Strange reg plate?

vincenzolorenzo

I was driving on the M50 last night between the N4 and N7 junctions and there was a guy in front of me driving a Vauxhall Astra with a very odd reg - ST WW ***. The plate had the IRL stamp on it, couldn't see if there was a county name written on it. Threw it into mywheels.ie and came back as invalid reg. Has anyone ever come across this before? Is there some special reg I haven't heard about or was this just plain illegal???

andyseadog

could it have been a foreign reg that coincidentally had 'WW' in the middle and an EU marking rather than an IRL badge on the left?

vincenzolorenzo

Thought that at first but drove up a bit closer and it definitely had IRL stamped under the EU flag like all other Irish reg plates. Not sure on reg plate rules, would have thought it should have the country its registered in stamped on the plate. Like if i was in Germany and had to get a replacement plate I would still have to have IRL on my plate rather than D??

colm_mcm

If it's a Vauxhall then there's not many countries it could be from. maybe one of the Channel Islands.

Nissan doctor

I've seen several foreign reg't cars with IRL plates on them, maybe try to draw less attention from the law?

ninty9er

If it was printed here there aren't too many places that would stock non IRL plates.

waxon-waxoff

Probably somebody who got the uk reg printed on an irish plate so it looks like an irish car at first glance. Probably saving up for the vrt.

The lads in donegal have been printing irish regs on yellow plates for years

colm_mcm

have a gander at these

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_car_number_plates#Crown_dependencies

the_syco

vincenzolorenzo wrote: »

I was driving on the M50 last night between the N4 and N7 junctions and there was a guy in front of me driving a Vauxhall Astra with a very odd reg - ST WW ***. The plate had the IRL stamp on it, couldn't see if there was a county name written on it. Threw it into mywheels.ie and came back as invalid reg. Has anyone ever come across this before? Is there some special reg I haven't heard about or was this just plain illegal???

Yes, have across this before. white plate on front, yellow on back, number doesn't exist on cartell.ie The format was something like "02 D 123456".

Berty

It could also be somebody from Northern Ireland who believes they are in fact Irish and uses IRL on their number plate to prove a point.

Sids Not

vincenzolorenzo wrote: »

I was driving on the M50 last night between the N4 and N7 junctions and there was a guy in front of me driving a Vauxhall Astra with a very odd reg - ST WW ***. The plate had the IRL stamp on it, couldn't see if there was a county name written on it. Threw it into mywheels.ie and came back as invalid reg. Has anyone ever come across this before? Is there some special reg I haven't heard about or was this just plain illegal???

Stick in..01 ww *** or 07 ww *** and see what comes up...

The clever (deliberate) location of the mounting screws can throw off a speed /toll camera...;)

Richard

Beer Baron wrote: »

It could also be somebody from Northern Ireland who believes they are in fact Irish and uses IRL on their number plate to prove a point.

"ST WW" wouldn't be a valid NI (or GB) registration.

Oh, and as for the channel islands, Jersey plates are J followed by a number, and Guernsey ones are just a number.

sean1141

trade plate??

Magic Beans

It could even be German. ST - Steinfurt, North-Rhine-Westphalia.
Maybe he just replaced a lost or damaged plate using a standard Irish plate.

Our man in Havana

Magic Beans wrote: »

It could even be German. ST - Steinfurt, North-Rhine-Westphalia.
Maybe he just replaced a lost or damaged plate using a standard Irish plate.

Serious insurance implications if he did that.

subway

im thinking 97 or even 07 wouldnt be that hard to turn into ST with a few well placed screws.

Gophur

Our man in Havana wrote: »

Serious insurance implications if he did that.

What are these "implications"?

Can you give one example of a previous case where such "implications" were highlighted?

BronsonTB

Fine is 1500 for illegal number plates but I've yet to see somone getting the full fine in court.....But I'd imagine that day is getting closer with the more frequent custom/gaurds checkpoints over the summer months. only a matter fo time before they see the revenue that can be got esp with so many german style plates around.

Blazer

BronsonTB wrote: »

Fine is 1500 for illegal number plates but I've yet to see somone getting the full fine in court.....But I'd imagine that day is getting closer with the more frequent custom/gaurds checkpoints over the summer months. only a matter fo time before they see the revenue that can be got esp with so many german style plates around.

they're completely legal
As long as 1. IRL at the EU side, 2) County on top and 3 )the numbers are a particular height then they're grand.
No laws against the font for the number plates in Ireland.

mgbgt1978

Looks very like a german number.
Some scumbag probably stole the original plate to stick on his bedroom wall and the owner had to have a new plate made in Ireland.

Our man in Havana

Gophur wrote: »

What are these "implications"?

Can you give one example of a previous case where such "implications" were highlighted?

German numberplates are issued by the insurance companies in Germany. As such any copy made here would be invalid. Also there would be no Stadt/emissions/test seals on the plate.

mgbgt1978

Jebus the polizei get around;). Surely having any number plate is better then none at all.
TBH I am more interested in the fact that the OP said it was a Vauxhall rather than an Opel.

The only plates issued by insurance companies in Germany are called Versicherungskennzeichen, and are for mopeds and very,very low-powered cars (max 50kph).

rubberdecky

If this was a green Astra estate am pretty sure I saw the same one. Was followed by one of these into Cherrywood iirc. Didnt look too hard at the reg (as it was behind me) but assumed it was German

BronsonTB

Sc@recrow wrote: »

they're completely legal
As long as 1. IRL at the EU side, 2) County on top and 3 )the numbers are a particular height then they're grand.
No laws against the font for the number plates in Ireland.

http://www.irishstatutebook.ie/1999/en/si/0432.html

Point 14 does restrict the kind of font you can use.

14. The identification mark shall appear in black characters and each letter or figure shall have a height of 70 millimetres and a stroke width of 10 millimetres. The total width of the space taken by each letter or figure (other than the letter “I” or the number “I”) shall be not less than 36 millimetres and not more than 50 millimetres. The distances between adjoining letters and adjoining figures shall be uniform and shall be not less than 8 millimetres.

Back on topic...Without a pic of the reg from the OP we cannot tell if it meets the legal requirements or not.

vincenzolorenzo

Unfortunately I didn't have a camera with me at the time but it definitely said ST WW ***, the same format/letter size/spacing as a valid Irish plate. And I tried putting the reg into mywheels.ie, replacing the ST with numbers but nothing comes up. Its just something that I was very curious about when I saw it!

subway

Cmon, what's the reg?

vincenzolorenzo

Can I post the actual number or is that against forum rules??

Our man in Havana

Post away.

inforfun

Drivers position should be making it easy to see whether it was German or not.

vincenzolorenzo

ST WW 290. Vauxhall astra, this body type:


It was dark so couldn't see colour exactly but I'd say it was a dark green colour. Nice set of black alloys. Quick too, couldn't keep up with it to look for more details