Need Help From UK Riders
Advanced
Joined: Mar 2009
Posts: 80
Likes: 0
From: West Midlands, UK
Dropped in on the MOT station today.
The answer was not as clear cut as I would have liked, but the opinion seems to be that it would be a fail with your current set up. The turn signals need to be orange. The book of rules states that for post 1965 motorcycle should display a red light to the rear, white to the front and turn signals should be orange. The ambiguous book does not however state that failing to do so is considered a fail for the MOT. Figure that out if you can. He said that he had had to fail a mustang that had red turn signals, though he had never had to deal with it for a bike. He did say that to get it through the MOT you could remove or mask all the lights and say that there are no lights fitted, and he can then give a pass for daylight use only. But that sounds a bit daft to me.
The more I chatted with him the more it seems the whole MOT test is a farce - there are just too many grey areas that are left to the discretion of the test centre. Take loud pipes as an example - the pipes can be failed if they sound louder than stock pipes on that age and type of motorcycle. This is a totally subjective judgement and there are no measurements taken or decibel limits set! The test centre could lose its licence if he is caught passing a bike that in the opinion of a government inspector is too loud. If your pipes are stamped with 'not for road use' or 'race use only' that is an automatic fail, but if you grind off or otherwise hide that stamp, that is not a fail! So find a deaf partially blind MOT inspector that you don't particularly like and your laughing.
Welcome to the UK!
The answer was not as clear cut as I would have liked, but the opinion seems to be that it would be a fail with your current set up. The turn signals need to be orange. The book of rules states that for post 1965 motorcycle should display a red light to the rear, white to the front and turn signals should be orange. The ambiguous book does not however state that failing to do so is considered a fail for the MOT. Figure that out if you can. He said that he had had to fail a mustang that had red turn signals, though he had never had to deal with it for a bike. He did say that to get it through the MOT you could remove or mask all the lights and say that there are no lights fitted, and he can then give a pass for daylight use only. But that sounds a bit daft to me.
The more I chatted with him the more it seems the whole MOT test is a farce - there are just too many grey areas that are left to the discretion of the test centre. Take loud pipes as an example - the pipes can be failed if they sound louder than stock pipes on that age and type of motorcycle. This is a totally subjective judgement and there are no measurements taken or decibel limits set! The test centre could lose its licence if he is caught passing a bike that in the opinion of a government inspector is too loud. If your pipes are stamped with 'not for road use' or 'race use only' that is an automatic fail, but if you grind off or otherwise hide that stamp, that is not a fail! So find a deaf partially blind MOT inspector that you don't particularly like and your laughing.
Welcome to the UK!
Thread
Thread Starter
Forum
Replies
Last Post
