MOT - New inspection criteria for number plates.

Cheers for that Reg. Incidentally for those who wish to know:

What has this got to do with whether the vehicle is safe to use on the road? You operate an MOT bay, not a police station.

The number plate must be reflective to the right standard, if not then the vehicle is potentially more dangerous as it is slightly less visible.

Rog ( snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com) gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying :

Nothing. Nor have several other parts of the MOT.

And?

An MOT fail doesn't automatically mean a vehicle is unroadworthy. Never has.

Plates are not reflective for safety/visibility of the car, thats why you legally have to have reflectors in the lights. Plates are reflective for identification only.

Why are they different colours, then?

Dave Plowman (News) ( snipped-for-privacy@davenoise.co.uk) gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying :

So when some tit's stuffed it down an embankment and into the shrubbery, and all plod can see is the reflection of his torch off a numberplate, he knows which end of the car he's looking at.

Identification of the front and the back?

Just like rear reflectors?

reflective plates were brought in to increase visibility of the vehicle (remember the fogs we used to get?) It would have been ideal to use white backing at both ends of the car, but that would have meant showing a white 'light' to the rear which would not have been ok, so a compromise bright colour of yellow was chosen. White at the front is ok anyway.

Mrcheerful

Sorry but you are quite wrong! They were introduced to improve the visibility of a vehicle. They don't replace the reflectors but augment them. IIRC they were introduced about the same time as the law was changed to allow you to park on the road at night without lights in a 30mph area. With cars parked everywhere without lights, they wanted some additional reflecting surfaces to help parked cars be seen.

And of course there are no reflectors on the front (pre reflective plates)

Am i being dense?

it says that plates are fitted vertically, or as close to vertical as is reasonably practicable;

Now, should that not be horizantal(across) as vertical is , like, upright.

================================== It's probably to stop people putting number plates on sharply sloping bonnets like E-Type Jaguars which can make the plate almost invisible from the front.

Cic.

Neil - Usenet ( snipped-for-privacy@SPAMblueyonder.co.uk) gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying :

Probably.

Vertical viewed from the size, rather than on a sloping panel, such as the bonnet.

I was following a car the other day and noticed it had transparent but non-reflective patches over the first 3 and last 2 characters, leaving only '1 A' or something on a reflective bit. It wasn't very obvious (but still visible) in sunlight but when we went into a heavily shaded area I could only see the 1A, the rest of the plate just looked dull yellow...

I guess he thought it would help with cameras.

It looked more like a "Me! Me! Stop Me, Mr Plod!" sign to me...

Think about looking from the end on - i.e the plate should be attached to a vertical surface on the car, not e.g. pointing down at the road mounted on a spoiler...

I saw something similar, but I think it was only over part of the figures. So changing an 8 into a 3, or whatever.

Yep.

I'm willing to stand corrected, but ive heard many "reasons" for them becoming reflective but never seen any evidence for it. Doesnt really stand for motorbikes either though, with them not having to have front plates and being even less visible than a car when parked on the road at night (usually at an angle).