mx5,s plates

[Max Wilby]

Sorry to hear about your soft top being attacked. I am from Christchurch and a
member of the club here, and have not heard of
anyone having had the same problem down here. The Christmas before last I was
holidaying around the north island, and spent
a couple of nights in Auckland one of them having my roof cut and a few things
broken or removed completely, but three times,
thats real bad luck. Maybe move south we need need more people down here.
RE PLATES I think MX5,S look great with computercut numbers on the front
instead of plates,but it seems the powers that be
dont agree. A few other people I have spoken to regarding this and myself have
been issued $200 .00 tickets for not displaying
a front number plate. I was wondering if this has happened to anyone in the
northern part of the country. If so perhaps if enough
people were interested the club as a whole may consider approaching the
appropriate department of the government and see if
this could be arranged. Interested to hear any comments on this subject.
Max

[zorruno]

I have had a fine of $200 for no front plate - it was displayed in the front
window on the dash at the time. I got off when I wrote and queried which
section of which act this fine applied to. I also refitted the plate and
sent photos. We had a persistant cop though, he had warned us twice and
lived near by. Well, I say he was a cop... he was actually ex traffic...

I have now had smaller similar looking plates made by a signwriting friend -
see here
http://www.mx5club.org.nz/members/fox/plates/
No hassles yet with this.

free plug for him... Mark Wallath, Signs Unlimited, 33 Boston Rd Mt Eden,
Ph/Fax 09 358 2100
He has made a computer cut letters for plates, and stick on replica number
plates are usually about $25-30
He also recently made some www.mx5club.org.nz stickers, and I'm going to get
more done.

Cheers
H.

[zorruno]

Are you saying that if we swap our normal metal number plate with
a painted on copy we are risking a $200 fine? If the details are the
same and the number plate is big enough to read what could the
issues be? This seems crazy!

definitely. Issues are
1. speed camera reflectivity
2. counterfeiting - you could have one plate on two cars, or a made up
plate. The MOT only EVER issues two of the same plate, unless you can
document that one was lost or damaged.
3. what size is big enough to read? from what distance? does your '1' look
like an 'I'? etc
4. one letter could fall off a plate made from vinyl stick ons - therefore
wrong plate - someone else could be blamed for an incident

There are a number of issues that are not defined well in any of the acts
(or I can't find) such as - angle to the road, covering with clear material,
mounting position on car. It is pretty much up to the officers discretion
at the time, so will normally depend on whether the cop has a sensible
enough attitude to explain the above issues, or give you a ticket because he
is having a bad day.

If it ever came to court however, I suspect that you would lose if you
didn't 'at least' have the MOT supplied, unmodified number plate mounted
somehow front and rear. I don't intend to test this theory however.

There are people in the club that have no front plate - and been stopped
many times without getting a ticket. If you live near or come across the
same officer twice however, expect them to be less lenient the second time.
It can also help to be female, older, have a nice MX5 (not 10mm from the
ground with 18" wheels and a 4" exhaust), live away from main citys, etc
etc...

H.

[darryl]

RE Plates, I must say there has always been one question I have wanted to
ask the powers, is, if Motor cycles only have to have a rear plate, why
can't cars get away with just one plate???
Afterall, it would be far easier to escape a situation (accident, robbery
etc) on a bike than in a car.
I once had my front plate mounted on a hinge on my RX-7 and it would
disappear once you were doing about 30km/h. I didn't know this until I got
pulled up in whangamata for no front plate (I had just put a different front
bumper on it the day before, and it didn't have mounting points for the
plate) and all I could find to attach it was fishing line. I then went back
down the road and go pulled over again. Didn't get a ticket as when the cop
looked again the plate was there. It was quite funny as it was when he said
he thought I hadn't put the plate back on I realised what was happening.
Then about a week later my plate fell off so I mounted it on hinges.
My brother in law got done for having stickers on the front of his MX-5
instead of the plate a couple of times. it didn't help that he was far from
your quiet driver friendly to police type.

Darryl Curran
Bitch'n Performance
bitchn.7@xtra.co.nz
0064 7 889 1613 home/work
0064 21 250 5083 mobile

[Deanna Bell]

From: "Max Wilby" <max@inet.net.nz>
To: <mx5list@mx5club.org.nz>
Subject: mx5,s plates
Date sent: Tue, 19 Jun 2001 22:24:22 +1200
Send reply to: MX5List<mx5list@mx5club.org.nz>

Are you saying that if we swap our normal metal number plate with
a painted on copy we are risking a $200 fine? If the details are the
same and the number plate is big enough to read what could the
issues be? This seems crazy!
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