New NCT items

racso1975

http://www.ncts.ie/NewInspectionItems.aspx

Would have thought that the fog and reversing lights would have been tested already.

anyhow thought it might help those who have cars booked in for begining of april

Yakuza

Mmm, judging by the pic, if your car isn't a yellow Citroen Xantia, your car might fail too

Atomic Pineapple

looks like mostly filler to add to the two main new ones of tints and exhaust noise.

Saab Ed

Whe the NCT was launcehed back in the 90's they said that the test would get more severe as the quality of the roads improved. It seems nobody from the NCT head office has been off a main road in ages cause if they did all you'd need to pass the test is just turn up, such is the poor state of the nations roads at the moment.

jimmycrackcorm

I tested a car last week and a fail point was the abs indicator light not working - how is that possible if these checks are not due until April 1st?

seamus

Yep, looks like filler to put in the exhaust and windscreen items, though they haven't exactly gone overboard on the exhaust noise, a more appropriate limit would be 90Db at 1 metre. If your car is louder than that, there's something wrong.

The rear numberplate one is already there - I got a visual fail a few years back because my numberplate lamp was gone...

zilog_jones

jimmycrackcorm wrote: »

I tested a car last week and a fail point was the abs indicator light not working - how is that possible if these checks are not due until April 1st?

ABS light was already part of the test, I don't know why they mentioned it there.

Lex Luthor

So I take it they have light meters to test the windows? You need a different meter aswell to test windsreens than the other windows as you need to test the light across the glass and not into the car

ART6

Saab Ed wrote: »

Whe the NCT was launcehed back in the 90's they said that the test would get more severe as the quality of the roads improved. It seems nobody from the NCT head office has been off a main road in ages cause if they did all you'd need to pass the test is just turn up, such is the poor state of the nations roads at the moment.

Years ago now I was chief tester in an MoT station in the UK. Every year without fail the tests became more severe, approaching the point where we couldn't pass a brand new car (we tried it as an experiment, and it failed). This will happen here as the Greens mount their hobby horse to get rid of all cars (except of course ministerial limos and bikes). The state of the roads has nothing to do with it as they are in the control of the public sector (or what we laughingly call a government), whereas private and commercial vehicles are not. Therefore, a vehicle damaged by disintergrating roads is the fault of the owner for not paying attention, not the LA or the NRA. You petrol heads are a dying breed that will be legislated into extiction, leaving the roads open for Gormless and his bike;)

JohnWhale

I've already noticed a reduction in the amount of children driving souped up cars, presumably due to this "current climate" and if this helps to stamp out the boy racer culture completely then I'm all for it!

racso1975

well lets just paint everybody who modifies a car with the same brush!

shoegirl

seamus wrote: »

Yep, looks like filler to put in the exhaust and windscreen items, though they haven't exactly gone overboard on the exhaust noise, a more appropriate limit would be 90Db at 1 metre. If your car is louder than that, there's something wrong.

Is the tinted windows and exhaust noise requirements not just a good sharp jab at boy racers who are quite likely to have modifications that increase noise and window tints?

shoegirl

JohnWhale wrote: »

I've already noticed a reduction in the amount of children driving souped up cars, presumably due to this "current climate" and if this helps to stamp out the boy racer culture completely then I'm all for it!

There is a marked move back towards the old days when motoring was a serious investment, not to be taken lightly. If I am not wrong, my first car ate about 40% of my monthly after tax wage, between the loan for it, insurance, tax, servicing and petrol. The cost of running a car in terms of servicing and petrol hasn't dropped much (I just had a part replaced, which cost an eye watering 3 times the list price in the UK) and insurance is climbing in a lot of areas again. That will put them off the road faster than any NCT.

rb25

JohnWhale wrote: »

I've already noticed a reduction in the amount of children driving souped up cars, presumably due to this "current climate" and if this helps to stamp out the boy racer culture completely then I'm all for it!

There are decent people who have "souped up" cars who are safe road users. You cannot tar all with the same brush.

As far as I understand the NCT, it was originally brought in to weed out the mechanically unsafe cars from our roads. This is a good thing.

It could of course be seen as just another form of a biased tax. i.e. it only applies to those with cars older than a certain age.

W.Shakes-Beer

JohnWhale wrote: »

I've already noticed a reduction in the amount of children driving souped up cars, presumably due to this "current climate" and if this helps to stamp out the boy racer culture completely then I'm all for it!

:rolleyes:

seamus

shoegirl wrote: »

Is the tinted windows and exhaust noise requirements not just a good sharp jab at boy racers who are quite likely to have modifications that increase noise and window tints?

Pretty much. Excessively loud exhausts are a public nuisance, and boy racers are most guilty of this. If this results in a lot of modified cars being put off the road or having sensible exhausts fitted, great.

Tinted windows reduce the amount of light entering the vehicle and will make it more dangerous to drive, particularly in low light conditions, so this test is basically making sure that people aren't taking the piss with their tints.

znv6i3h7kqf9ys

Just passed the NCT this morning with a 1994 Car with a loud exhaust and got a cert for 2 years. What's shocking is I don't think it would pass if I brought it in 2 weeks.

blastman

Anyone listening to the Last Word last night? According to the RSA's own stats, faulty cars are responsible for 0.7% of fatal accidents. Pedestrians are responsible for 18%. You get one point for driving the wrong way down a one way street, but you can get five for having no NCT. Still think it's not a money-making racket?

furtzy

blastman wrote: »

Anyone listening to the Last Word last night? According to the RSA's own stats, faulty cars are responsible for 0.7% of fatal accidents. Pedestrians are responsible for 18%. You get one point for driving the wrong way down a one way street, but you can get five for having no NCT. Still think it's not a money-making racket?

Surely thats because there are less faulty cars due to the NCT.

znv6i3h7kqf9ys

furtzy wrote: »

Surely thats because there are less faulty cars due to the NCT.

No there were lower fatalities before the nct was even introduced

JHMEG

No point in bringing in the exhaust regs unless the gardaí are also going to enforce them. It's easy enough to stick on a "quiet" exhaust for the test, and go back to the "performace" exhaust afterwards.

seamus

Mechanical failure has always been a very small contributor to road accidents, but in order to bring us up to scratch with the rest of the EU, we were obliged to introduce a roadworthiness test.

The thing about it is that if the car "goes", but is faulty, the driver will compensate. So if your car pulls to the left more than it should, you will compensate. That compensate diverts some of your attention away from other areas, so when you have an accident because you weren't watching your right wing mirror, you can't blame the unroadworthiness of the vehicle, but at the same time the accident may not have occured if you weren't spending some of your effort compensating for the faulty vehicle.

Or to take a more obvious example - your tyres are half bald. Most drivers can compensate for this by changing the way that they drive. But one rainy day, you take a corner too fast, lose grip and hit a wall. Officially the crash is a result of driver error - you were driving too fast for the conditions. But had your tyres not been bald, the accident may not have occured.

No there were lower fatalities before the nct was even introduced

That's just completely incorrect. Fatalities have been dropping fairly consistently compared to the number of cars on the road since 2000. I think what you mean to say is that the NCT doesn't appear to have had any measurable effect on the number of fatalities, which is arguably true.

JHMEG

furtzy wrote: »

Surely thats because there are less faulty cars due to the NCT.

That Anton Savage lad is starting to annoy me - he gets so many things wrong. He implied a car with an traction control maulfunction light illuminated was just as safe as a car that had no traction control at all. He didn't seem to understand that when the light is illuminated it is possible that other related systems, such as ABS, might be disabled.

Dempo1

Yes came across this new extended list on an advertisement in the papers over the weekend. I noticed the point about ABS light not coming on or showing fault, i believed this was already a requirement?

I have an annoying engine warning light (the orange engine symbol light) that comes on and off. Having an extensive service, including putting the car onto a computer at main dealer, they could not locate fault. It has no baring on performance and mechanically the car is excellent. We believe there may have been a short when a new battery was installed and bizarrely the light goes off when i fill the petrol tank? Anyway, i passed the test last year but i am concerned this light showing up may affect this years test? (Long story, but my car was in storage for two years, its an 04 with only 36k miles on the clock)

furtzy

Emilia Scrawny Newspaper wrote: »

No there were lower fatalities before the nct was even introduced

From the figures I found this is not the case. NCT introduced in 2000 when there was 415 fatalities. Figure from 2007 was 337 and it was lower than 415 in each intervening year. Probably doesn't prove anything but what percentage of fatal accidents prior to the NCT were attributed to faulty cars

Jip

Dempo1 wrote: »

I have an annoying engine warning light (the orange engine symbol light) that comes on and off.

That's not covered as part of the new items, I too have the same and my car also passed last year with it with the light on at the time.

Dempo1

Jip wrote: »

That's not covered as part of the new items, I too have the same and my car also passed last year with it with the light on at the time.

Hi Jip, thanks for that! Its bizarre and the initial service cost me over a thousand euro including a new catalytic converter (think i was screwed here) and after all that the orange light keeps showing, spoke to a friend recently and he said to try and remove all the fuses one by one and this may solve the problem? just annoying!

Jip

Mine turned out to be a short with an O2 sensor, seems to be on more often than not these days. Like yours mine is not an issue in the running of the car, the only issue it may have caused was high emissions so rather than replace it the dealer just said put it through the NCT, if it fails we know why, if not there's no need to replace it.

You get used to it being there and when it's off it feels like there's something missing from the dash

Dempo1

Jip wrote: »

Mine turned out to be a short with an O2 sensor, seems to be on more often than not these days. Like yours mine is not an issue in the running of the car, the only issue it may have caused was high emissions so rather than replace it the dealer just said put it through the NCT, if it fails we know why, if not there's no need to replace it.

You get used to it being there and when it's off it feels like there's something missing from the dash

LOL:) yes i see your point but i got screwed on the catalytic convertor, cost almost €600 and made no difference re the light. The car only has 36k miles on the clock, aaa well will just have to grin and bare it although the car did pass last years NCT!

woody33

And an airbag light on makes a car unroadworthy because...?

Jip

because maybe the airbag is not working or malfunctioning.

znv6i3h7kqf9ys

This loud exhaust requirment is a joke. Don't get me wrong I think that there is nothing worse than a nissan micra with an exhaust the size of the port tunnel fitted but what about performance cars. I passed the NCT this morning with a 1994 M3 with a stainless steel exhaust. The car is loud but no louder than a wrx or evo. Certainly not louder than a Ferrari. What are those guys going to do?

Anan1

Emilia Scrawny Newspaper wrote: »

This loud exhaust requirment is a joke. Don't get me wrong I think that there is nothing worse than a nissan micra with an exhaust the size of the port tunnel fitted but what about performance cars. I passed the NCT this morning with a 1994 M3 with a stainless steel exhaust. The car is loud but no louder than a wrx or evo. Certainly not louder than a Ferrari. What are those guys going to do?

A car can be fast without being loud. Would any/many road-legal cars fail the test straight out of the factory?

Dempo1

Jip wrote: »

because maybe the airbag is not working or malfunctioning.

LOL:) But i guess its a safety issue for drivers and passengers??

seamus

Emilia Scrawny Newspaper wrote: »

what about performance cars.

Louder exhaust does not equal more performance. A car can still be a performance car without deafening everyone within earshot.

There doesn't seem to be any indication on the rule itself in terms of how it will be measured.

The loudness of sound is proportional to your distance from it. Yes, that's obvious, but from a testing POV it's important - from how far away are they going to test?
In addition, the revs matter. Any car at 6000 rpm would easily output more than 99Db at 1 metre, but at idling revs or even 3k revs shouldn't be anything close to that.

A Ferrari idling wouldn't come close to 99Db at 1m, so there's no reason why someone who's hacked a POS to bits can't achieve the same control.

znv6i3h7kqf9ys

Anan1 wrote: »

A car can be fast without being loud. Would any/many road-legal cars fail the test straight out of the factory?

Ferrari's are pretty loud.

Jip

Dempo1 wrote: »

LOL:) But i guess its a safety issue for drivers and passengers??

Not unless it activated while the car was been driven causing the driver to loose control and crash into a bunch of school kids out collecting money for the local homeless shelter

znv6i3h7kqf9ys

Here's how loud for comparison

* Near total silence - 0 dB
* A whisper - 15 dB
* Normal conversation - 60 dB
* A lawnmower - 90 dB
* A car horn - 110 dB
* A rock concert or a jet engine - 120 dB
* A gunshot or firecracker - 140 dB

I guess you need to have a normal conversation beside a lawnmower and your car before you bring it for a test

Anan1

Emilia Scrawny Newspaper wrote: »

Ferrari's are pretty loud.

That doesn't answer my question.;) As seamus said, it doesn't seem as though we have enough information to form an opinion on this one.

Atomic Pineapple

From the consultation that they ran it seems they will be following the EU regulations on how to test exhaust noise.

Which is 3000rpm at 3 metres and a certain angle.

Any stock ferrari will be under 99db no problem in those conditions

blackbox

JHMEG wrote: »

That Anton Savage lad is starting to annoy me - he gets so many things wrong. He implied a car with an traction control maulfunction light illuminated was just as safe as a car that had no traction control at all. He didn't seem to understand that when the light is illuminated it is possible that other related systems, such as ABS, might be disabled.

He's starting to annoy me too, but mainly because he failed to make his point because he was totally rubbishing the NCT when it has definitely improved the standard of cars on the road - does nobody remember the total junkers that you used to see with a headlamp (not just the bulb!) and wing missing etc. and "crabbing" along the road. Getting the brakes and tracking checked sometimes is also a great idea.

I personally think that only items that are mandatory should be failed - for example ABS on cars after the date it was brought in. On an older car where it was an optional extra it makes no sense to fail it when a car of the same age without the ABS option will pass. Same goes for airbags. How many instances have there been of them going off without impact when there was a warning light showing.

Previously Anton had an unjustified rant against driving with dipped beams in daylight.

dceire

I've my NCT on 12 April & was just flicking through this nct manual.

It says on pg 21 that Wipers are tested. My front wiper motor hasn't exactly been working correctly for over a year now. The 2nd & 3rd settings work fine but while the 1st setting operates the wipers, they dont exactly stop where they are supposed to. They just seem to stop wherever & whenever they feel like it. I've been able to live with it as I use the 2nd setting & turn it off when they reach the bottom of the screen.

I've the car insured until August & am leaving the country then so I really don't want to splash out the €200 needed for a new motor. Would they fail the car on this? I didn't think they even checked the wipers.

I'm guessing Reasons for Failure #4 would fail me here

slimjimmc

JHMEG wrote: »

That Anton Savage lad is starting to annoy me - he gets so many things wrong. He implied a car with an traction control maulfunction light illuminated was just as safe as a car that had no traction control at all. He didn't seem to understand that when the light is illuminated it is possible that other related systems, such as ABS, might be disabled.

Yeah, his blatant inaccuracies and condescending tone got my blood boiling, and that takes a lot.

He also went on a rant about how the new specs mean he will have to fit new tyres at considerable expense, which are rated for his car's top speed even though he could never legally drive at that speed. If he bothered to actually read the NCT manual he would have seen that tyres only have to be suitable for maximum legal speed limit (120kph).

SV

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=moEKOyw43_A

should give you guys an idea on the db rating
99 seems fair enough

aero2k

Dempo1 wrote: »

I have an annoying engine warning light (the orange engine symbol light) that comes on and off. Having an extensive service, including putting the car onto a computer at main dealer, they could not locate fault. It has no baring on performance and mechanically the car is excellent. We believe there may have been a short when a new battery was installed and bizarrely the light goes off when i fill the petrol tank? (Long story, but my car was in storage for two years, its an 04 with only 36k miles on the clock)

It could be the filler cap. The cap is an essential part of the emissions control system. I don't know how it works, but I know a lot of handbooks specify tightening the filler cap until it clicks 3 times, or something like that. I think most cars will show a warning light if you leave the filler cap off. Maybe try a new cap?

Atomic Pineapple

more info on it in the new nct handbook



seems to be at a 45 degree angle 0.5 metres away even at that while idle and not under load a car really shouldn't have an exhaust that's over 99db.

It also seems the test will only take place if the tester decides the exhaust is excessively noisy

JimmyO

Jip wrote: »

because maybe the airbag is not working or malfunctioning.

What about the same make and model of car but with no air bags fitted when it was bought?

Is that car not roadworthy?

Bif

Folks,
The wife's 00 corolla is due for NCT Sat. week. The yellow engine management light is on all the time (car seems fine but have not had it on diagnostics yet). Will it fail the NCT on this? Thanks.

JimmyO

Bif wrote: »

Folks,
The wife's 00 corolla is due for NCT Sat. week. The yellow engine management light is on all the time (car seems fine but have not had it on diagnostics yet). Will it fail the NCT on this? Thanks.

Not until 1st April. 5 days later it would!

Jip

JimmyO wrote: »

What about the same make and model of car but with no air bags fitted when it was bought?

It's hardly going to malfunction and risk blowing up as you drive then is it. A malfunction in an airbag does not necessarily mean it won't go off in a crash, it could go off on it's own or going up a kerb etc.

JimmyO wrote: »

Not until 1st April. 5 days later it would!

It won't, it's not one of the new items. It may fail due to whatever is casing the light to come on, not because that light is on.

Atomic Pineapple

JimmyO wrote: »

Not until 1st April. 5 days later it would!

Actually it will fail, thats already part of the test