300bhp/ton
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Air suspension legality issue
- Thread starter Christoff45
- Start date
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discool
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You can be sure that is correct
It applys when you export\import and reregister within the EU irespective of age of vehicle...
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Absolutely!
You try importing a kit car into the EU!
Best of luck to you unless you can bribe someone!
On import, as far as I know, they check the vehicle conforms with the CoC and if it has been modified it will be rejected. Modifying cars in the EU is much, much harder, if not impossible. For instance, even if you want to chnage the wheels in Germany, the wheels have to be TUV approved.
In France you are not allowed to amke any changes to your engine to allow it to generate more power and other modifications are really reduced. People do do it, and seem to get away with it, but it is very likely to be illegal and if caught they could get into trouble.
People in this country often do not realise how lucky they are in that modifications are allowed to be made and they can still get insurance for them.
300bhp/ton
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Op is in the UK, so not a problem.
Op is in the UK, so not a problem.
Im well aware of that and was replying to another member re CoC not applicable after vehicle leaves factory as @Stanleysteamer says in the UK you dont realise how lucky you are...as for insurance it differs here in Portugal as it is the car thats insured and not the driver also the mot is not done at the local garage you take it to one of only 9 testing stations in the Algarve if you live in that region and they dont do repairs...
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Let's sum this all up by simply saying that once you buy a car in this country, at the moment, you can take it abroad, to the EU at least and reigster it, with no problems, other maybe than changing the headlights to ones that dip the other way. (Although I have heard of peeps getting away without doing this and in more modern cars that come with a means of changing the positions of the lights, this will not be necessary.)
In the UK, as soon as the car is driven out of the factory, you can modify it and this is governed by the gov as is to be seen here
https://www.gov.uk/change-vehicle-details-registration-certificate
and for radically altered vehicles here
https://www.gov.uk/vehicle-registration/radically-altered-vehicles
Obviously there is little you cannot do that would not be sanctioned by the government as long as it is notified and passes any test the govt decides it needs to.
Once that is done you go hunting for insurance.
So you can alter the springing on your car no problem, and there is no difference really between removing air springs and replacing with ordinary springs, and replacing your normal coils with heavy dutys.
We are so lucky over here.
In the UK, as soon as the car is driven out of the factory, you can modify it and this is governed by the gov as is to be seen here
https://www.gov.uk/change-vehicle-details-registration-certificate
and for radically altered vehicles here
https://www.gov.uk/vehicle-registration/radically-altered-vehicles
Obviously there is little you cannot do that would not be sanctioned by the government as long as it is notified and passes any test the govt decides it needs to.
Once that is done you go hunting for insurance.
So you can alter the springing on your car no problem, and there is no difference really between removing air springs and replacing with ordinary springs, and replacing your normal coils with heavy dutys.
We are so lucky over here.
Depending on vehicle you may need to change reversing and rear fog as well...we recently dismantled a Fiat Barchetta's headlights and re-glued the dip deflectors from rhd to lhd...
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True!
Can be fun playing with the dipping devices. You did well to get it all apart wivout breaking stuff!
We had a Jersey reg car that Barry bought as a spare for his (no chance to matriculate here) so practised on that before sorting the customers..so there was 3 silver Barchettas in the garage at the same time...if rules were different here the engine out of the spare would be in my Seicento!!...
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Do they have the same rule in Portugal as in France, namely that you cannot register a car that is not a model previously exported to the country by the manufacturer? Weirdly some totally normal cars that have been previously on sale in say the US or Japan, cannot be imported and registered in France, under this rule. @Avocet1 knows more about all this than I do.
Yes a Jap import on UK plates you cant matriculate...the reason the Barchetta couldnt be reg was Jersey plates so the vat would be due then import tax...I got a CoC for my 1975 101 FC from the main dealer here still got a wrangle with the customs at the moment will get there eventually!! I hope its only been 18 months so not that long the way things work in the Portugese civil service...lol
Broadly, the situation is the same across all EU Member states, but there are vast differences with how the rules are enforced.
As has been mentioned, it is illegal to register a passenger car, brand new, in any EU Member State, without some form of approval. For mass-produced cars, that's an EC "type" approval, and for niche vehicles it can be some other lower level of type approval or even an "individual" vehicle approval. The CoC that has been mentioned in other posts, is the certificate that declares compliance with a "type" approval. Individually approved vehicles have a different form of certificate.
However, once registered, the responsibility for compliance passes from the manufacturer to the owner. This is the crucial bit. the point of first registration in an EU Member State, is the critical point at which the manufacturer is no longer responsible for it meeting the rules. This is only reasonable, as the owner could drive it straight out of the showroom to the Halfords round the corner and put different wheels on it, a roof box, a different radio.... etc.
In the UK, at the point of first registration, the type approval regulations cease to apply, and the vehicle is then governed by the Construction & Use regs and the Road Vehicle Lighting Regs instead. These allow more flexibility than the type approval regs, but not MUCH more. What happens is that they are very poorly policed. The same is true in most EU Member States. They will all have their own versions of C&U and the Lighting Regs. As has been said, in France and Germany, these are quite strictly policed, but in the UK they're not. This gives the impression that some mods are legal here, when in fact they're not, it's just that nobody polices them with any enthusiasm.
Insurance companies are something different to add to the mix. They permit some modifications and not others. People think these are legal requirements (and sometimes they are) but often they're not, it's just the insurance company taking the commercial decision as to whether it is willing to still bear the risk (which is why some insurance companies will let you do something and others won't).
Getting back to the OP, I'm not aware of any UK regulation that says 7 seaters need to have air suspension. (I hope not 'cause I have a 7 seater company car and it's on steel springs)! I'm also pretty certain there won't be a law that says "Landrover Discoveries with 7 seats need to have air suspension". Laws aren't generally written like that, with specific provisions for specific models. Fitting air suspension would, without doubt, invalidate the type approval of a vehicle that was fitted with steel springs (and vice versa). If Landrover type approved with both, there will be no problem swapping, but realistically, Landrover are unlikely to let you look through their type approvals!
Given that the car is (presumably) already registered, we can forget about invalidating type approvals anyway, and we need to start looking at whether there's anything in Construction & Use or the Lighting Regs that prevents it. Again, there won't be anything in any of those regs that specifically says you can't. Instead, the regs will say something like: "Braking systems shall conform to UN ECE Regulation 13H" (or something like that). Reg 13H will then contain requirements that say something like "the ABS / ESC (or whatever) system shall meet the following requirements:" and it will go on to specify a number of tests. So, for example, the ABS system will need to act in sch a way that the vehicle remains stable under a variety of different load conditions and on a variety of different road surfaces when the driver brakes hard and provokes an ABS intervention. The manufacturer will carry out those tests as part of his type approval and they will be witnessed by a government agency. The spec of the tested vehicle will be documented and a stamped-up copy kept by both the manufacturer and the government agency.
So the minute you change anything on the car that alters the specification from what was type approved, you lose your proof that it meets the requirements of ECE Reg 13H which, in turn, means you can no longer provide proof that it meets the C&U requirements. It MIGHT still do so, but you have no proof. At this point, your vehicle would be illegal. This is (one of) the reasons why the Germans are so strict on aftermarket wheels and tyres. The manufacturer will have optimised the ABS pulses to work in harmony with the natural inertia of whatever wheels and tyres the vehicle was type approved with. Change the inertia of the wheel and tyre assembly, and you might (in an extreme case) get something with a natural frequency completely out-of-phase with the ABS pump pulses.
As mentioned, nobody here polices the C&U regs with any great enthusiasm, so you're pretty much free to alter what you like (subject to your insurance company agreeing to it). If the vehicle is then involved in an accident serious enough to warranty and accident investigation, AND the accident investigator is switched-on enough to spot the modification, the legal onus to prove compliance with C&U rests with whoever made the modifications. If you can't prove compliance, you'll be prosecuted (and your insurer will run away claiming that the vehicle had been modified from what he thought he was taking the risk on, so he might not pay out).
ronsealdeath
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And a partridge in a pear tree
Si Click
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Top post Mr Avocet1.
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Thanks for taking the time to post all this. Very edifying. A classic!
Christoff45
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Thanks guys, still not crystal clear, so I'll just mention it to my insurance company when I re-insure. Ta.
300bhp/ton
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It's perfectly clear.
When car builders build new cars, the cars have to confirm to Type Approval. For one off or very small scale production or sometimes when you import a vehicle. They can go through an IVA (Individual Vehicle Approval).
For use on the road, the vehicle must confirm to Construction & Use Regulations. These are different to Type Approval, although in general the Approval will check for this compliance.
If you modified a vehicle the Government have a two sets of rules for either:
-Radically altered Vehicles
-Rebuilt Vehicles
These rules will tell you if you need to get an IVA for re-approval. If you don't and it still complies with Construction & Use Regs, then you should be fine.
Changing the air spring to a coil would not require an IVA. So you are (IMO) fine
It's perfectly clear.
When car builders build new cars, the cars have to confirm to Type Approval. For one off or very small scale production or sometimes when you import a vehicle. They can go through an IVA (Individual Vehicle Approval).
For use on the road, the vehicle must confirm to Construction & Use Regulations. These are different to Type Approval, although in general the Approval will check for this compliance.
If you modified a vehicle the Government have a two sets of rules for either:
-Radically altered Vehicles
-Rebuilt Vehicles
These rules will tell you if you need to get an IVA for re-approval. If you don't and it still complies with Construction & Use Regs, then you should be fine.
Changing the air spring to a coil would not require an IVA. So you are (IMO) fine
The only thing I'd urge caution on, is that the Rebuilt and Radically altered "rules" are actually DVLA guidelines, rather than law. They're not very good, to be honest - and hopelessly out of date. There's a link here:
https://www.gov.uk/vehicle-registration/radically-altered-vehicles
but DVLA are really only concerned with the identity of the vehicle. I've had this out with them plenty of times over the years, but they're a pretty non-technical bunch (and I think that quite suits most of us!) so there's little to be gained from pushing this. The link above, takes you to another link called "road vehicle regulations" which, in turn, takes you to the Construction & Use regs (but laughably, the 1986 original regs, rather than how they are today). I think there have been about 200 amendments since then, so that version is worse than useless!
If you're going to modify a car, download the IVA Inspection manual for M1 vehicles:
https://assets.publishing.service.g...oval-inspection-manual-passenger-vehicles.pdf
and work to those. Again, they are NOT "law" but if you work to those, you'll at least be in with half a chance of satisfying the C&U and the Lighting regs!
