as above really I cant get my head around why its so important your wheels are covered by a fibreglass arch that would snap into bits if anything touched it anyway!!??

I am right you cant have bare wheels at all arent I

even though Ive already done the sva

??

its queries for next time

Agreed that a Seven cycle wing isn't that strong but them's the rules! Apart from SVA, I think you would fail MOT, just like if you have a chav tintop with wide tyres extending sideways out of the wheel arches.

Plus personally I wouldn't fancy having totaly open front wheels to throw up enve more shite off the road...

Correct, the road contacting width has to be covered for a certain % of the periphery (somebody help me out here). Same applies to trailers. Purely safety, debris, rain etc etc.

On a land rover, even with wheels covered, the sides will get caked in mud as the tyre will get outside the arch when steering - won;t have that in a 7 where the arches move in sympathy with the wheel but there to illustrate that muck will get thrown up by them.

I have been reliably told, but haven't been able to establish the veracity (don't know if it's true either) that in fact for road use you do NOT require mudguards. However if it rains you then do - could be a bit tricky if an unexpected shower catches you out!
This is backed up by the fact that at the American car nite we sometimes go to at the Dick Turpin A127 there have been at least 3 "hot rod " type vehicles that have no wheel covering at all - one lives local to me & tells me he's never been nicked for it - he agrees only required when wet!
They are obviously required for SVA & MoT, but not part of construction & use - I believe.

[Edited on 13/11/06 by russbost]

The law was changed after the Romans defeated Boadicea
Alex

There are other querys to contend with

It is not mandatry to have windscreen wipers, nor windscreen washers, yet if fitted they must conform to a MOT standard,
equally if lights are fitted they must work, if not fiited it cant fail !!

these little gems were relayed to me when i was building my car by a semi retired MOT tester (not retarded)

there are probabley more, but i dont recall them

I can't find anywhere that says this but I have found that a vehicle with a windscreen can't pass type approval without wipers, washers and demist unless the screen folds down.
SVA tests the conformity to construction and use and states that you need front wings which cover the wheels so they must be a part of construction and use, I know I was warned by the police for not having one on a motorcycle years ago and a friend was told to get some fitted to his trailer recently. Your mate who has never been nicked for not having any has just been lucky so far I think. Does he get MOT without them?

There do seem to be a lot of open wheeled hot rods around Billing Aquadrome most weekends in the summer, and I have yet to see one get pulled. There has to be some loop hole to allow it surely?

Construction & use, SVA & MoT are 3 completely different sets of regs.
For instance at SVA you do NOT require a horn & providing your tyres have the correct speed rating they can be bald YES BALD, fact told to me by SVA examiner (Mr Bl**dy Picky I think his name was!!!).
For Mot (& SVA) if you have no windscreen, or a fold down one you don't need wipers washers or demist, however that doesn't stop you from driving the car with the screen up when it's hissing with rain! If you turn up for MoT with no headlights they cease to be part of the test - but you'd never get thro' SVA without them. Hence as you can see they each interpret stuff differently. I was until about 2 months ago an MoT tester & have read the SVA manual from cover to cover several times (& wrote an article for Kitcar mag), but know very little about construction & use - I did have a copy of the construction & use regs once (& jolly exciting they were too - NOT), but unfortunately that was about 20 years ago & they would be long out of date even if I'd still got them.
If anyone's got any more info on open wheels I'd be interested to hear it.