what car is that

 

71 Lamborghini Espada.

 

Do you mean 'knock off' style wheels with the multi-pronged spinners? They're still being manufactured for Corvettes and are 100% street legal irrespective of whether the car came with them or not.

Corvette Aluminum Wheel Set, Knock-Off Style, 1966 - Corvette Parts and Accessories

 

Lots of illegal stuff gets manufactured. It's just not enforced.

In this case the DOT stopped them from being imported and a switch was made to a hex style nut. But you can certainly buy reproductions of these today and put them on your car. It's very doubtful that any state DMV is going to to bother you. In the case of this particular model they stuck out quite a bit further than many other styles at that time hence the ban.

They could not be offered on any new vehicle today.

 

We can thank Ralph Nader for his meddling in this and many other car related subjects. I'm still amazed 40 years later how many people he had fooled with his 'save the world' tactics.

 

Fairs fair, Mikey. Can you imagine what sort of damage those would do to your legs if you were brushed by them while walking or riding a bike. That's why the original wire wheel 'knock ons' got replaced with a nut. Those things would wreck a Roman War Chariot!

Cheers,

Languid

 

Did that ever actually happen?

 

Why yes it it did! In every uber liberal safety ****'s minds eye.

There are all kinds of regulations now about vehicle height etc so as to less adversely impact pedestrians. Nerf cars are next!

 

Is that a necessary condition for issuing a ban? No. At least, I hope not.

We have laws about what's allowed to stick out from a car, couched in fairly general terms. At some point it's a judgment call as to whether a particular thing is allowed or not. If a cop says it's not, you could argue and even go to court, and you might win, but who'd want the hassle.... Anyway, it's back to the judgment call thing in many cases, but in others it's blindingly obvious to most people as to whether certain things are dangerous.

Of course, you can still fit the dangerous item, but if you hurt someone you can also expect to be paying for it, probably in money and a jail term. If you don't get as far as hurting someone but are pulled by the police and found guilty in court, it'll be similar. If it's not judged too seriously dangerous I guess you'd avoid jail. Maybe just have the car impounded / lose your driving licence. (You get a fine, too.)

Is the situation so different in USA/Canada?

 

Well this has now turned into a philosophical/political discussion more than anything else.

Over here we refer to it as the nanny-state syndrome. Pass a lot of laws and regulations trying to prevent theoretical harmful things from happening to people.

It strangles business and you can end up never leaving the comfy chair in your tv parlor out of pure fear. Life is sometimes risky and a rosy outcome can never be guaranteed.

If it's a demonstrable issue I don't have a problem. Cell phones are a good example. I think they do indeed cause problems but having police officers issuing tickets isn't the answer. Having an interface via bluetooth or wifi that makes them inoperable for the driver seems like a very real possibility in the near future. That would be fine with me.

The long eared spinners on my Espada do look pretty intimidating. The car is after all named for the sword used during the final kill of a bull fight. But the reality is that they don't even extend beyond the fender lines of the car. If any part of your body is close enough to those spinners while the car is moving to be hit by them I expect that the car's body will have already finished you off anyway.

 

Ironically, our beloved S-types sport bonnet leapers in North America whereas they are verboten in the UK.

Apparently the UK has out-nannied the colonies. Never thought I'd see that.

 

People moan that ours is a nanny state but usually are remarkably ignorant in that - for example - they won't know what is illegal and what isn't. I guess they like to moan and truth doesn't matter.

Not much is banned until (say) 3 years after it's blindingly obvious it should be. All the existing data showed mobile (cell) phones should be banned right from day one because similar things (taxi and police radios etc) were well known to cause accidents. Nothing was done. As more crashes occurred still nothing was done. Eventually drivers were banned from using handheld phones but handsfree was allowed, yet the data showed they were equally bad. Etc.

A lot less is banned than people say. But there are catch-alls such as the "C & U Regs" (Construction & Use Regulations) which as I said are in fairly general terms in some places.

 

Except... that's false.

It's a well-known falsehood. Well, known by some.

 

Why do so few S-types in the UK have leapers then? (Serious question)

 

Mikey, the leapers (and so many more things) are no longer allowed in the UK because they might increase the chance/severity of injury when striking a pedestrian. No joke.
Here in North America, it's generally frowned upon for pedestrians to step in front of moving vehicles, and for drivers to run down pedestrians and the like.

I'm not bashing the UK, but like most rules and regulations they seem end up going way way way beyond the threshold of diminishing returns.

 

+1

Except that it can take much longer than 3 years, and multiple highly publicised deaths.

Sometimes laws get passed because people and businesses just will not do the right thing on their own.

For example, laws finally got passed imposing absolute liability for runaway wheels flying off of transport trailers. There were already laws requiring inspection and maintenance, but of course wheels were still flying off trucks and killing people.

Keeping your wheels on the truck would seem to be a sensible thing to do. But, apparently too expensive and bothersome for owners and operators.

People do stupid things because they feel that they are exceptions to common sense. Talking and texting while driving. Or as seen on JF more than once ... wanting to defeat the DVD entertainment inhibit on the NAV system.

Well, the next time your precious Jag gets pranged ... consider whether they might have been on their cell phone, texting, or fiddling with their GPS.

 

It's actually quite a bit easier than that.

It can be done in software at the cell tower without additional cost or changing subscriber equipment. Simply disable call handoffs between cells and the calls get very short while in motion. That will work on every phone in service and cannot be defeated.

If the driver stops, the call can continue on the same tower for as long as desired. If a 911 call needs to be made, it will still work on whichever tower is closest. You just cannot maintain a call across multiple towers. The idea was sent to NHTSA by yours truly last year.

It used to be that people carried change in their cars and stopped to use a payphone. Worked just fine.

 

They ARE allowed. Please stop repeating this falsehood.

 

At least 2 reasons:
1. they get stolen / torn off, often causing nearby damage
2. they need to comply with the various car laws, which basically means making them spring-loaded (or similar) to reduce/avoid pedestrian injury

#1 is depressingly common
#2 is the most you have to do from what I've read, I'm not actually certain you have to do it or to what extent, but #1 means I won't be putting one on - I live in England which is very crowded so the car will almost always be at risk

Oh and no you can't electrify them to prevent #1 (pity)

High-end marques (Bentley, RR) tend to have motorised statuettes that retract to address #1; spring-loaded, too

 

Sounds like it might violate some other sort of law?

That also would prohibit any passenger from using their cell based devices.
That one is not likely to get implemented over here. People will have this stuff implanted in their brains pretty soon.

Have you seen how pedestrians are absolutely zombified by all of this stuff?

Personally, I think drivers should get negative points (a positive rating) assessed towards their drivers license id they hit a pedestrian who's completely distracted by their MP3, Ipad/Ipos etc. It's damn dangerous and a disturbing anti social trend in our culture.

The Borg are here!