Are just side repeaters legal?

[RobM77]

I'm in the process of putting my Roadsport A racing Caterham on the road. Initially I want to run it without headlights, but I will be fitting indicators. The problem is, at the front the indicators are integral with the headlight units. Does anyone know if small side repeaters on the wings will be legal on their own? I realise that indicators aren't actually a legal requirement, but I would have thought having them on the back would necessitate having them on the front.

[CanAm]

Don't know about the legality of it but common sense (!?) would suggest the Regs would demand better visibility.
I have seen one Caterham with indicators mounted on the nosecone, and you could always mount (ahem) Westfield indicators there.

[RobM77]

CanAm said:

Don't know about the legality of it but common sense (!?) would suggest the Regs would demand better visibility.
I have seen one Caterham with indicators mounted on the nosecone, and you could always mount (ahem) Westfield indicators there.

Yes, that's a good point. I'm imagining I'll end up with lights anyway, but I'm not sure how easy it would be re-align them in the garage when fitting them back on after a race weekend.

[ewenm]

I'm surprised you're considering no lights anyway. Assuming you will use it as a road car occasionally, I'd want to know I could get home whatever happens to delay me...

Alignment - get them properly aligned first then make a mark on the adjustable bits that you can re-align back to when re-fitting them again.

[RobM77]

ewenm said:

I'm surprised you're considering no lights anyway. Assuming you will use it as a road car occasionally, I'd want to know I could get home whatever happens to delay me...

Alignment - get them properly aligned first then make a mark on the adjustable bits that you can re-align back to when re-fitting them again.

Thanks for the tip on aligning the lights

Mmm.. the idea of making it road legal boiled down to several things:

1) get used to driving the car so racing it is safer and easier. The ergonomics of folding my leggy body into the Caterham are especially unusual and take a lot of getting used to from a driving point of view.

2) Get more use out of the car than 3 races a year and 3 tests!

3) Attend track days and Sunday blats with my friends in the Lotus 7 club.

3 has only come to mind recently, and would really require some lights, as you rightly point out...

I want to have an absolute minimum of hassle preparing the car for a race, and I had originally seen unbolting lights as unecessary faffing. If I can quickly and easily re-align the lights though this wouldn't be so bad, as upon inspection their fitting looks pretty easy (slot it in and plug it in basically). The other issue is that I sit so low I didn't want the lights to obscure my view forwards. I've seen smaller lights on some Caterhams though, I could get myself some of those?

I think the plan will be to get the thing on the road asap without the lights, and then order some of those smaller lights quite soon. The reason for the two staged approach is that before I spend too much money I want to ascertain what the car's going to be like on bumpy roads with full racing suspension.

[bikemonster]

Can you not just race with your lights taped up?

I race a 7 replica which is road legal. Here in Brightest Africa the scrutineers are happy with lights as long as they have an X of tape across the lenses. TBH, I leave 'em like that all the time, as I very seldom use the car after dark anyway.

[ewenm]

There's a company called SVC that do a variety of lights.

[RobM77]

bikemonster said:

Can you not just race with your lights taped up?

I race a 7 replica which is road legal. Here in Brightest Africa the scrutineers are happy with lights as long as they have an X of tape across the lenses. TBH, I leave 'em like that all the time, as I very seldom use the car after dark anyway.

I don't want to fit standard Caterham lights as they're so large and I sit so low that I won't be able to see where I'm going (I've got some and tried it!). I race in an official Caterham series, and they don't allow non standard parts on the cars, especially not if they're visible.

Besides, not one of the 30 odd cars that race have lights, even the road legal ones, so I assumed the aerodynamic disadvantage was tangible.

[RobM77]

ewenm said:

There's a company called SVC that do a variety of lights.

Thank you. I've been browsing their website and comments regarding them on blatchat and they seem like a really good company. Their 5.75 inch units look like the ones for me.

I've also been looking at the traffic regulations on the web, and can't see anything that suggests it's legal to run without headlights!