> ... Before the test, the examiner > checked the car and failed it because the rear window brake light > didn't go on. Both tail brakes were OK. She explained that she'd > bought the high light the day before but hadn't connected it yet. > She > lost the appointment and the $80, and was appealing, through the > program, to get the $80 back. The answer was that if there's a brake > light there, other drivers expect to see it go on, so she didn't get > the $80 back. It didn't matter that the car had functioning factory > brake lights In NZ cars 1st registered after a certain year (~~1990?) have to have high level brake lights. Cars 1st registered before that don't have to have them BUT if they are fitted they must work. My daughter's car falls in the latter category. At a recent checkup (= WOF = Warrant of Fitness) the high level light's bulb was dead. The eaxminer advised her to either replace the bulb or to remove the light. ______________ (one of) My car(s) (an old Subaru Leone wagon) has 4 headlights plus 2 factory fitted auxiliary fog lights . The fog lights are covered with protective plastic covers. They don't work and have not done so since I bought the car over a year ago. At the last WOF test (2nd or 3rd since I've had the car) they said the fog lights must be working or be removed by next WOF test 6 months hence. They noted this ob their computer record - available to all WOF testers country wide. New rules apparently. Have to fix them I guess. _______________ I can actually sympathise with the intent of both these rules, even though they may seem arbitrary and stupid. A high level brake light can be much easier to see than std rear lights and a motorist in traffic could indeed be depending on a light which is visible but non functional. Fog lights which are illegally adjusted so that they dazzle oncoming cars could be claimed to be non functional during a WOF test and then enabled thereafter - or just switched on using an accessory switch as is often enough the case with fog lights. The really keen will adjust lights down for WOFs and up again afterwards but most people don't go to those extremes. I have vague memories that our lovely 8 inch? 100 Watt Cibie Super Oscar driving lamp which we used long ago for night-time car trialling became illegal after some years of use because we had only one fitted (all you needed !!!) and the regs were changed so that you had to have a pair so that 3-eyes would not confuse people in some manner. As we only used it on long straights or in dark countryside where its stunning illumination was needed, and never used it against oncoming cars (lest they catch fire in the beam :-) ) the requirement was a nonsense. [[Just perhaps and maybe it was also occasionally useful on main highways to remind oncoming cars that THEIR lights were still on full beam]]. I vaguely recall that the lamp thereafter used to become non-functional for a short period around WOF time and that the testers never complained (and probably understood). But, that was long ago and that part of the memory may be a synthesised one. The lamp is real enough, but it currently lives on a shelf in my basement. Russell -- http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist