50 mph limit on A - roads ??

This nonsense with 12-seater LWB's is getting rediculous. I think you would be ok with a 109/110 as the vehicle is not registered as a PSV vehicle, but as a PLG. We have several training minibuses, (Iveco/Merc Vario) which have had the number of seats reduced to 8 so people with new licences can drive them. They are taxed as PLG, and are entitled to do 60 on single roads. Not that you'll find them doing it often, 50 is about as fast as they'll go (well knackered)

Alex

Nonsense it might be, but you should read your highway code regarding the legal speed limits for passenger carrying vehicles constructed with more than 8 seats...

National speed limits are:

Outside of built up areas unless marked otherwise - single carriageway =

50MPH

------------ditto--------------------------------- - dual carriageway =

60MPH.

It doesn't have to be registered as a PSV either. A privately owned double decker bus that will not carry fare paying passengers is classed as a PLG vehicle and can be driven on a car licence.

Happy motoring

THuNK

According to DVLA your ordinary car licence (B category) is restricted to: 'Motor vehicles with a MAM not exceeding 3500kg having not more than 8 passenger seats with a trailer up to 750kg.'

To drive any vehicle with 9 or more passenger seats requires additional D1 (up to 16 passenger seats) or D category on your licence. Nothing to do with vehicle being classed as a PSV. Minimum age is 21 (subject to certain exemptions).

Tom

On or around Tue, 12 Aug 2003 11:19:35 +0100, "Tom Redfern" enlightened us thusly:

the long station wagon is classed as a dual purpose vehicle, being as it's

4WD, ISTR.

though in fact, mine currently only carries 6 passengers anyway.

In article , Simon Isaacs writes

Although unfortunate circumstances I don't have any sympathy (even assuming he was 'properly' insured on the 110 in the first place). My current car insurance has loads of conditions relating to drivers under

21 (even if named on the policy). When I was 22 I couldn't get insurance on my 109 for more than 6 seats without paying 200% extra. I was once pulled over 5 minutes after buying a new car and asked for proof I was insured (which I was). I couldn't get cover at all from Direct Line on the 109, had to cancel the policy when I bought it.

I passed my test around 1990, even then a friend's father had to sell his 110 CSW and swap it for a Range Rover to allow his 18 year old son to legally drive it. Another friend had his insurance on a Lightweight cancelled by the broker with immediate effect (although it took them 2 weeks to notify him) because they assumed he (and not his father) was the main user (he was listed as an occasional driver).

The law is probably over complicated and inconsistent, but that does not excuse not knowing the score. 20 year olds crashing 110 CSWs does not help and kind of supports the reasons why the law exists as it does.

True, but I passed my test in 1971, and have a "D" category on my licence.

Happy days when things were not so complicated :O)

THuNK

Very picky John, and I suspect he was trying to make his quota. The basic rule of thumb is if there are street lights in a built up area and no speed signs to show otherwise, it's 30MPH. Those people who know Liverpool, will remember the infamous "Southport Road" from the Mons pub Northwards in Bootle. This is a dual carriage way in a built up area with street lighting and used to have no speed signs. There were always radar traps on this section - white mini vans with Police Radar nicely printed in black on the side. 30 MPH....Now there are signs all over the place including huge ones on the road surface. Even better was Queens Drive, the city's ring road which was nearly all dual carriageway and nearly all 30MPH, though you wouldn't know it as the signs were non existent.

You can never win.

THuNK

In article , John Halliwell writes

Sorry, but I've held off on this until now... The present debacle is largely because of our driving licence (and transport policies generally, for that matter) being mucked about with to conform to EU diktat.

The insurers follow the government's cue. Given that 110s in particular are officially recognised as the safest vehicles on British roads, you'd expect insurance to be correspondingly low. It's not, for two reasons: one is the potential for passengers to claim (reasonable, I suppose), but the other is the insurers 'taking fright' at its re-classification according to EU rules as a minibus.

I long for the day when we can make our own laws in our own country again (don't get me started on Kinnock and the 40 tonne lorry scandal).

Regards,

Simonm.

They also have far fewer cars per mile of road, tougher learning and testing regimes and far higher insurance premiums too.

Been there ... done that ...

Regards Steve G

remove the nospam to email me

The higher German speed limits are a bit of a fallacy anyway. They are slightly higher, but the derestricted bits are few and far between, and mostly 'unusable' anyway.

I did squeeze a very brief indicated 155mph on the way back home once, but on the whole autobahn and major road driving in Germany (Munich and Stuttgart) was much slower than driving in the UK, mostly due to the traffic.

Tim Hobbs

'58 Series 2 '77 101FC Ambulance '95 Discovery V8i

I agree Tim. I've spent a lot of time living and doing business in Germany since the mid-1970's and around the major cities traffic flow is very slow. You can, however, make use of the "unlimited" autobahn limits in the more remote areas and it certainly makes a difference to journey times between the cities.

Can't recall being able to get the Discovery up to 155 though ... unless you count kph :-))

Regards Steve G

remove the nospam to email me

If you ever got it there I certainly wouldn't fancy getting the bugger back down again!

Chris Crane's 5.2 Range Rover can't manage 130mph, so God knows what bhp you would need to crack 155.

For the record, it was a 1997 Nissan 200SX.

Tim Hobbs

'58 Series 2 '77 101FC Ambulance '95 Discovery V8i

Virtually every time I've been in Germany I've witnessed the results (and been stuck for hours on end in the resulting queues) of some of the locals testing the unrestricted speed zones! Carnage! Personally, the fact that my Discovery will probably manage around 90 odd mph is fast enough for me........

HIrst Family wrote of a Land Rover 110:

Snip...

Of *course* you can use bus lanes (except that one from Heathrow into London on the M4). If you read the SI you'll see that the definition of "bus" used is based on the number of seats... (No, really, I spoke to the person who *wrote* the local traffic order. Honest.)

jd

Here in Bristol the company operating the mobile speed cameras were slammed recently when people sent photographs of them to the local press. They were parked on double yellow lines, immediately after a rather tight bend in the road and just in front of a pedestrian crossing (not on the zig-zags). Since then they've tidied up their act a bit.

I'm not sure how far they can read down the road but near my home we have a flyover (dual carriageway; 40mph limit) and they park about

300m from the top on a patch of grass. The camera looks to be aimed at the point where cars become visible at the top of the flyover. The DVLA also park there with the tax disc detector van.

ASAIK there's no requirement to put out any signs to say they're operating in the area, but I could be wrong.

Regards Steve G

remove the nospam to email me

In article , SteveG writes

A 'company', not the Police?

Yes, similar incident in my part of the world (particularly after the Daily Mail showed one parked on yellows, the pavement, a cycle track...). Here it was one on the pavement level with the white lines from a fixed camera. The police claimed it wasn't a 'pavement' but 'a patch of tarmac at the end off a restricted access road'. The net result was the local residents parking on this piece of 'non-pavement' and a request to have the fixed camera removed as it obviously is not doing the job it was intended to do (the reason given for it being put there against their wishes).

I believe the new laser gear is line of sight, they used to set up on a fly-over near me. If you took the direction they were pointing it in and worked out where it intersected the road they were monitoring, it was something like 500m (probably limited more by the line of sight than distance).

There must be some reason why they carry the signs in the first place? A friend of mine was done on a bike on a dark country lane, he just saw a guy flagging him down (apparently with no obvious insignia or markings) so he carried on. In court the judge agreed that the rider would not have known who it was or what he was doing, but still felt it proper to give him 3 points for the offence and 3 points for failing to stop and a

400 pound fine.

Yeah, here in Luton it's called the "Bedfordshite Casualty Reduction Partnership", which seems to be some semi-commercial & police revenue enhancement company. They put adverts on the back of our buses as well.

Quite amusing to see an advert for cash raising by speeding fines on the back of a bus overtaking you at 40mph in a 30 zone (not that I would do something like that)

Alex.

On or around Thu, 14 Aug 2003 17:57:14 +0100, Llandrovers! enlightened us thusly:

seen a fair few dodgy speed limit signs, these are a yellow square sign, with a white circular centre carrying a black number (40 or 30, typically), but with a BLACK border around the circle. I suspect that these signs are put up in places where there's no speed limit, and are deliberately made to look like speed limit signs, without actually having any legal force.

anyone know?

AFAIK, the only legitimate speed limits are those where there's a continuous pattern of street lighting making an automatic 30, or ones signed by means of a white, circular sign with a red border.

SG: Yes, we have one of these "camera consortium" set-ups - a joint venture between the police and local councils - who actually buy the cars/cameras/etc., but they are mannedby serving police oficers as part of their rostered duties.

snipped

SG: They may use signes in the vicinity just so they can say "you were warned" but on a road that already has camera signs they probably feel additional ones are not needed. Dunno really.

Anyway, I'm a good boy and keep to the speed limit so have little sympathy for those caught - including my son :-) I fitted an after-market speed limiter to the Disco and just set it to the speed limit ... no amount of right foot can get it to go faster. Even works whilst running on LPG.

Regards Steve G

remove the nospam to email me