluster but probably easier and cheaper than fixing the issue.

[andym1603]

John87 said:

I was speaking to my tester when I dropped the car off and he reckons that there could be some cars written off on their first MOT under the new rules despite being mechanically sound. His thinking was that if something relatively low value but new enough to have all the fancy electronics comes in and fails on a couple of warning lights being lit, it could cost several thousand to repair. That could easily be more than the value of a 3 year old Korean hatchback.

Treated like a, no cost to the government, scrappage scheme. Should weed out some more of the older cars that would generally be good for few years yet depending on the fault obvisiouly.

Edited by andym1603 on Wednesday 20th March 12:06

[Agrispeed]

What does it mean by wiring and connections? Do they mean trailer sockets etc or actual car looms? Seems a bit odd...

[smiffy220]

dingocooke said:

Toltec said:

What if your car does not have a steering lock?

The caveat for many MOT test items is 'if fitted' with exemptions based on vehicle age; for example, speedos are compulsory from 1st jan 1937 so if your vehicle is pre Jan 37 you dont need one for the MOT

If your car is pre-1960, you don't need an MOT anyway.

[big_boz]

None of this matters to a propper PH though does it as a mid 90's TVR or Mk1 MX5 has almost none of these fetures, and certainly none with a warning light!

[J4CKO]

I think we are being over nannied yet again, ok cars should be fit to use on the road but this is getting more and more difficult, a lot of the country don't have any money to replace their car or leave their car at a garage with an open ended bill for sorting whatever issues. The rules seem to be pricing people off the road.

What happens with airbags if removed to fit another steering wheel or something, is that now a fail, is an engine light a fail now as well, my old Saab used to light that one if I put supermarket fuel in.

Most accidents aren't caused by car defects, it is driver defects

[Dr Doofenshmirtz]

Gareth79 said:

andyiley said:

You seem to have missed the point mentioned earlier that all warning lights must come on & then go out & remain out.

An MOT tested doesn't just look to see that they are off, they stop the engine, turn on the ignition & check that all come on & then go out, so removing the bulb is no good to you.

I suspect there will soon be a market for a device that emulates the exact ignition-on warning light sequence of various vehicles. Sure it's a hassle to remove the instrument cluster but probably easier and cheaper than fixing the issue.

It's easy to replicate the behavior on the ABS bulb with just a simple 555 timer circuit.
And that's all I have to say about that

[J4CKO]

Dr Doofenshmirtz said:

Gareth79 said:

andyiley said:

You seem to have missed the point mentioned earlier that all warning lights must come on & then go out & remain out.

An MOT tested doesn't just look to see that they are off, they stop the engine, turn on the ignition & check that all come on & then go out, so removing the bulb is no good to you.

I suspect there will soon be a market for a device that emulates the exact ignition-on warning light sequence of various vehicles. Sure it's a hassle to remove the instrument cluster but probably easier and cheaper than fixing the issue.

It's easy to replicate the behavior on the ABS bulb with just a simple 555 timer circuit.
And that's all I have to say about that

I suspect there may be a cottage industry springing up in MOT dodges but I suspect the ones that suffer here are families with an aging French car, still being paid for that has a bulb lit, they then get a bill for a grand to sort it so they can get an MOT.

[pingu393]

Gareth79 said:

andyiley said:

You seem to have missed the point mentioned earlier that all warning lights must come on & then go out & remain out.

An MOT tested doesn't just look to see that they are off, they stop the engine, turn on the ignition & check that all come on & then go out, so removing the bulb is no good to you.

I suspect there will soon be a market for a device that emulates the exact ignition-on warning light sequence of various vehicles. Sure it's a hassle to remove the instrument cluster but probably easier and cheaper than fixing the issue.

A 555 timer, a resistor, a capacitor and some wire is the answer .

[LukeSi]

Airbags, none of them, Power steering, removed and the bulb gone from the dash, ABS works, everything else it doesn't have.

[big_boz]

I might be wrong but i was of the understanding that if something was fitted as standard then it has to work.

So for instance if you car is only a few years old and your ESP stops working you can not just simply pull the fuse as it was standard and required by law for the manufacturer to fit to the car.

[oyster]

chrisw666 said:

Manicminer said:

I beg to differ, when a drunk driver piles into you head on in an 80s Escort or Astra chances are it might sting a bit. In a modern car you have a higher chance of wearing an airbag for a few milliseconds and walking away (not always).

Same goes for ABS, that doddery old codger behind you or young buck with his eye down his passengers top is more likely to stop before smacking you up the arse when they're caught by surprise on wet road.

People still find new and interesting ways to use cars to kill themselves but I'd rather have the idiots driving around with ABS than not.

We will have to agree to differ on that. I for one don't want to live in a world sanitised against the stupid when the stupid should be weeded out by natural selection.

If my family gets wiped out by a drunk driver who survives the crash, in what way is natural selection working?

[AlexS]

chrisw666 said:

Instead of adding all these items to the MOT test would it not be easier and more effective to just bang ignorant mongs who assume and MOT is the same as a service and who only ever touch tyres, brakes and other items when their car fails and who even then use the cheapest possible solution?

Cars don't need ABS, I managed 10's of 1000's of miles in non ABS equipped cars and so did lots of other people, without crashing and dying. With decent new tyres and well maintained brakes there should be even less need for them.

But no lets legislate to save the stupid from themselves instead of just shooting them or banning them from the roads.

There is a difference between the way the brakes on a car that never had ABS and one that does are set up. Previously the brake bias will have been set to ensure that the fronts lock before the rears (including a proportioning valve to compensate for light loads) so that the car maintains stability. On a car with ABS and ESP the electronics keep the car stable under heavy braking. If these systems are offline then the car could become very unstable just when you don't want it to.

[mcford]

andyiley said:

You seem to have missed the point mentioned earlier that all warning lights must come on & then go out & remain out.

An MOT tested doesn't just look to see that they are off, they stop the engine, turn on the ignition & check that all come on & then go out, so removing the bulb is no good to you.

According to the MOT computer a SRS light illuminated, indicating a fault is a fail, whereas an inoperative SRS light is an advisory, from which I can only conclude that having a SRS light that doesn't illuminate meets the requirement of the MOT test.