MoT plan threatens tyre safety

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Source: Auto Express

The group fears defective rubber will be missed by owners who rely on the test to ensure their car is fit for the road. Experts predict tread depths could slip undetected below the 1.6mm minimum, leading to more accidents. Around 10 per cent of vehicles currently fail their MoT on worn or defective tyres.
 
What's an MoT?

If that is the same as a roadworthy certificate, then I'll agree to that. The amount of cars we get in at work which have unroadworthy tires is amazing
 
I can say it's true as my mum fell for it.

A few years back we had a blow out on the motorway, non-violent, but scary nonetheless. And it was because my mum never thought to check the tread because of the MOT.

Needless to say, I check it for her now.
 
The amount of people these days who are totally ignorant of the condition of their car is appaling. Most people don't bother to check the tyre pressures or tread. First time they have an emergency stop they wonder why their car is all over the road. If the government balanced the amount of money lobbied at the speed kills campaign with maintaining vehicle and basic road safety (especially for kids although that has happened a bit recently) it would surely result in better statistics for road accidents.

I heard they are thinking about making MOTs every 2 years, is that where this came from as I cannot find the info on Auto Express's website. Imaging how bad your car could get if you did nothing to maintain it for 2 years....
 
MoT, Roadworthy cert., Safety Inspection, pretty much all the same thing. Here in MD Its a fairly strict test that only happens when the car is registered under a new person. In VA its less strict but its every year like the MoT (correct?) Tires are usually a pretty big part of any SI in the US
 
It's claimed such an idea would reduce beuraucracy costs, but when you take into consideration important car safety elements such as tyres and brakes, you realise how stupid it is.

Of course, more inattentive owners will allow their tyre tread to go below 1.6mm, simply becase the law lets them until a copper stops them and notices the appauling condition of their tyres. And brakes are another item you don't really want to ignore, either.

An episode of Fifth Gear a year or so ago revealed that tyres at the legal level aren't much cop either, and that tyres are only really much good above 3mm.
 
But brakes are a different matter, especially as most brakes use the wear-pin mechanism so they get loud and screechy when they reach the minimum value.

It's not neccesarily the blow-outs you should worry about with worn tyres anyway, it's the aqua planing on standing water.
 
I changed my rear tyres while they were still quite legal purely because it was getting a bit twitchy in the wet.

I overheard a woman at work last year going on about her tyres, she knew at least one of them was really under-inflated but would sort it out in a few days or so..... She was off to pick her kids up after work.

It also explains why parents run accross the road dragging their kids behind them when there is a crossing nearby. Road safety for parents eh?

I'm having a right rant today.
 

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