Outer Limits 4x4 Board

my zuk is engineered SPOA on 31's etc.... so i wont face any issues when this comes in - HOWEVER - i strongly disagree with what theyre doing... if you're only allowed to go 50mm wider, but you're allowed 150mm taller providing you do a lane change test then theyre encouraging an unstable build... let alone the fact everyone just does the max 150mm lift on stock tyres here, gets it engineered then runs the biggest tyre they can squeeze under there anyway! Simple proof the logic is flawed in making these rules.

The logic is not flawed. If you get your car certified and then make changes, you are driving an illeagal vehicle. Wy even bother in the first place?

The only flawed comment is your reasoning.

Batty
4WD Action

melts wrote:

Batty wrote:

mkpatrol wrote:How do you know its going to "render" a large amount of vehicles illegel?

I could not see in there anywhere that thay (the states or whoever) are going to make these changes retrospective.

That is correct. It is unlikely the states will make the legisltation retrospective. Imagine how much it would cost them.

Batty
4WD Action

VSB's arent retrospective, in that you cant get fined for past use of these mods. however if you want to continue using the roads with your car moving forward from the date the standards come into effect you need to comply. So if the standards say you need to be engineered for your level of lift that you happened to have installed back when you didnt need engineering (this is an example, i havent looked at what you can and cant do now vs the changes yet) you will now need engineering to comply with the road rules / adrs.

worse if they have you recorded for some form of mod that has a requirements change before they can just get in touch and ask you to prove that you have done the work to comply it. if you fail you become the owner of a yellow stickered car.

The only thing that has any form of retrospective protection is a bone stock vehicle, which should have a plate saying it was built on a date to comply to a list of adr's. that car should only be assessed to that level. put on some mods and then suddenly your mods need to meet the current adrs.

its a joke and i bought a 4wd to get away from dealing with pits and licensing and engineers, and figured a 4wd would do that and let me enjoy my weekends, now reading this stuff its like owning an import all over again. at least so far i havent seen police grief 4wd owners like they do import owners.

ps. the rant above about how the laws will void retrospective blah blah blah are only for WA, i dont know any other states way of treating these problems, as I have only dealt with WA licensing, where they wore me down and I ended up de-registering an import because their process is arcane and for every step i pushed forward i was given another 2 steps to take as they moved the goal posts.

Melts, modifications that have been approved under previous schemes dont have to be re-approved once a new set of rules come in.

The technicality is that if the modifications were changed after the new rules were implemented or not approved previously then you have to comply with the later rules.

It is up to you to keep accurate records of your mods. Same applies if you make extra mods, then the vehicle may have to be re-certified.

Batty wrote:The logic is not flawed. If you get your car certified and then make changes, you are driving an illeagal vehicle. Wy even bother in the first place?

The only flawed comment is your reasoning.

Batty
4WD Action

If the overall goal is to have safer modified vehicles, then my logic is not flawed at all. If they allowed you to go wide as far as you went up people would be building more stable rigs which would pass lane change easier. If they allowed you to run the tyre you desired (with inspection of loads on joints/cvs/bearings etc of course) then there would be no need for people to make changes afterwards.

A lot of people "bother in the first place" because they know once its engineered they can get pulled over running larger tyres, fit stockers, go over the pits and chuck the big ones on again - ive seen it done. Sure, if they crash and kill a person or whatever the law will crack down on them and theyll be totally liable for driving an unsafe vehicle, but most dont worry about that do they? Most of the member on this forum are guilty of that! =)

I think the only retrospective changes that I know of that have come in have related to safety belts.

mkpatrol wrote:
Melts, modifications that have been approved under previous schemes dont have to be re-approved once a new set of rules come in.

The technicality is that if the modifications were changed after the new rules were implemented or not approved previously then you have to comply with the later rules.

It is up to you to keep accurate records of your mods. Same applies if you make extra mods, then the vehicle may have to be re-certified.

thats funny. it should be true, but its not. pits can ask you to change things if they believe its not up to scratch, including re-engineering anything you have previously done. and police can issue yellow stickers for anything, sending you to the pits where you get to find out what they dont like.

the key to this is that inspectors simply say, well an engineer would never of approved this, you must of changed it since it was previously signed off.

and to speed things up i have heard a rumor of changes in the WA system plan to give police the ability to judge the validity of engineering certs and 'tear them up' if they think you have done extra mods, forcing you to go back to square one and get everything re-engineered. For DIY and daily driven owners who cant have the car off the road for a week or two at a time this is a joke. anyone who says its impossible to give the police these powers must of slept through the hoon laws, judge jury and executioner there, loss of car for 7 days, loss of license for 3 months and $600 dollars in costs for;
a) testing or contesting your vehicles handling
b) testing or contesting your vehicles braking
c) testing or contesting your vehilces acceleration
d) emitting noise or smoke from any wheel of your car
e) racing another vehicle
f) driving in excess of 50kph over the posted speed limit
g) any i missed?

exactly why i de-rego'd my import. I still think i'm better off in my 4be, and i dont expect to get troubled for a bit of lift and nicer tires. but one thing it looks like i'll carry on from my lessons learnt driving a drift car is keep all the stock parts, since you'll be putting them in to pass the pits. once police can tear up a cert they arent worth the paper they are printed on - stock is the only sure way to get through the pits without extra expense then...

in that regard these changes seem moot. but it would be nice to think i could follow the right processes and be legal. I just doubt with the effort being put in my the police to punish drivers, coupled with the apparent dislike of 4wd's by some staff at tech section / inspection stations, that its not worth paying up to engineer when I can pick up a spanner and revert to stock to pass. that and i havent had police trouble in the 4be and none of my 4be converted friends have either, to us reasonably modded 4wd's seem like stealth craft compared to our old rides.

^^ you say they can tear up a engineers cert and say theres no way - if thats the case then you can take them to court and prove it was, all it takes is a phonecall to the engineer as your witness. I know one engineer who is dead against these new regs and fights very hard to get things through for the vehicle owner when he believes the rig is safe.

That and my engineers cert is a photocopy of the original, which is kept safely at home =)

yep i do
as i have been told these new powers are to stop people from adding mods illegally. so a police office pulls you over and then evaluates your paperwork vs the car and if they decide something is a-miss can invalidate all your paperwork.

now how many officers do you know have a tape measure to check the height of your car when you're pulled over?

so the officer decides you've been naughty and gives you one of these new defect notices. i cant imagine a circumstance where they will allow you time to 'remove the supposed illegal mods' so your paperwork has to be invalid else everyone would just remove their illegal mods like they do now and roll over the pits with only whats engineered.

to anyone who thinks that wont come in to applause of the general public, cast your mind back to the start of the millenium, would you of thought people would be happy cops can just take your car off you for braking too hard or chirping your wheels?

my bet is these new police powers will come in as another ammendment of the hoon laws, supposedly aimed at hoons that modify their cars illegally. but if you're right about police and pits hating 4wds then 4wds are the collateral damage.


first they came for the import street racers and i didnt speak up because i wasnt a ricer...

I doubt your informant has has his info correct.

The cert tells of all of the mods which are approved and now required as part of that vehicles registration. There are many mods that are not reversable.

If there is a discrepency in comparison to the info on the cert then he'll probably defect it until it is returned to the registered specification which includes the modifications which have been approved and are now required per the cert.

I also carry a photocopy of the engineers papers in the 4WD rather than the original, but they can tell if its an original by the watermark in the paper. If they still think that this is a modified copy then they can either check the roads authorities copy or contact the engineer to confirm.

If they rip it up then the stinky stuff is going to hit the fan and they know it and have better things to do than explain why they destroyed private property while on duty as a policeman to a court.

^^ my point exactly.

i dont doubt theyll bring in some sort of on the spot notice system, but only if they can prove beyond reasonable doubt on the spot its not running the right gear (like say, 33x12.5r15 stamped on the tyre when the engineers report says 31x10.5r15)... THEN and only then would the police have the grounds to yellow sticker you on the spot - and guess what - they already do that =)

im not talking about doctored certs, im talking about getting a mod approved then changing the mod, ie get 3 inches of lift approved then go 5 inches later, or, get approvals for mods a, b and c, and then you add mod d without approval and suddenly you have to recertify

hopefully that makes more sense as to explaining what they are targetting and the why should be obvious.

and spot notice system? the police can pull you over for any reason, and issue a defect notice for pretty much any reason. the changes here are pretty much saying, if you get yellowed, you will need to recertify all your mods. its essentially tearing up your certs but letting you find that out when you rock up to the pits.

ah, ok so what you're saying is why do you need to recertify if you proved it safe at a particular modification level... well, if its publicly known that this is the case it could deter people from re-modding after engineering... however i doubt it will have much effect, and being that the modifications and previous engineering pre dates the new rules they cant force you to re-engineer... thats like saying a house built earlier than X has to be demolished because it doesnt meet the latest building codes...

melts wrote:im not talking about doctored certs, im talking about getting a mod approved then changing the mod, ie get 3 inches of lift approved then go 5 inches later, or, get approvals for mods a, b and c, and then you add mod d without approval and suddenly you have to recertify

Well what do you expect?????

Changing the mod after the approval process invalidates the certificate completely.

How can you expect an engineer to have that particular mod covered in his public liability insurance cover after a change has been made after the fact?

The police officer/rego inspector is bound by law then to have the vehicle re-certified & if that means that there are new regs in place at that time then the vehicle has to be certified to those new regs. That is the way its always been.

If the thing has not been changed at all & you can prove it then you will have no issues other than the hassle of doing an inspection after a defect has been given.

We used to honour old approvals all the time, if a vehicle had been out of rego or the paperwork had been lost then we would find it & check. If it was all the same then the vehicles could be re registered.

I used to cop this all the time when I was working at the local RTA inspection station here:

"Mate it has been passed by the engineer, its on the certificate."

I look at the certificate & the mods only resemble half of whats on the certificate.

I say "Sorry mate X,Y,Z is not on here, you will have to get it re engineered".

"Gees your a c*&t".

I say "Well I'm not the one that changed it after the engineering certificate was issued"

my point is only that the police officer can say it doesnt match up, not wait to you get to the pits to be properly inspected and told.

its more of a problem with police saying that a pod filter for example is a mod and so you have to re-cert your engine, brakes and rollcage mods because the officer said so (thinking my other car here), even if you passed the pits with the pod filter on (and lo and behold it doesnt need a permit over here)

i imagine it works the same with lift, 'why thats more than 90mm and this cert says 90mm so what have you done' and on goes a yellow. thats my problem with it, letting cops inspect mods. also makes me wonder if you happen to be silly enough to really use up your tires and you get yellowed for baldies does that also invalidate your certs, wouldnt suprise me if it does.

melts wrote:my point is only that the police officer can say it doesnt match up, not wait to you get to the pits to be properly inspected and told.

its more of a problem with police saying that a pod filter for example is a mod and so you have to re-cert your engine, brakes and rollcage mods because the officer said so (thinking my other car here), even if you passed the pits with the pod filter on (and lo and behold it doesnt need a permit over here)

i imagine it works the same with lift, 'why thats more than 90mm and this cert says 90mm so what have you done' and on goes a yellow. thats my problem with it, letting cops inspect mods. also makes me wonder if you happen to be silly enough to really use up your tires and you get yellowed for baldies does that also invalidate your certs, wouldnt suprise me if it does.

What everybody who modifies vehicles need to realise is that the police dont know the full ins & outs of the registration system, they are basically taught by the Rego guys the basic stuff like bald tyres, loud exahaust, blown lamps & such.

Once they find this sort of a defect & the vehicle is modified then they will send it for a full inspection to ensure everything is ok. The Rego Authorities will not just pass somethig because a copper said so (we didnt anyway).

Things like bald tyres, loud exhausts & such are a separate issue to your Engineering certificate, they are just basic roadworthy issues that every vehicle has to comply to.

But you hit the nail on the head, once you modify, make sure you keep the easy stuff right & you will attract less attention. A blown headlight bulb will get you an inspection for sure.

In WA where VSB14 is being tested.
If you want a 3 inch lift,33 inch tyres on your GQ AND want Approval or Engineers Certification you must 1st apply in writing to our DPI(traffic/transport department) Who have Stated"we hate 4wd's and we will make you jump through as many hoops as possible"
The DPI then in writing respond with a raft of things/hoops you must jump through, this is if you are lucky.More often than not they don't respond or take months to do so,in fact 6 months in some cases.I know of people who have had their application rejected because they or their Engineer has used 2 different colour pens hard to believe but true.

As for the Police they simply put stickers on 4wd's over here "because your 4wd looks too high"I am not talking early model rough looking 4wd's I know of many 2006 onwards neat tidy 4wd's that have been stickered and yes once in the system boy does our DPI make the owners life hell.

VSB14 is a joke reputable Shops and Individuals have been modifying 4wd vehicles Commercially and Privately for years with NO realistic risk to the Safety of other Road users.In fact I have conducted numerous stability tests and Lane Change Tests.How many Tests contributed to VSB14 well I have asked for this Info approx a dozen times and recieved NO availble test data at all.The Fact is VSB14 has been written with more of The Authors opinion rather than any Scientific or Factual data to back it up.

VSB14 is simply enpowers those who have little or no understanding of why we Desire or in some persons cases require the ability to modify our 4wd vehicles,as stated above in WA our DPI has demonstrated and stated it does not like 4wd vehicles, so how on earth can these people be trusted with making a decision on whether you can modify your 4wd.

WA is the test state if successful, Eastern States based 4wders can expect the same hoops.