New Demerit + Fine System & Radar Dectectors Banned

[Adydas]

Its possible that pic was staged to get the best angle of the unit behind the tail pipe for soley Photographical reasons, they might not have been running a test from the photos shown.

[Mr Revhead]

possibly.
but that would also explain why certain cars failed when they shouldnt have.
like those aussie cars which have to meet the ADR.....

basicly i call b/s on the NZPC tests.

the point is they need to develop a fair and consitant test method. which means wof stations need to buy the right gear

[barryogen]

are you sure? coz that doesnt match with the pics they showed of it...
where they had it right behind the pipe, like 10cm from it

you are right, thats what the images were of, but the article said they were using the proposed test method.

[Akane]

I remember once me and my buddy is out by the twilight roads having a cruise, a cop stopped us, whipped out his "testing equipment", shoved it right next to the tail pipe, told us to rev it, and failed us, gave us a fine.

I was the passenger, but anyways I said:

Akane: Mr Officer, according to the testing rules (back then) shouldn't it be 1m away from the exhaust?

Officer: Don't tell me how to do my job smart ass.

Akane: Errrrrrr okay

And we received our fine.

---------------------------

Roadside exhaust noise testing... Yeah right.

[barryogen]

Akane: Errrrrrr okay

And we received our fine.

---------------------------

Roadside exhaust noise testing... Yeah right.

Camera phones are handy little devices... most cops do not like to be filmed though for some reason.

[xsspeed]

i hadnt seen this sh1t in the news but have just seen this thread, not sure if its been pointed out,
but having studied acoustics decibels is the most stupid way of measuring sound level! basically what happened was back in the day when they had no clue how sound was transmitted they decided to create these levels, as had been used by other scientists for other things at the time.
There is a huge variation in decibels with a change in distance, where 10 decibels is equivalent to half or twice the percieved loudness, so you can see that 5db (95 to 90 db limit) is quite significant.
Also doubling the distance will generally result in a 6db drop, so the difference between measuring the sound at the exhaust and 1m away is a huge diff.
Measuring in dbs also doesnt account for the fact that sound is a spectrum, similar to light, and human hearing is more tuned to higher freq's than lower ones, therefore the general public will get more pissed of with high sounds, than low freq - read exhaust - sounds.

On the bright side a proper acoustic tool costs a shitload, and unless they have found something cheap that reads over or under, i cant see the cops forking out for heaps of these. And i dont really see how they can hold up in court without producing a real db value. plus the acoustic measurers detune really quickly so they are gunna have to spend heaps keeping them serviced.

[Mr Revhead]

good stuff.



interesting off topicish....

NHRA highlights on yesterday, they had the camera lying on the ground pointing at the car as it took off, just infront and off to the left of the camera was a half empty powerade. when the top fueller nailed it the powerade looked like it was boiling its nuts off!
describing it doesnt do it justice, but it was an awesome thing to see.

[slighty_sykotic]

50 demerits for running a stop sign... that makes me sad.

I've had too many close calls with people running stop signs, worst one woulda ended in my death if I'd been running a fraction of a second earlier. A moron drove right infront of me at well over 100kph (I was driving down an open road too). Most New Zealanders fail at stop signs IMO. I'd say ~80% of people I see never come to a complete halt.

Im sure i see 96% of people here in the Manawatu that don't stop.

I also was getting to the point of at my old job at 6pm, I would slow down to 85km/h at a certain part of the road, because I knew some idiot would pull out in front of me, and 9 times out of 10, sure enough someone did. (camerons line and milson line if anyone knows it, just out of feilding).

Another HUGE problem I have is the uncontrolled intercection rule. Why can't $&#$% learn the god dam rules!?!?!. I love being in my old laser, as I would pull out in front of the bastards, problem is that non of them understood and just swore at me, pulled fingers etc.

my point is that if we keep going down that path we leave way too much to the discretion of police officers, some of whom feel that they can abuse their powers to prove a point.

exaclty right, the police are only there to enforce the law, not be the law.

Bring back a dedicated traffic force i say

I dont see how thats going to help mate, a traffic force would be just as bad/worse.

(if they do pull up a suspended driver and hes found to be over his demerit limit, they confiscate the license immediately I believe? Thats one bonus I guess.)

Not at the moment they don't. They have to wait for the LTSA to get its ass into gear and put out a notice.

There are alot of people out there that have over 100 demerits, get pulled over by police, police find they have over 100 demerits, but there is no notice in the system, so they can't do anything (sometimes they do try to ring the ltsa to get the notice done then and there, but that doesn't often work.


And about ohaeka, I drove through that, right in the middle of the day, and I had mates that work on base, live in bulls, and they went through it a few times, each time the delay was no more than 3 or 4 mins.

[Truenotch]

Along the lines of the stop sign rule, a lot of police don't know (or recognise) the rules behind it. The main point of this being that at a stop sign you must "Stop on the intersection at a point where you can see the way is clear". This doesn't mean you have to stop at the line every time. And also when behind another car at the intersection it's fine to go straight through as long as you stopped at some point and could see the intersecting road. Most drivers don't know this rule and will stop at the line every time, even if it is obvious that the way was clear. This could be a problem with the new de-merit system.

[slighty_sykotic]

Along the lines of the stop sign rule, a lot of police don't know (or recognise) the rules behind it. The main point of this being that at a stop sign you must "Stop on the intersection at a point where you can see the way is clear". This doesn't mean you have to stop at the line every time. And also when behind another car at the intersection it's fine to go straight through as long as you stopped at some point and could see the intersecting road. Most drivers don't know this rule and will stop at the line every time, even if it is obvious that the way was clear. This could be a problem with the new de-merit system.

Have you actuly been pulled over by a cop for this? All the cops I have ever dealt with know that rule, and they will normally not pull the second car over, even if they think they might not have stopped in a place they can see clearly, for the benifit of the doubt.

[Truenotch]

lol nah haven't been pulled over for any traffic offences yet man. I know people that have been in trouble for that, good few years ago now though.

I'm with you about the 96% of drivers in palmerston north though, used to see at least 3 a week go straight through featherston st from Heretaunga / russel st... Never saw anything come of it though.

[RAZA]

Noise is not a safety issue

errr, yeah it is, and 95dB is plenty loud enough to cause some serious damage to hearing. An hour of 95dB will cause permanent damage, if you have a loud car, don't go on long trips or you'll turn into a deaf old b**tard.

Perhaps I should have been clearer and said that reducing noise is unlikely to bring down the road toll, which is the stated objective of the new legislation.

In terms of a car making 95db damaging your hearing, as others have said, if you spend a long trip with your head close enough to the exit of your exhaust for you to be constantly exposed to 95db you've got bigger problems than noise....

[xsspeed]

Noise is not a safety issue

errr, yeah it is, and 95dB is plenty loud enough to cause some serious damage to hearing. An hour of 95dB will cause permanent damage, if you have a loud car, don't go on long trips or you'll turn into a deaf old b**tard.

Perhaps I should have been clearer and said that reducing noise is unlikely to bring down the road toll, which is the stated objective of the new legislation.

In terms of a car making 95db damaging your hearing, as others have said, if you spend a long trip with your head close enough to the exit of your exhaust for you to be constantly exposed to 95db you've got bigger problems than noise....

which was exactly my point above, the decibel level changes depending on how far you are from the source. If you had 95 db right at your ear in your ear, you'd be worried by much less than a hour of it.

If you had 95db at your ear from a source 2m away, at 1m away it would be 101 db, and at 0.5m would be 107 db, which equals $&#$% loud, louder than most things in fact.

If your car produces 95 db at 1m, then at 2m you will hear a sound at 89db. Plus most cars have their exhausts pointing away from the driver so the directional nature of the source propagates the sound away in which case the sound heard by the driver will be even less.

[Si]

does anyone know how they plan to test cars with twin exhaust pipes, and more interestingly, side exit pipes?

[Mad Murphy]

Another HUGE problem I have is the uncontrolled intercection rule. Why can't $&#$% learn the god dam rules!?!?!. I love being in my old laser, as I would pull out in front of the bastards, problem is that non of them understood and just swore at me, pulled fingers etc.

I come across these every day (ironicly just up the same road where I was almost cleaned up). Many a person has got a one-finger salute from me for not giving way properly.

[slighty_sykotic]

Another HUGE problem I have is the uncontrolled intercection rule. Why can't $&#$% learn the god dam rules!?!?!. I love being in my old laser, as I would pull out in front of the bastards, problem is that non of them understood and just swore at me, pulled fingers etc.

I come across these every day (ironicly just up the same road where I was almost cleaned up). Many a person has got a one-finger salute from me for not giving way properly.

Problem is that they honestly in their mind think they are doing nothing wrong.

So they just think you are a asshole for no reason.

Maybe if you threw a brick with the rodecode painted on it at their car....

[barryogen]

..

[MasCam]

From the Beehive website

Is there a proposal to ban speed detection and interference devices?

Yes there is, and this will be phased in over two years:

the first year after the offence becomes law will attract a fine of $50 and 25 demerit points;
the second year after the offence becomes law will attract a fine of $100 and 50 demerit points;
the third and subsequent years after the offence becomes law will attract a fine of $150 and 75 demerit points.

Speed detection devices Illegal!!!!!!

GPS units are being made illegal ..... Hang on that would mean Speedo's are being banned as well. Those demerits are sure going to add up quick.

Hang on again that was speed detection and interference devices, what's a speed interference device?? are brakes going to be made illegal so that we have to drive so slow we can coast in when we want to stop. I have seen power poles interfere with a cars speed in the past, the power companies are going to be in trouble.

Sorry for the sarcasm but I am trying to point out what a poorly thought out proposal they have at the moment and that they have tried to avoid the use of the words radar detector. It is just included in the middle of the rest of the proposal to try to slip it through, as stated before there will be a lot of businessmen not to happy about that one.

How about a buy back scheme for those of us with them??

[FST4RD]

Radar detectors are not speed detection nor speed interference devices.

[Boosted_162]

Radar detectors are not speed detection nor speed interference devices.

Exactly! Speed interference devices/jammers are already illegal. Plus the ones over here dont really work anyway. All radar detectors do is locate radio waves correct? Could they get you if you made you own device that picks up radio waves?