Petition against 2yr MOT proposal...

That would be an awful lot of people. The same kind of people that see a failure as unfair.

At least Eire has one now. I went over there a while ago, before the test, and there were some shocking sheds about.

I was under the impression it was a requirement, a lot easier to check with all these alloy wheels being used.

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

Not a requirement at all. In fact, quite the opposite. The wheels are not permitted to be removed during the test.

MOT testers are not allowed to remove any covers during a test. If they can't see the item, then they can't fail it.

A good example being wheel trims. The wheel might only be held on with two nuts, but provided it feels secure, the tester is not allowed to remove the wheel trim to check.

But try taking anything over 3.5t for a test, and it's totally different. If they spot hub caps, or any removable covers that prevent the proper inspection of any testable components, then you won't be in the test station for long.

Far too many! The MOT is only a test to the minimum required standards. For something to fail an MOT, it has usually got to be well beyond serviceable limits.

I agree it seems odd, some cars ive seen struggle from one MOT to the next, and some Ive had (peugeot 205) passed for 5 years with nothing but basic maintenance like pads and discs. I'd suggest maybe it would make more sense to have long periods between while the car is new and shorter as it ages.

it into line with the

errrm i didnt say you did ?

Take your cars to your local council run testing station then. Its what I used to do when I lived in the UK.

D.

And then longer again once the car is more than, say 40 or 50 years old. I can't imagine many accidents are caused by, say, a Silver Ghost having a chip in its windscreen, or a Morris having more play in its track-rod ends than a tester whose grandfather wasn't even born when the car was made can understand. The ludicrously expensive quasi-tax that is the present MoT test falls disproportionately heavily on owners of such cars.

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

Except that presupposes that new cars don't have "issues".

They do.

Tyres wear. Maintenance gets skipped.

Hell, my old man had an A-reg Cavalier which failed it's first MOT on rotten brake pipes - then it turned out they hadn't even been fitted properly from the factory...

I think it's a little unfair to call the MOT charge a tax.

Pretty much common on the Lada Samara on first MOT too.

In message , Adrian writes

Catalysts can die without anyone noticing until the first MOT. Bit of a bitch if the car has a 3-year warranty, and worth getting the emissions checked sooner on anything with a known risk of cat failure.

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember "NT" saying something like:

Nothing wrong with that.

Get a life.

Adrian mumbled incoherently to the rest of uk.rec.cars.maintenance:

True, but to be honest modern cars are fairly good for the first few years on most safety aspects. Tyres are something that arent even covered now with the 3 year first MOT so thats not changed.

Autolycus mumbled incoherently to the rest of uk.rec.cars.maintenance:

I see your point but I have seen some old cars (old beetles etc) that are absolute wrecks driving about throwing out plumes of smoke. I must admit the quantity of them is miniscule but then being hit by a rare car wont make you happier when youre in hospital lol.

"here lies Autolycus, lucky to have been hit by an old car" :)

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

Complete bollocks.

There's no difference between the first MOT and any other.

Adrian mumbled incoherently to the rest of uk.rec.cars.maintenance:

You misunderstood the point. You said that presupposes new cars dont have faults. My point was tyres are not checked up until the first MOT (i.e. up to the "3 year" first MOT). Not that the first MOT didnt have tyre checks. Hence I was just suggesting that some new car possible faults arent covered now either.