Biennial MOT tests

It's like that in the US and a lot of cars driving around are just not roadworthy.

Many people don't take their car for a service. The MOT protects the people around them.
 
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It happens everywhere, owning a car is a large responsibility which to be honest a lot people ignore and do very little other than fill up
 
JonRGV250 said:
It must be half the cars I MOT have the service light on.
Some people can barely afford the MOT fee, let alone the repairs or a service.
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Someone with whom I frequently lunch owns a Bentley and he says that when he goes to get it serviced the car park is full of cars (Bentleys & similar) for which the garage is awaiting payment for repairs or servicing. People really do forget to budget for the maintenance costs.
 
I've moved on from regular garage work to working with mostly classics and prestige cars. I still have my MOT license but I very rarely test these days. I honestly don't miss it one bit. The vast majority of people treat their cars about the same as they do their washing machine, they give it no attention or care, just use it. Then when it goes wrong it's a massive inconvenience that is someone else's problem that needs to be sorted that day no matter what. Or when it fails the MOT, they look at you in disgust. Not our fault that you can't keep up with simple servicing and preventative maintenance. Perhaps sorting out the previous years advisories throughout the course of the year would have avoided a massive failure that's going to cost a lot of money all in one lump.

I understand money is tight for a lot of people, but people quickly forget that they are responsible for keeping their car safe and maintained.

Like I say, I honestly don't miss it at all. I work mostly now with people who love their cars and are actually excited to sink 5 figures of money into their pride and joy. Plus for me, I'm rarely under any pressure to get a job finished. It's more about taking the time to do the job properly.
 
A couple of pics from today's testing..

How this hasn't blown out yet is a complete mystery..

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and a perfectly acceptable repair to a seat belt..

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and yes, somone had attempted to sew that patch thing onto the belt for whatever reason that I'm still unable to fathom out.
 
andy_mk3 said:
I've moved on from regular garage work to working with mostly classics and prestige cars. I still have my MOT license but I very rarely test these days. I honestly don't miss it one bit. The vast majority of people treat their cars about the same as they do their washing machine, they give it no attention or care, just use it. Then when it goes wrong it's a massive inconvenience that is someone else's problem that needs to be sorted that day no matter what. Or when it fails the MOT, they look at you in disgust. Not our fault that you can't keep up with simple servicing and preventative maintenance. Perhaps sorting out the previous years advisories throughout the course of the year would have avoided a massive failure that's going to cost a lot of money all in one lump.

I understand money is tight for a lot of people, but people quickly forget that they are responsible for keeping their car safe and maintained.

Like I say, I honestly don't miss it at all. I work mostly now with people who love their cars and are actually excited to sink 5 figures of money into their pride and joy. Plus for me, I'm rarely under any pressure to get a job finished. It's more about taking the time to do the job properly.
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Yeah but you can get an MOT done and receive half a dozen advisories, do nothing, then go back 12 months later and 3 of those advisories have vanished.
 
JonRGV250 said:
Yes, both were "dangerous" failures.
The Range Rover with the bulged tyre is still with us until a new tyre arrives, the seatbelt failure was driven away.
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Sort of related to the seatbelt I had a conversation with someone at work a couple of days ago in relation to covering stuff up for an MOT and the tester "not allowed" to remove stuff, etc. to check - said to them if it comes to it the tester can just refuse to test it if they suspect something is dangerous :s they seem convinced they can just slap some tape over a dangerous fail and the tester has to pass it...
 
General rule is that if we need tools to remove something, then we can’t.
But, on the other hand we’re not allowed to remove wheel trims or brake fluid reservoir caps.
The customer has to make sure their vehicle is in a presentable state to be tested, and I would say to them that if duct tape was covering a seat belt then the vehicle isn’t in a presentable condition for me to inspect correctly, and if they refuse to remove it, then I’d refuse to continue the test and cancel it (the same goes with sat navs/dash cams, loads of junk on the seats etc etc).
 
JonRGV250 said:
General rule is that if we need tools to remove something, then we can’t.
But, on the other hand we’re not allowed to remove wheel trims or brake fluid reservoir caps.
The customer has to make sure their vehicle is in a presentable state to be tested, and I would say to them that if duct tape was covering a seat belt then the vehicle isn’t in a presentable condition for me to inspect correctly, and if they refuse to remove it, then I’d refuse to continue the test and cancel it (the same goes with sat navs/dash cams, loads of junk on the seats etc etc).
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Why would a dash cam mean that it's not in a state to be tested?

Thankfully the garage I use is OK with the car seat being in. I remove it if I can but if the next stop after nursery drop of is the garage then it's staying in and I'll take the note saying they couldn't test the belt, if they even bother to record that.
 
lordrobs said:
Why would a dash cam mean that it's not in a state to be tested?

Thankfully the garage I use is OK with the car seat being in. I remove it if I can but if the next stop after nursery drop of is the garage then it's staying in and I'll take the note saying they couldn't test the belt, if they even bother to record that.
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We're allowed to remove dash-cams/navs etc as long as we inform the person presenting the vehicle, but in some cases it's not practicable.
And by that I mean when theres wires coming down from the head lining, A pillars and all over the dash board, all of which I don't want to unplug or remove due to damage that I may cause, or the presenter may claim that I've damaged.
If I ask for them to remove such items and they decline to, I can either refuse to test or fail the vehicle for..

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I think it's is fair to say that a person may accept that it's reasonable to fail their vehicle for having damage to their windscreen that affects the view from it, but for some reason some think it's ok to have a large nav screen plonked on right in their view of the road but that isn't an issue.

All MOT stations are ok with child seats in, but we're not allowed to remove them to fully check the seat belt, but we must inspect the belt as best we can with the seat in place and then advise..

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JonRGV250 said:
We're allowed to remove dash-cams/navs etc as long as we inform the person presenting the vehicle, but in some cases it's not practicable.
And by that I mean when theres wires coming down from the head lining, A pillars and all over the dash board, all of which I don't want to unplug or remove due to damage that I may cause, or the presenter may claim that I've damaged.
If I ask for them to remove such items and they decline to, I can either refuse to test or fail the vehicle for..

OcJ5Pz4.png


I think it's is fair to say that a person may accept that it's reasonable to fail their vehicle for having damage to their windscreen that affects the view from it, but for some reason some think it's ok to have a large nav screen plonked on right in their view of the road but that isn't an issue.

All MOT stations are ok with child seats in, but we're not allowed to remove them to fully check the seat belt, but we must inspect the belt as best we can with the seat in place and then advise..

aWAy2Tx.png
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Ah OK. I've never removed a dashcam when getting my cars MOT. I always fit them so they aren't visible from the drivers seat though, tucking them behind the rear view mirror on the passenger side which I guess is the difference here.
 
What amazes me is people driving around with their phones stuck to their windscreen right in front of their faces. Like literally right in front, they almost have to look around it to see in front of them. Always women, every single time.

How these people manage to tie their shoelaces every day without hanging themselves is beyond me.
 
lordrobs said:
Ah OK. I've never removed a dashcam when getting my cars MOT. I always fit them so they aren't visible from the drivers seat though, tucking them behind the rear view mirror on the passenger side which I guess is the difference here.
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I've never removed or been asked to remove my dashcam. However like yours it's tucked behind the rear-view mirror and the cabling goes directly into the mirror stem cover and into the headlining so there's no hanging cable.

Diddums said:
What amazes me is people driving around with their phones stuck to their windscreen right in front of their faces. Like literally right in front, they almost have to look around it to see in front of them. Always women, every single time.

How these people manage to tie their shoelaces every day without hanging themselves is beyond me.
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Whilst at work I have seen this many times, two that stick out was a taxi that had both the company PDA and his mobile phone in clip-on phone holders attached to the dash binnacle and the other was a woman with what appeared to be an ipad mini (7" tablet) mounted on the top of the dash, directly in her line of sight.

Both were reported to the local plod but as of now never heard anything back.
 
Resident said:
Whilst at work I have seen this many times, two that stick out was a taxi that had both the company PDA and his mobile phone in clip-on phone holders attached to the dash binnacle and the other was a woman with what appeared to be an ipad mini (7" tablet) mounted on the top of the dash, directly in her line of sight.
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My other favourite is people driving around with their wing mirrors in.

It just beggars belief, the fact that they've not even noticed that they're folded in just tells me that they're so oblivious to their surroundings that the mirrors aren't even required. I reckon you could restrict half of our drivers' field of vision to 15deg and they wouldn't even notice.
 
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