My eldest lad has a V reg VW with all the typical boy racer stuff… body kit, alloys, smoked lights, tints, etc.
He’s now decided to have a straight through exhaust fitted (the present one isn’t loud enough ) which involves removing the standard fit Cat.
Someone has told him to keep the Cat & refit it at MOT time then remove it again!!
I’ve had a look at the law & basically if the engine can pass the emissions test without a Cat fitted then that’s OK but, the test is so stringent that this is very unlikely… the only way to meet the requirements is through a converter.
So, to the question
If he was stopped by the dibble do they have the facility to do a roadside emission test?
If so & the car fails (very likely) what is the penalty?
Obviously he would have a valid MOT but the car would not be roadworthy so would that invalidate the MOT?
I’m hoping that someone on here might have some idea
My apologies for the long & probably confusing post
If the Vehicle is new enough to require a Cat Converter then it needs one all the time, also there will be legislation on the noise the of the vehicle. As far as I know replacment pipes on motorbikes have to carry a kite mark to show they confirm with BS and I’m sure car pipes will have to comply with boss BS and C&U regs.
Finally a loud pipe in a blinged up car will attract the attention of the Plod,
I know it/'s common practice among the boy racer fraternity. Plod can send the car for a test but he gets time to re-fit the cat first. If there are any stop and check facilities they must be rare.
ok as a ex boy racer (who am i kidding) has your lad tryed an k&n airfilter kit it will make a nice roar or pipercross do them as well ps they are ok by the plod and the mot won’t be a problem
lug84:
ok as a ex boy racer (who am i kidding) has your lad tryed an k&n airfilter kit it will make a nice roar or pipercross do them as well ps they are ok by the plod and the mot won’t be a problem
he’s got it bad just wait till he get its it i a mag like fast car or redline
me i got the bug young but atm i’m driving a 4x4 don’t know how that happend
i’d like to get a 350Z to play about with when i have thw money
yes if you can get the car thru the emmisions without the cat it is ok but make sure you get an exhaust that complies with the sound levels (or mr plod will get to know him on first name terms) we take the cat off the rally cars some pass mot (sort of special tyes if not) and some need the ecu remappin!!! tho takeing the cat off shouldnt make to much difference to a 1.1 punto thing!!! think i would put a slightly bigger exhaust on k&n air filter and a fast road cam get the ecu remaped so it resembles the emissions!!! just to point out my brother has an evo 6 with the cat removed and that passes the emissions!!
Now this is where you tell us it’s a 1.0 or something haha. You can get a cat replacement pipe that looks like a cat, but is just a straight pipe then if you get stopped and they look it look like you got a cat. Then all you do is swap it over at mot time. Has he told his insurance company about all the mods? Even the K&N will need to be declared. Remember if there are Lambda sensors then you may make the engine management light come on if they both say the same reading or if the only one there says a reading that’s outside the allowed range. Personally unless there’s a really big engine under that bonnet then what’s the point? Sure it’ll be a wee bit quicker I suppose but if it’s anything less than a 1.6 then he’s still gonna get creamed with everything out there. I love it when boy racers who don’t have a clue about Volvo think their car is amazing compared to mine and try and show off. Little do they know I have a T5 with 250 bhp muahaha
muckles:
If the Vehicle is new enough to require a Cat Converter then it needs one all the time, also there will be legislation on the noise the of the vehicle. As far as I know replacment pipes on motorbikes have to carry a kite mark to show they confirm with BS and I’m sure car pipes will have to comply with boss BS and C&U regs.
Finally a loud pipe in a blinged up car will attract the attention of the Plod,
With motorbikes for MOT have to have an end can stamped BS to pass in majority of garages.
Common though espec on sportsbikes people will then replace the end can with something else. A lot of the times you buy a sportsbike, have an aftermarket end can on it and the owner also will give you the orginal end can for a MOT.
Its not always to do with having a loud exhast, replacing the orginal end can, can be expensive espec the new bikes and they tend not to be designed for a British winter and salty roads.Espec the new end can, can be £500 to replace, so a lot of people replace them with a £100-£150 end can which maybe gives better air flow, cheaper to replace it, keep orginal for MOT’s. Even if its not BS stamped doesent have to be extremly loud.
Police attitude, suppose depends on the area and most importantly depends how loud it is. If its not extremly loud prob wouldnt bother at all. At worst prob have to go replace the can with orginal and show it to a MOT test station.
The De-Cat pipes are usually about £20 off Ebay, suppose kinda handy as well since Cats are quite expensive, certainly not £20. Heard a lot of people in tuned cars replace the cats, even those boy racers in the Jam sandwich ones replace the Cats, well according to a local garage who makes custom made stainless steel exhasts, he has made de-cat pipes for the traffic cops.
and as its a modification ur insurance may be invaled and dont think they wont try and get out of paying as they will.
As for plod sending you to have things checked and having time to change the pipes etc over dont believe it the guy round here did that but plod had writen what was fitted on the ticket and took pics of it cause he got peed off with kids changing it.before retesting
I would tell your boy to tread carefuly things are getting tight all round now
It’s a 1.6 Polo & he’s informed the insurance company of the body mods/K&N & they weren’t interested They only wanted to know if (or more likely when) he added anything performance enhancing.
He’s now looking at having the ecu remapped!!!
He’s even bought (around £250) a DVD player with slide out screen to replace the CD player he already had… I don’t think I’m charging him enough board!!!
It’s a 1.6 Polo & he’s informed the insurance company of the body mods/K&N & they weren’t interested
Thats surprising. my insurance company got a bit shirty and wanted to up the premium a bit when I declared side steps and wind deflectors on my disco.
Evidently it makes it more attractive to thieves!!!
Melchett:
He’s now decided to have a straight through exhaust fitted (the present one isn’t loud enough )
Right then, he’s had it fitted! Sounds great at 5.30 sunday morning when he goes to work We’ve already had serious “words” about the startup ritual… Starts car followed by several short blips on the throttle, then a longer blast & finally away, using as many revs a possible
I’ve told him if he can’t be sensible then he can park the mutated tangerine somewhere else… went down well
Melchett:
It’s a 1.6 Polo & he’s informed the insurance company of the body mods/K&N & they weren’t interested They only wanted to know if (or more likely when) he added anything performance enhancing.
He’s now looking at having the ecu remapped!!!
He’s even bought (around £250) a DVD player with slide out screen to replace the CD player he already had… I don’t think I’m charging him enough board!!!
wtf,my car insurance went up on the same car i had been driving for a year because i had went from driving vans to driving hgvscar was still the same, no mods nothing just more miles, how the hell can he add all that stupid worthless mince to his car and the insurance company dont care. whos he insured by?
gogzy:
wtf,my car insurance went up on the same car i had been driving for a year because i had went from driving vans to driving hgvscar was still the same
You want to check out other insurance companies, when I changed insurance companies a couple of years ago my car insurance dropped significantly, when I mentioned it to the insurance broker I was told it was probably because that particular insurance company took into consideration my job as an HGV driver.
I can’t see why being an HGV driver should increase your car insurance costs
gogzy:
wtf,my car insurance went up on the same car i had been driving for a year because i had went from driving vans to driving hgvscar was still the same, no mods nothing just more miles, how the hell can he add all that stupid worthless mince to his car and the insurance company dont care. whos he insured by?
He’s with More Than insurance & I’m as surprised as you are!
gogzy:
wtf,my car insurance went up on the same car i had been driving for a year because i had went from driving vans to driving hgvscar was still the same
You want to check out other insurance companies, when I changed insurance companies a couple of years ago my car insurance dropped significantly, when I mentioned it to the insurance broker I was told it was probably because that particular insurance company took into consideration my job as an HGV driver.
I can’t see why being an HGV driver should increase your car insurance costs
its my age aswell im only 22,still int hat age bracket of im an idiotic driver and will cause more crashes than anyone ont he road now ive only had one crash cause by me and it wasnt even a bad crash, 5mph into the back of acar that i thought had moved away froma junction but had stopped half way out onto it.worse still it was round the corner from my house. still the lady wouldnt move off the motorway slip road cause she thought i would do a runner even though i told her where i lived and even gave her my phone number, she even wanted to phone the police.
Melchett:
gogzy:
wtf,my car insurance went up on the same car i had been driving for a year because i had went from driving vans to driving hgvscar was still the same, no mods nothing just more miles, how the hell can he add all that stupid worthless mince to his car and the insurance company dont care. whos he insured by?
He’s with More Than insurance & I’m as surprised as you are!
id watch if he an accident tbh, they might turn round say he never had declared these things.
im with direct line mainly to get the no claims shizzle, no insurance companyw ill insure me on my saab in my name right now though in april im taking the insurance in my name, im paying something like 380 a year or something, when i first got the car it was 500 then it went up to 550, got it down now cause of how long ive had it
) which involves removing the standard fit Cat.
has your lad tryed an k&n airfilter kit it will make a nice roar or pipercross do them as well ps they are ok by the plod and the mot won’t be a problem 
We’ve already had serious “words” about the startup ritual… Starts car followed by several short blips on the throttle, then a longer blast & finally away, using as many revs a possible 
