Brake discs and MOTs

DevonPaul

Junior Member
Messages
76
Something that might be of interest to the odd person on here, but the MOT regulations are changing on 20 May.

They will include stricter checks on... "Three other areas on cars that have the potential to cause serious accidents are also going to be scrutinised more closely than before. Testers will check steering systems – a steering box with a heavy leak will result in a MOT failure, as will reversing lights that don't work or have blown bulbs and brake discs that are “significantly or obviously wornâ€."
https://www.whatcar.com/news/mot-test-changes-in-2018/

Now a lot of this is in the opinion of the tester, and obviously nobody here would want to run around with a dangerous car, but if you had been waiting 18 months for a set of front discs then you might want to have a look when your MOT is due in case you needed a bit of breathing space.
 

philw696

Member
Messages
25,113
To be fair as a ex UK Tester its been a long time coming to get the Test up to a higher standard.
Advisories are a bit of a joke as the masses ignore them.
Cars should be in a top serviced condition in my opinion.
 

allandwf

Member
Messages
10,958
To be fair as a ex UK Tester its been a long time coming to get the Test up to a higher standard.
Advisories are a bit of a joke as the masses ignore them.
Cars should be in a top serviced condition in my opinion.

Agreed, or perhaps an advisory one year, and if not dealt with by the next one an automatic fail?
 

philw696

Member
Messages
25,113
Thing is a year is a long time and another 10,000 miles a lot of driving.
I think it should be pass or fail.
 

miket

Member
Messages
647
10,000 miles a year I should be so lucky! I don’t get enough spare time to rack up that sort of mileage in the Maserati....
 

Mott The Hoople

Junior Member
Messages
188
To be fair as a ex UK Tester its been a long time coming to get the Test up to a higher standard.
Advisories are a bit of a joke as the masses ignore them.
Cars should be in a top serviced condition in my opinion.

That's easy to say when you have money. Many people struggle financially to keep their car on the road only to have it fail an MOT on something not remotely relevant to safety.

Then there's the environmental considerations. It's often pointed out that engines are cleaner now than on older cars - whilst utterly ignoring the fact that 50% of the environmental damaged is caused whilst making the bleeding motor.

Let's please get back to an MOT being purely a safety check and nothing else.

Steve.
 

Trev Latter

Member
Messages
1,213
To be fair as a ex UK Tester its been a long time coming to get the Test up to a higher standard.
Advisories are a bit of a joke as the masses ignore them.
Cars should be in a top serviced condition in my opinion.

Whilst I wouldn't disagree cars should be kept in a top serviced condition, don't forget the MOT test is there to check for minimum standards which are often a world away from decent servicing standards.

I stopped testing back in 2006, having started back in the early 80s, so I completely accept that standards have moved on a bit from then, but I can honestly say hand on heart, that back then, if I'd had a vehicle that had just about made the standard on every item (with advisories on each) I wouldn't want to drive it! I think there have been huge steps forward in testing standards in more recent years; Annual assessments for examiners rather than every five years, QC checks being carried out by independent people rather than someone from within the station to name a couple which spring to mind. Although part of a main dealer which had a test station in the main workshop, I had the advantage of managing and running a second stand alone station (in a separate location) run remotely from the main unit, so it was easier to get the guys to apply the correct testing standards as defined by VOSA (as it was then) rather than the standards they'd apply when servicing the vehicle, which were often higher. We had a nice arrangement there where I'd QC the guys from the other station and vice versa as all of the examiners were nominated for both. We were also located about 200 yards from the local DVLA centre, so we got to know their guys pretty well as they'd often drop in for tea.

The point there really, is that DVSA as they are now, are making progress by improving the standards of their examiners and implementing better vehicle standards gradually. It's along slow process, but it'll get there in the end. My understanding of the test changes is that advisories are disappearing and that there will be major and minor fails, the minor fails replacing the advisories, but I'm not sure how that's going to translate into pass/fail criteria as yet.
 

DevonPaul

Junior Member
Messages
76
Whilst I wouldn't disagree cars should be kept in a top serviced condition, don't forget the MOT test is there to check for minimum standards which are often a world away from decent servicing standards.

Definitely, however sometimes you do wonder what they are considering.

The wife's BMW Z4M (340+ BHP) has had repeated 'worn front tyres' advisories since the MOT in December 2013 when the first warning was "Nearside and offside front tyres worn to approx,2.5 to 3.5mm." OK, she drives it gently, and sparingly, but that was 12,000 miles ago.

This year it will get a new set all round as they're all down to about 2mm, and are 6 years old.
 

Trev Latter

Member
Messages
1,213
Part of the problem is that the test manual is regarded as a bible and anything outside the clearcut pass/fail isn't catered for other than as an advisory. The official line from VOSA/DVSA to examiners is "pass and advise" to anything that isn't a clear fail in accordance with the criteria in the test manual.

@DevonPaul In the case highlighted above, the tyres are still within legal limits, so therefore a pass in the eye of the examiner. Bringing the conversation back to servicing standards and please don't take offence, but one could ask why you'd leave it another 12k miles before replacing worn and already five year old tyres on a 340bhp car (or any other for that matter)? It does kind of reinforce the point Phil made a few posts back.
 

DevonPaul

Junior Member
Messages
76
@DevonPaul In the case highlighted above, the tyres are still within legal limits, so therefore a pass in the eye of the examiner. Bringing the conversation back to servicing standards and please don't take offence, but one could ask why you'd leave it another 12k miles before replacing worn and already five year old tyres on a 340bhp car (or any other for that matter)? It does kind of reinforce the point Phil made a few posts back.

The tyres were only a year or so when first advised - they are now probably 7 now if I check the date code.
They are still 2mm all around, it generally goes out to the pub when it is a sunny Sunday, heck the Maser does more miles and that is supposed to be the Sunday car.

At the first advisory there was over 3mm tread on all the tyres, I couldn't find anywhere under 3mm, although the test place did offer to replace them all for about 50% more than Protyre would have charged.

I just went through the online history, and I wonder if they look at the old advisories and put them on again (or even be prompted to delete them) as there was one year the advisory didn't appear.
 

Corranga

Member
Messages
1,219
The tyres were only a year or so when first advised - they are now probably 7 now if I check the date code.
They are still 2mm all around, it generally goes out to the pub when it is a sunny Sunday, heck the Maser does more miles and that is supposed to be the Sunday car.

At the first advisory there was over 3mm tread on all the tyres, I couldn't find anywhere under 3mm, although the test place did offer to replace them all for about 50% more than Protyre would have charged.

I just went through the online history, and I wonder if they look at the old advisories and put them on again (or even be prompted to delete them) as there was one year the advisory didn't appear.

At 7 years old they are probably getting pretty hard. Keep them another couple of years and you never know, they might be so hard that they don't wear at all.
Of course, as they continue to harden up, they also provide less grip.

We bought an incredibly low miles Vauxhall VX220 which was still wearing original tyres. It felt fine until you pushed on, or it rained, or you had to stop quickly, then it became a death trap. A new set of rubber completely transformed the car. I appreciate the VX220 probably has a lot more driver feel than said BMW (and a lot less power for that matter). It wasn't even a brand thing as you could only get 1 brand / tyre that matched and fitted the front / rear wheel sizes. The fitter even called me to ask why I was replacing perfect tyres with the same, but new and I told him to check the date codes!

Another way to think about it, if i were looking to buy said car, and saw that the tyres haven't been replaced in that many years, despite the owner knowing, I'd wonder what else has been ignored, and walk away, and I'm probably more flexible than most on that sort of thing.