Blue light windscreen washers

"Paul S. Brown" wrote in news:bnm0cv$1376do$ snipped-for-privacy@ID-169718.news.uni-berlin.de:

A quick google on "blue light windscreen washers" reveals

Which bit of yours is blue and sprays fluid?

;-)

Tim Hobbs

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

Interesting, pity PC lambert is wrong!

This subject come up on uk.legal about every 3 months, blue lights at the front are legal as long as they do not flash.

Is that flash, or appear to flash?

The difference being the LED itself flashing, or being occluded by a part of the bodywork on a rough road. Your average traffic cop is going to see a flashing blue light behind him and pull the vehicle it's on if it's not another police car.

On the other hand, the Road Vehicle Lighting Act is an interesting read.

Unless I have missed a revision, which is possible, then the new trend for distinctly blue headlights is illegal as the Act states that headlights shall be either white or yellow, and I don't know anybody who doesn't perceive these as being blue.

On a slightly different tack, has anybody seen a thing called the "Mobile Baby" which is a short range FM transmitter that clamps to a mobile and allows it to be heard through the car radio.

I have this vision of people buying these to bypass the clampdown on handheld phones in cars and being charged with operating an unlicensed transmitter instead.

P.

The rules basically are that the obligatory lights on the front (headlights, position lamps and (depending on the size of vehicle) end outline marker lamps) must be white or yellow, however you are permited to have additional lighting on the front of the vehicle in any colour except red, blue included.

Flashing blue lights are illegal because only emergency vehicles are allowed 'special warning lamps' which are specifically defined in the act as a "lamp, fitted to the front or rear of a vehicle, capable of emitting a blue flashing light and not any other kind of light" i.e. if the lamp does not flash, it is not legally classed as a 'special warning lamp' and is therefore legal.

You can also get them for MP3 players. They're very good actually. AFAIK they're not legal in UK. If they are, then the manufacturers generally aren't getting them licensed for use over here.

This is the sort of thing, although there are now many variants:

David.

snip

Yep, they're being offered on eBay.

Regards Steve G

On or around Tue, 28 Oct 2003 23:48:29 +0000, "Paul S. Brown" enlightened us thusly:

mind, a small blue LED doesn't look a lot like a police strobe...

some of them are very blue. The blue-white ones are probably marginally OK, but the very-blue ones are a) not white and b) dangerous, 'cos they don;t actually put much light on the road.

I can confirm the car baby is NOT LEGAL in the UK

Regards

Zen

Goody goody.

I may have my local Trading Standards have a word with the pushy git in the market, along with their friends from the Radiocommunications Agency/OfCom.

"You sir - yes you! Do you know that you could be fined up to £1000 for using a mobile phone without a handsfree kit when you're driving your car as of December - buy one of these and you won't"

"No - I'll be arrested for operating an unlicensed transmitter in regulated frequency space and be liable for an unlimited fine - I'll take the £1000 chance thanks"

P.

Zen wrote:

Hi P,

Yes quite right,

There are lots of companys trying to push this kind of thing on to the market. All illegal.

Any device that transmits in the broadcast band has the capbability of inteference etc etc....

I saw in Halfords a kit that plugs into the ISO plug of your car radio and so muting the radio but using the radio amp.

This is the way to go.

Regards

PS Not long to Ofcom now............,

I've found a Bluetooth headset to be fine - not that anything will really work, handsfree or not, in a 101 ;-)

Martyn

Try a Sennheiser or Bose noise-cancelling helicopter headset :-)

Malcolm

I've got this sudden image of Martyn driving down the road having mounted an observation dome on the front of Bungle. Another Dredd 101 is born...

P.

I wonder if Mandy would mind me wearing one every evening?

Tim Hobbs

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

In article , Tim Hobbs writes

Um, it goes over your ears.

Sorry, forgot.

IT GOES OVER YOUR EARS!

Regards,

Simonm.

I can visualise the settings now

1. Coronation Street
2. Mother in Law
3. Screaming child
4. Riveting information about today's shopping trip
5. Dog barking at next door's cat

There's a lot of money to be made with this...

Tim Hobbs

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

Crikey Hobbs, you're onto a winner here!

An Audio 'killfile'...

I'll add to the list:

1. Moaning about 101 items on Credit Card Statement
2. Comments about untidy office
3. Moaning about essential gadgets on Credit Card Statement
4. Comments about body size

Actually, come to think about it, most women I know already have an inbuilt Audio killfile - a handy selective hearing defect which kicks in around the end of the evening, often accompanied by a headache...

Martyn

Only 101? Show season must be over...

She doesn't call you... No, she wouldn't. You hate that.

That might be something to do with (9)...

Tim Hobbs

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