"33bhp?" Yes "i dont believe you, I'll seize your bike and take you to court"

[embee]

Originally Posted by BanditPat

The 33bhp is at the wheel for purposes of the law mate.

Anyone know the directive, statutory instrument, ECE test procedure or similar that specifies how it is to be measured? Just for interest.

[timwilky]

Possibly start with the type approval stuff (ECWVTA)

Directive 95/1/EC :- Measurement of Power, Torque and Maximum Speed

European standards are crank measurements

50 pages and still no resolve

[Geodude]

Originally Posted by paiste

50 pages and still no resolve

Ive never read so much in years, last book i read said argos on the cover

[Jayneflakes]

I had a lovely chat today with a Bike Copper today about this issue and he was rather interesting in his views. The chap I spoke to was a Police advanced skills instructor and I asked him what the procedure was if they suspect that a bike is not restricted. He did say that they have access to a Dyno, but do not use it very often, the one for checking scooter top speed would not be much use, because it does not measure power, only speed and if they go above twenty nine point something miles per hour, they are in trouble.

He did say that they would take a license infraction seriously and would need to check it if they had serious doubt. However when I asked him how they could tell, he was pretty vague, not because he did not know, but because it seems the rules are pretty vague. I asked him about the certificate as proof of restriction and he was dismissive of it as evidence, it seems that they too are onto the E-Bay certificate scam.

One thing he did comment on though was his approval of the 33BHP restriction and the advancement with training through him. I was offered a place on a course for next year after I have been out on my restricted bike for a while.

Sadly, Mr Bike Copper was actually out to investigate a collision between a fast moving biker and a truck, luckily the biker escaped serious injury, but it seems he was more than angelically lucky.

This adds nothing to the dilemma facing the young lad here, but it was interesting.

[embee]

Originally Posted by timwilky

Possibly start with the type approval stuff (ECWVTA)

Directive 95/1/EC :- Measurement of Power, Torque and Maximum Speed

European standards are crank measurements

Yep that'll be it I reckon. As well as being crank (or an output shaft) measurement, it is also steady state (at least 30 sec at constant conditions) and all the conditions discussed earlier (temps, pressures, including coolant out temp) must be held within specified limits and the overall correction factors must lie within certain limits (0.97 - 1.03) in order for the test to be valid. An inertia dyno wouldn't be acceptable (and would indeed give numbers which bore little if any relation to the certified values, it would have to be an absorbtion dyno.

If this is indeed the test procedure by which the manufacturers must certify their restriction devices, and by inference I would suggest any compliance test would have to follow the same procedure, then there is no way on this Earth that any test run by the Police on a seized bike would comply. Not only would it not be possible to measure at the crank (though gearbox output shaft might be acceptable), it would cost an absolute fortune to have it done to these standards and isn't something you can just turn up somewhere and say "just check this for us".

I haven't fully digested the blurb but the tolerances for production compliance seem pretty big too, 10% or even 20% is being bandied about, so you could probably (possibly) find an argument to demonstrate that even if the measured power exceeded the 25kW it would still be in conformity with the certified value according to the rules.

Absolute can of worms, I'd certainly have a go at challenging any measurement in court if it was me.

[Speedy]

Someone do me a favour and message me when the results are in!?

[Red Herring]

Originally Posted by Jayneflakes

I had a lovely chat today with a Bike Copper today about this issue and he was rather interesting in his views. The chap I spoke to was a Police advanced skills instructor and I asked him what the procedure was if they suspect that a bike is not restricted. .........

The bit I have put in bold above is very relevant. If the police have reasonable grounds to suspect an offence they have a power under PACE to seize anything that is evidence of that offence. We can argue that in this example it would be completely disproportionate but the fact would remain that they would have a power to seize the bike.

The big issue here is that under the circumstances that the Op was stopped and spoken to they would have no grounds to have formed that reasonable suspicion. He was stationery at the road side when first spoken to and moved a short distance across the road (that's my understanding) when asked to by them. Had he been doing an 80mph rolling burnout or something else that could give cause to suspect the bike makes more than 33hp then the coppers could argue the issue, but I think they are going to struggle on this one. Their only out is that they had a reasonably held belief (formed following the conversation with their sergeant) that a restricted bike had to have a plate displayed and that the absence of the plate led them to form the suspicion that the bike had been altered (or not restricted). The fact that they were wrong about the plate may (hard though it will be to accept) be fairly irrelevant, it's all about if in their mistaken belief about it they could have had a reasonable suspicion about an offence.

Sorry if that's a bit longwinded, but I just can't see any other way they can get out of this one. Either way there is noting I can find in any legislation anywhere that gives them a power to actually put the bike on a dyno. All they can do is produce the bike as evidence to show that it doesn't have a plate on it.

[Red Herring]

Oh, I forgot to add that if they did seize it under PACE then they must return it as soon as it ceases to be evidence of any offence and they can't charge you with any of the costs involved in it's seizure and storage. That's down to them.

this is a mad thread still no results lol..