Heralding a Mystery

As someone who appreciates a bit of left-wing satire, I follow The Daily Mash on Facebook.

But, as a UK car nerd, I was somewhat irked by this which appeared on my feed:

Every UK car nerd knows that they stopped building Triumph Heralds well before the 1976 that that P registration indicates.

So what is the story and why does that number plate look so familiar to me?

Was it one of the several "driven" by Thora Hird playing Edie in Last of The Summer Wine?

I put driven in quotes because

a) I don't know if Thora actually drove the cars herself

b) Whoever was driving, the joke was that Edie was crap at driving

But, in either case - no:

So, if it isn't Edie's, then I must know it from somewhere else.  A search or for "Red Triumph Herald Convertible" brought up no more images of it - not even the one from the Daily Mash piece.  A search for the registration number did bring up that photo though - but bugger all else.  Search by Image didn't help either - it just brought up some similar cars plus some Imps and Simcas.

So, what does mycarcheck tell us?

It tells us it really is a Trumph Herald from 1976:

But, of course, it can't be.  Can it?

The Government MOT check site tells us more.  It tells us that it is a 1969 car that was first registered in 1976.

Incidentally, there are only 5 MOTs recorded on there from 2013 to 2018 (when the rules were changed and MOTs were no longer required on cars over 40 years old.)  It looks like it was only doing about 100 miles in between those MOTs so I guess that it just goes to car shows every so often.

So why wasn't in registered for the first seven years of its life?

Sometimes it has been stuck in a car showroom or private collection and sometimes it has been a military vehicle.  Surely the military wouldn't be interested in a convertible Herald would they?

Except that is the wrong colour and it is left-hand drive.

So not the one Daily Mash have found.

So where did they find it?

And why does it look familiar?

I haven't the foggiest.

Arthur Daley, Little Dodgy Maybe?

And I'm not just talking about the awful cardboard cut-outs:

 

Two stars of Minder are up for sale.  The story is here.  There's no doubt about the Capri - I remember it played a big part in the opening titles. But that isn't the reg no. of Arthur's Daimler that I remember.

Now I'm not sad enough to remember all the number plates from the cars of my TV youth.

But I'd know them if I saw them again.

And I knew this one when I Googled "Arthur Daley Daimler":

I ran a quick MyCarCheck on DYO979V and it isn't on the books.  VDU342X is.

So then I tried the Government's MOT History Website. I have been aware of this site for a while and tried it out once on my Jag when I saw a link on Facebook.  Then a blogging chum of mine inspired me to look at a car I used to own.

I found out that my old Merc is now a taxi.

And still has a lot of the niggling problems that Mercs built around the turn of the Century had that made me get shut of it.

And it confirmed that DYO979V is not on the road.

Although VDU342X only seems to have been around since March 2014 when it's Front Exhaust had a minor leak of exhaust gases.

However, I found a fan-site which seems to offer a solution to the mystery.

Now, even though I'm a Jag man, I'd rather have the Capri that Dennis Waterman drove in the series.

Actually, I 'd rather have the car he drove in New Tricks:

 I could be so good for you.

Testing Times

My car passed its MOT Test on Tuesday.

It wouldn't have done so today.

The test wasn't due to expire until April 8th.  It's a good job I always put it in early because the rules changed yesterday.

Thanks for warning us about that, Ministry of Transport!!

There has been bugger-all publicity about this from what I have seen and heard.  A letter with the road-tax reminder wouldn't have gone amiss.

Even the press haven't been that bothered - The Telegraph were the only one I spotted who had a story on it.  They quote the AA's patrolman of the year who tells us, “If you’ve been happily ignoring a warning light because it’s not part of the MOT, these changes mean your car could now be on the MOT scrap heap or you’ll need to fork out on expensive repairs.”

Basically, the test is a lot tougher now including airbags, onboard sensors and other items that reflect how cars themselves have advanced technologically over the years.

On a personal note, I found out last Autumn that the rules were going to change although I didn't know when that change was going to happen.

Like Penny from The Big Bang Theory, my wife has been driving around for ages with this sight in front of her:

At the time, her MOT tester told us that we wouldn't fail for that light but it would be a failure 12 months down the line.

When Penny's car broke down and Sheldon pointed out that he'd warned her about the check engine light months before, her reply was quite logical:

"The light was just fine, it is still blinking away.  It's the stupid engine that stopped working."


My car has the opposite problem - a light that doesn't come on when it should.  The interior courtesy lights don't come on when you open the front, passenger door.

Doesn't sound like a big deal does it?

But it also means that the dashboard warning light that the door is open also doesn't come on.

Still, I have a year to get it sorted.