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 Dont quote me on this but.............

.I've just collected my car from the garage and been told by one of the mechanics there , that Towbars are now included in the MOT, however, if they are covered up when delivered to MOT station, the tester is not allowed to remove the cover to test it and it does not constitute a fail....... hmmmmmmmmm, interesting...........

Quote: Originally posted by Bill Terry on 21/5/2009

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This dosent start till the 1st of Oct, plus vosa will have the power to take lorry`s coaches CARAVANS of the rd from this date. At the moment they only have the power to snatch cars off the rd.

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Hi Bill

I don't know where October came from, the towbar test is in now, and VOSA can prohibit any vehicle from continuing a journey if it is overloaded or has a significant mechanical defect, caravans, cars even motorcycles included, and from 28th May will be issuing fixed penalty tickets and putting points on licences.

HTH

Cheers

Paul

Quote: Originally posted by sillylilly on 21/5/2009

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 Dont quote me on this but.............

.I've just collected my car from the garage and been told by one of the mechanics there , that Towbars are now included in the MOT, however, if they are covered up when delivered to MOT station, the tester is not allowed to remove the cover to test it and it does not constitute a fail....... hmmmmmmmmm, interesting...........

How exactly do you cover up a towbar? Most of what is checked is under the vehicle.

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Quote: Originally posted by sillylilly on 21/5/2009

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 Dont quote me on this but.............

.I've just collected my car from the garage and been told by one of the mechanics there , that Towbars are now included in the MOT, however, if they are covered up when delivered to MOT station, the tester is not allowed to remove the cover to test it and it does not constitute a fail....... hmmmmmmmmm, interesting...........

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Quote: Originally posted by sillylilly on 21/5/2009

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 Dont quote me on this but.............

.I've just collected my car from the garage and been told by one of the mechanics there , that Towbars are now included in the MOT, however, if they are covered up when delivered to MOT station, the tester is not allowed to remove the cover to test it and it does not constitute a fail....... hmmmmmmmmm, interesting...........

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So if you were to put a cover over the whole car....................???

Bertie.

This forum never fails to educate.  We were completely unaware of this new legislation and fortunately our tow bar is newly fitted and should be okay.  Whilst it is sensible to ensure that cars incorrectly fitted or with unsafe towbars are stopped from using the roads and that for the safety of all so should caravans  be checked if seemingly unsafe, it is another b****y European law that is forced onto us.

Carol

Howdy peeps, just nipped on to say......

Many thanks to the marvellous emailed newsletter thingy from our beloved UKCS because this was the first we'd heard of the new MOT bit regarding the checking of towbars. There certainly IS an article about it one of the Caravan club mags that we get every month, but to my shame.....neither of us had actually read it before we got our email newsletter from this site.....

Having now managed to plough through several back dated issues of our CC mag.....(8 w-h-o-l-e months to be precise when clearing out the magazine rack and realizing that we'd not even opened them! Shame on us, they're sooooo informative we REALLY should read them as they arrive), on a sunny afternoon sitting in the garden last week, I found the same information.

I asked my SIL if he was aware of this now being a part of the MOT as he was, (until earlier this year), a vehicle technician, (aka...mechanic), when he left his job to start his own business but he said that as he was no longer an MOT tester.....he hadn't a clue.

Thankfully, the towbar we're now using is on my motability vehicle, only one year old, so will not require an MOT until it's handed back in 2011 by which time we'll be changing it for another vehicle anyhoo but there's still the one on my hubby's old Vectra to be considered.....best he tries lugging me along with it to do a strength test as since my increase of vastly excess poundage, I reckon I might be a tough test for it.

Once again......a humnugous to dear, dear UKCS, where would be all be without ya!

I have just recently had cause to discuss my towbar breakaway cable with my service dept (car and towbar new "09").

The mechanic who assisted me is the MoT tester for the dealership.  He tells me that the towball has to be fitted and secure to the towbar or it will fail MoT, so covering it does not appear to be an option.  I did not go into details with him beyond that, so I assume that, apart from ensuring security, it is given a visual appraisal; not a full blown check for excessive wear, where a towball is deemed to be in need of replacement when any part of its spherical head falls below 49mm in diameter.

I did download (into a file) the EU regulations concerning towing. The document runs into more than 200 pages - phew!   So if the MoT gets too involved regarding towbars/towballs, I dread to think of how it would be dealt with at MoT tester level.

Bertie. 

I have just been looking at the towbar MoT test requirements on the VOSA website. As a retired development engineer, I can only say "what a shambles".

Method of Inspection:  Visually assess the towbar for wear and pull on the towbar and/or its mountings to check for security, corrosion fractures or damage.

(1) Pull how/with what?  If manually (by hand), this will not detect movement that may occur under accelerating and braking conditions with a trailer/caravan in tow.  (2) corrosion - Many towbar fixing points have their end mountings enclosed in the bow sections of the chassis, and are not visually accessible without some dismantling.  Also, corrosion often creates a tightening effect due to rust scaling, which then diintegrates when subjected to loads, and only then does insecurity show itself.

How will the wear be assessed?  Towbar components will be rejected if they become reduced by more than 25% of their original thickness.  That can take them below the strength designed into the as-new safety factors.

For towballs the amount of acceptable wear is considerably less, therefore a towball will be rejected if the visual assessment indicates that the towball is obviously excessively worn.  The recommended wear at which point a towball should be replaced, is when any part of the spherical surface drops below 49 mm diameter.  This can happen and the towball still be visually in a satisfactory condition, particularly where a towball is frequently cleaned to accommodate the friction pad type couplings.  Here, the only true way to check it is to use a micrometer.

Detachable towballs: They will be checked for security in their anchorage brackets, and will be allowed up to 3 mm play at the towball.  I find this scary. In engineering terms, this is like dropping a penny down a drain grating.  With such play, the repetitive sideways forces exerted by the caravan would constantly work on this amount of play so as to progressively worsen it.

I have a detachable towball.  My last one, after 4 years, had virtually imperceptable

shake; perhaps 2 to 3 thousndths of an inch max. at the ball.  My current one, only a few months old, has none.

It will be interesting to see how this MoT works in practice.

Bertie.