car tax and heritage body shells

G

gosnell

New Member
I have just paid nearly £190 car tax on my 1974 P6B,and it made me think about the MG cars that have run the course of their life and then restored using a Heritage body shell swapping over the VIN plate and and then taxing the car as a pre 1972 car !!. To me it does not seem to right or fair. If I bought a piece of new furniture that looked like an antique it would be a reproduction, I Know that furniture is restored/ repaired but if it was to the extent of a new body at the best it would be a copy.
Considering the production run of the p6 and other cars that straddle the 1972 historic car date, it seems to be stupid that the same model of car one being pre 1972 is a historic car and one post 1972 is not.
I am not saying that a cars like the MG that have had a new body shell change should not be a historic car but any car that has a production run that straddles the 72 date should be historic vehicle

John Gosnell
 
Hi

I believe there's a formula about how many parts you use from the donor vehicle that determines if it keeps it's original registration and hence free tax status
 
With any car using a heritage shell, as far as the dvla are concerned it is a genuine replacement part so will not affect the status of the car.You will have to produce a reciept to prove it though!
If however you use a later donor shell to rebuild your tax exempt car,then you start to get into scoring points for parts used! Effectively using a s/h later chassis will mean using the corresponding reg no for it,not the tax exempt one!
A VERY grey area is when THE only identity on a bodyshell is the riveted on chassis plate! like Dolomites,TR6,Stags and others!
For example!!!
You could quite easily strip and restore a 1981 Dolomite shell,put the chassis plate from a 1972 Dolomite on it,and the corresponding 1972 reg no,use the 72 engine and trim,and paint it the right colour or notify a change of engine no and colour and nobody would be any the wiser!!
If you were to use all original and genuine parts then probably not even an expert could tell that its been done!!
Is it a ringer,OR??? is it a car fully restored with genuine original parts????
I had a 1975 p6v8 that was overall excellent,but the base unit was starting to rot.
I found and bought a 1971 p6v8,the outer panels were shot!,interior was not good, but the base unit,eng/box were all very good!
So effectively I restored the 1971 car using parts from both!! The tax exempt shell,most suspension and engine were used,so all I did was fit my white panels and leather interior to the 71 car.
It can get very complicated with the dvla points system!!
As I found out with a kit car years ago!
And YES!! I agree that tax exempt status seems daft that its not rolling like it should be!!
In theory you can have 2 cars a couple of chassis numbers apart, ie Dec72/Jan73 one is exempt the other isnt!!
As a definition of a historic car has now been arrived at,maybe the tax law will change soon!!
 
But the new definition still uses a cut-off date for all cars when it should really count all models being built before that date until the end of their production run. Far more sensible.
 
The FHBVC have adopted the 30yr rule,so if the govt abide by the decision for a definition of a historic car,then that would mean it should be a rolling date,when your car gets to 30yrs old it is tax exempt! As the 25 yr rule used to be before labour decided to freeze it! :x
 
Exactly Pilkie - you've hit the key issue! The original idea of historic status was that it would be a rolling date, moving forward a year each year; so by now all P6's would be tax exempt! That's even an environmentally freindly measure! Everybody understands the climate change implications of doing 20 mpg vs 40 mpg. BUT very few people understand how much greenhouse gas is generated by making a car. It is actually much more environmentally freindly to keep on using it once you've made it, than to throw it away and make another, albeit more fuel efficient, one.

Chris
 
...and the modern ones aren't even that much more fuel efficient, due to weighing twice as much as the older version and stuffing them with enormous engines making rediculous amounts of power which then have to be strangled by traction control etc to make them safe to drive, just plain stupid really.
 
webmaster said:
...and the modern ones aren't even that much more fuel efficient, due to weighing twice as much as the older version and stuffing them with enormous engines making rediculous amounts of power which then have to be strangled by traction control etc to make them safe to drive, just plain stupid really.
Click to expand...

I was shocked to find that my A6 is actually 600Kg heavier than the P6 :shock:

But then I was much happier in the snow this morning in my 4 wheel drive, traction controlled, luxury Uber cruiser. 8)

Sparky is at home and is going to stay there until the roads dry up.
 
DaveHerns said:
4 wheel drive may give you better traction in the snow but it's no better when it comes to stopping
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It will slow the car down better with engine braking though and it has ABS as part of the traction control.
 
I had to laugh last time it snowed, one of the ladies that works with my wife, stuffed her lovely 4x4 into a tree in the car park, thinking the 4x4 was immune to snow she came in way too fast and slid straight into the tree.

As said, 4wd doesn't help much when it comes to stopping, what's even worse though is proper big 4x4's weighing about 2 1/2 tons, with big wide road tyres, don't stand a chance of stopping in snow.

I remember my dad getting a bit over-confident in his Range Rover back in the late 70's, we went out playing in the drifts, then wiped out a neighbours tree on the way back into the street !

Was talking to my sister tonight, she's got a brand new BMW 1 series, says it's a nightmare in this weather, rear wheel drive with wide low profile tyres and not much weight over the rear axle.
 
One of my reps decided not to go out today and stayed at home with his (MY) Honda Accord parked safely in his drive.

The woman opposite decided to turn around in his drive, and drove up to the front of his car. Then whacked it in reverse and floored it. It would have been ok if she had actually found reverse, but, well she didn't :shock:

My Honda is now a short wheel based model and she managed to push it backwards into his garage and almost destroyed that too.

:roll:
 
Best motoring experience I ever had in the snow? Driving back across rural hill roads in mid wales in a Bedford HA van - yes, that's right, the one based on the original mk1 Viva!! At no point did the van ever point in the direction of travel, and we put up quite a good average speed. BUT, it wasn't my van ( :D ) and no one else had dared to risk it so there was no traffic to get in the way ( :D :D ). The HA had a truly light back end - but that just made it easier to chuck ( :twisted: ).

Chris
 
I would suspect that the A6 and others would only be in 2 wheel drive on the overrun and therefore no better on stopping performance than any other car with ABS . I would also suggest experienced drivers could stop quicker on snow without ABS . ABS is only a help if you panic. The only real solution is narrow studded tyres

4X4 just lulls you into a state of false security up to the minute you can't stop. I remember working with a woman who drove a Suzuki Vitara and thought she was a junior member of the Range Rover fraternity. I asked if she knew what 4X4 meant and she had no idea !
 
Going down into Sheffield this morning, everything else was sliding around like Jane Torville. I put the A6 into second and it controlled it down the hill without even a hint of a slip or a slide.

Sparky is still staying tucked up until the snow has gone. 8)
 
pilkie said:
As the 25 yr rule used to be before labour decided to freeze it! :x
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I always thought the 25 year rule was a bit generous.

For me the body is where the sole of the car is, changing the body shell is no different to building a kit car and so a new car. Problem is that taking that stance has so many unforeseen consequences that it's likely untenable.

I see what John is saying, if the body shell is a new one and not a repaired old one then saying it's a pre 1973 or just that saying its an old car is, well, a little white lie, in my book.
 
Best laugh I've had recently about 4x4 drivers is that many of them are into negative equity having so much HP on their Chelsea tractors which are now worth b*gger all . That'll wipe the smile off their smug faces
 
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