Tail fins (cars)

[Fading Fast]

Our system is quite different. Any garage employing or run by a mechanic with state certification can qualify to do inspections, and most towns have several, to the point where people will often shop around for a garage where the inspector might be a bit less strict than the last one they visited. But the other side of that is that both the garage and the individual mechanic are personally liable if a car bearing a sticker they signed is found to be the cause of an accident due to the vehicle being unsafe, so fear of such liability tends to prevent mechanics from just handing out stickers at random.

When I lived in Boston I thought that the system - basically, the same as the one you described - worked pretty well once we found an honest garage as the first one we used was clearly finding "something" each inspection that, conveniently, they could fix for a few hundred dollars.

Once we found a straight-shooter garage, we had one (maybe two) issues in the next 6 or so years and none were very expensive.

No system is perfect, but I thought the competition amongst stations (and the liability risk you described) balanced the market / regulatory push-pull reasonably well - and was definitely better than the state-run one (long lines, surly officials) in NJ (in the '70s and '80s, so no offense intended if it is better in NJ today).

 

[2jakes]

Cool doors!



That was a neat trick Doc... ???

Unless.....

Einstein, can we see your driver’s license ?

 

[Stearmen]

Over 25 is exempt here, and there's a strong move to change that. A few years ago, a man was killed by a 1930s fire engine that lost its brakes on a hill during a parade and crushed him.

Here it was 1975 or older. Though, a friend just told me he registered his 1980 motorcycle with classic plates. I can not find that on the DMV web sight?

 

[plain old dave]

This thread is becoming more and more interesting... The EPA found Nashville Metro "noncompliant" and there was fairly lively debate about the EPA-required vehicle inspections as to whether they would be simply smog inspections or whether they would bring back the old safety inspections.

https://tn.gov/environment/topic/apc-vehicle-inspection-program

The inspections are only done in a few counties and are NOT safety inspections. You'll note that in several Counties, the program is operated by the HEALTH Department and not the County Clerk or Department of Safety and Homeland Security. I have never met anybody in this State much over 40 or so that doesn't think re-enacting the old law would do anything other than line politicians' pockets. I am really trying to keep the discussion nonpolitical, but "safety inspection" and "politics" are heavily interrelated terms to those of us over a certain age here in Tennessee. When we hear "car inspection", a lot of us interpret it as "give $10 to the head of the Governor's campaign in this County."

 

[LizzieMaine]

We had kind of an opposite situation here. Twenty-odd years ago, we had a system implemented for auto emissions testing that was let out as a concession to a private company -- which built testing stations around the state and was supposed to staff and operate the facilities. Turned out to be a gigantic failure on every level -- the company was imperious and inflexible, its staff was poorly trained, and its private requirements were at odds with what the state actually wanted to do. The program ended up being repealed after a petition drive led by angry consumers, and the whole thing was written off as a cautionary warning about the pitfalls of "privatization."

 

[EngProf]

This thread is becoming more and more interesting... The EPA found Nashville Metro "noncompliant" and there was fairly lively debate about the EPA-required vehicle inspections as to whether they would be simply smog inspections or whether they would bring back the old safety inspections.

https://tn.gov/environment/topic/apc-vehicle-inspection-program

The inspections are only done in a few counties and are NOT safety inspections. You'll note that in several Counties, the program is operated by the HEALTH Department and not the County Clerk or Department of Safety and Homeland Security. I have never met anybody in this State much over 40 or so that doesn't think re-enacting the old law would do anything other than line politicians' pockets. I am really trying to keep the discussion nonpolitical, but "safety inspection" and "politics" are heavily interrelated terms to those of us over a certain age here in Tennessee. When we hear "car inspection", a lot of us interpret it as "give $10 to the head of the Governor's campaign in this County."

As a very-long-term resident of Tennessee I'm perplexed about the auto-safety inspections referred to. I've been owning/driving a car here in Tennessee for over 50 years and I've never experienced any sort of auto safety/structural inspections.

Were those local or county inspection operations? There just never have been any State-wide safety/structural inspections. (for those not familiar with TN geography, plain old dave is far away in east TN and I'm in Middle TN - "you can't get there from here")

In the days when the emissions testing was originated, environmental issues (air pollution, water pollution, hazardous waste, etc.) were within the jurisdiction of the Department of Public Health, as plain old dave says. By coincidence, I was the engineer working in Public Health who was in direct charge of evaluating the EPA-proposed auto-emissions testing program.

It was a total hoax and scam from the word go... It was a combination of bad data, misrepresented data, and some incomprehensible data. By pointing this out to my superiors, Tennessee delayed implementation of the auto emissions inspection program until threatened with a cutoff of Federal funds. (One of my personal "claims-to-fame" is being cursed in public by an EPA Regional Administrator for pointing out the deficiencies of the program in a public meeting.)

At the State level we now have a Department of Environment and Conservation, but at the local/Metropolitan level I think most have retained the Public Health model.

I definitely agree with plain old dave that most Tennesseans would be VERY reluctant to be subjected to and charged for any sort of inspection. It would be interpreted as government money-grabbing by politicians. However, since most politicians here want to keep their jobs they would never propose it to begin with.

Emissions inspection/testing was forced on us (in limited areas), as referred to above, so we had no real say-so in that matter.

 

[Fading Fast]

^^^ Regarding the above posts by plain old dave and Lizzie. What I take out of it is any system, organization, operation, construct - be it public or private - can be run by corrupt, incompetent, petty, arrogant people who abuse their power and line their pockets at the expense of their clients / citizens / etc.

It's a political argument to say which system is more susceptible to these behaviors, which has a better track record overall - so I'm not touching that - but I am willing to note that both public and private constructs can work and both can be horribly abusive and corrupt.

 

[plain old dave]

As a very-long-term resident of Tennessee I'm perplexed about the auto-safety inspections referred to. I've been owning/driving a car here in Tennessee for over 50 years and I've never experienced any sort of auto safety/structural inspections.

Were those local or county inspection operations? There just never have been any State-wide safety/structural inspections. (for those not familiar with TN geography, plain old dave is far away in east TN and I'm in Middle TN - "you can't get there from here")

In the days when the emissions testing was originated, environmental issues (air pollution, water pollution, hazardous waste, etc.) were within the jurisdiction of the Department of Public Health, as plain old dave says. By coincidence, I was the engineer working in Public Health who was in direct charge of evaluating the EPA-proposed auto-emissions testing program.

It was a total hoax and scam from the word go... It was a combination of bad data, misrepresented data, and some incomprehensible data. By pointing this out to my superiors, Tennessee delayed implementation of the auto emissions inspection program until threatened with a cutoff of Federal funds. (One of my personal "claims-to-fame" is being cursed in public by an EPA Regional Administrator for pointing out the deficiencies of the program in a public meeting.)

At the State level we now have a Department of Environment and Conservation, but at the local/Metropolitan level I think most have retained the Public Health model.

I definitely agree with plain old dave that most Tennesseans would be VERY reluctant to be subjected to and charged for any sort of inspection. It would be interpreted as government money-grabbing by politicians. However, since most politicians here want to keep their jobs they would never propose it to begin with.

Emissions inspection/testing was forced on us (in limited areas), as referred to above, so we had no real say-so in that matter.

Good info. Statewide inspections were done away with in early 1978.

Sent from my SM-G386T using Tapatalk

 

[EngProf]

Good info. Statewide inspections were done away with in early 1978.

Sent from my SM-G386T using Tapatalk

Please amplify... I've been driving here in TN since the mid-60's and have never seen or heard of any State inspections.

 

[GHT]

We had kind of an opposite situation here. Twenty-odd years ago, we had a system implemented for auto emissions testing that was let out as a concession to a private company -- which built testing stations around the state and was supposed to staff and operate the facilities. Turned out to be a gigantic failure on every level -- the company was imperious and inflexible, its staff was poorly trained, and its private requirements were at odds with what the state actually wanted to do. The program ended up being repealed after a petition drive led by angry consumers, and the whole thing was written off as a cautionary warning about the pitfalls of "privatization."

Just out of curiosity, how did America, a country that has relatively few diesel engined cars, discover that VW had been fiddling their emission figures? Furthermore it took the Americans to prove that diesel engines are not all the 'green,' planet loving power units that they have been hyped up to be. How and through what sort of testing did those results come?

I definitely agree with plain old dave that most Tennesseans would be VERY reluctant to be subjected to and charged for any sort of inspection. It would be interpreted as government money-grabbing by politicians. However, since most politicians here want to keep their jobs they would never propose it to begin with.

The UK testing is both stringent and reasonably fair. It stops dangerous cars from being on our roads. It always baffles me how someone can spend tens of thousands on a car but run with a blown headlight bulb, forever. Or bald tyres, or a cracked windscreen. And the ultimate, why on earth do those with a garage leave their expensive car on the drive whilst the garage is a dumping point for the household junk?

 

[LizzieMaine]

From what I understand, it came about due to suspicious differences between emission readings on European and American versions of the same cars. As far as the "greenness" of diesels go, maybe I don't get around much, but I've never heard anyone claim any particular greenness for them, and I would have laughed out loud if I had. I owned a 1981 VW Rabbit diesel for 13 years in the '80s and '90s, and while I enjoyed 50mpg with it -- going to Boston on $5 worth was a real kick -- I also knew it smoked like a longshoreman, and smelled like one too. "Green" is hardly a word I would ever have applied to that car. "Noxious greasy grey" was more like it, but at that time in my life it was the only car I could afford to own.

As far as the cost of safety inspections go, I've heard people kick about how much it costs to make needed repairs, but I've honestly never heard a single soul complain about the cost of the inspection program itself -- and I was around gas stations from the time I was two years old. Old-school New Englanders are very different from Southerners in that respect -- in general our ancestors came here in communities, not as individuals, and we have a strong communitarian strain in our culture. We don't have a problem with the *idea* of programs implemented for the common good, even if we might kick about the methods of the implementaton.

 

[GHT]

Sorry Lizzie, it's easy to forget that this is an international forum. Green is a term that our press have been using in a facetious way. The European Union claimed that the carbon dioxide emission was much lower in diesel fumes, failing to say that carbon monoxide and nitrogen oxide were dangerously high.
There's another curious puzzle, at least here in Europe. Have you heard of Adblue? It's an additive that trucks and buses use to reduce the harmful effects of diesel fumes. Why is it not used in cars?

 

[LizzieMaine]

I don't think we have Adblue here -- if we do, I've never seen it, but I got rid of my diesel twenty years ago, and haven't paid a lot of attention to such matters.

I used to put a shot of Marvel Mystery Oil in my Rabbit every time I fueled up. I don't know if it ever did any good, I just liked the way it smelled.

 

[EngProf]

I don't think we have Adblue here -- if we do, I've never seen it, but I got rid of my diesel twenty years ago, and haven't paid a lot of attention to such matters.

I used to put a shot of Marvel Mystery Oil in my Rabbit every time I fueled up. I don't know if it ever did any good, I just liked the way it smelled.

Adblue is the European/German name for what we call Diesel Exhaust Fluid (DEF). It's added to a reservoir, sort-of like washer fluid, except that it is injected into the Diesel exhaust for environmental reasons.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Ah. Clearly my Rabbit predated such technologies. I don't think it would have been possible to inject anything into its exhaust -- the smoke was so thick and sooty it was practically solid, and smelled like someone had jammed a bag of egg-salad sandwiches into the muffler.

 

[plain old dave]

Please amplify... I've been driving here in TN since the mid-60's and have never seen or heard of any State inspections.

We had them every year. They had the county number from the license plate; ours was 3 and when we went up to Maynardville, Union County was 78 and so on. I remember it being done away with in 1978 as we had a '78 Chevette and only had the one sticker, from when it was new.

 

[EngProf]

We had them every year. They had the county number from the license plate; ours was 3 and when we went up to Maynardville, Union County was 78 and so on. I remember it being done away with in 1978 as we had a '78 Chevette and only had the one sticker, from when it was new.

This is sufficiently odd as to be intriguing. As a car-nut/hot-rodder I must have gone through half a dozen cars from the mid-'60's through the late '70's and never had any sort of State inspection. Same for my pals and relatives...

This was also when I was doing the engineering evaluation for the proposed emission inspection and the notion that any sort of inspection was being done in the State never came up in our discussions. As a car-person it would have caught my attention as a potential threat to my own hobby and interests. Those of us in the State capital apparently didn't know what was going on in the Eastern part of the State.

We did have a local registration sticker that was only a car tax - no inspection was required. Is there any chance that your sticker was of that type? Don't think I'm questioning your veracity - I am just curious about how things could be so different in two parts of the same State (and no one here even knew about it).