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Apparently, but little American-spec Honda is a menace to German roads. How do I know this? Because I took the TÜV test. TÜV is the group in Germany which tests cars to make sure they are compliant to the appropriate German regulations. My 2000 Civic didn’t pass this all of the tests.
The easy test were for emissions. I was peeking at the test station, and it looks like they test for carbon dioxide and a couple other things. The Civic easily passed these. Then they ran it on a little vehicle dyno (that’s what it looked looked to me) and checked the turn signals, reverse lights, brake lights, headlights, etc. He seemed to think this was all right.
Next, they put the Civic up on ahoist and started poking and prodding at its belly. They checked the play in the steering, brakes, exhaust and so on. They even lifted the engine a few inches to see what it would do. I’m sure there’s a reason for this test, and maybe someone out there can tell me what that is.
Finally, he checked the headlights. Somehow, they didn’t seem to like them. My best guess is that the dispersion pattern is all wrong. He then proceeded to tell me all that was unholy about my car. I didn’t catch everything,, as he was speaking in German, but this is what I (sort of) understood.
Headlights are all wrong. There will be death and carnage on the autobahn unless I change them. Yellow park lights are not allowed up front. There will be death and carnage in parking lots unless I change them. The red reflectors on the brake lights are not big enough. People will constantly run into me from the rear, resulting in the aforementioned death and carnage. There is no rear fog light, resulting in, well, you get the idea. Also, the park lights have to be fused separately on the left and right. (I actually got the translation of this much later.)
I also needed other things, like a piece of paper saying what kind of motor was in the car. Looking under the hood is very unreliable, apparently. For this privilege of being told that I have the car from American automotive hell, I paid around $125.
Most of what I understood didn’t seem to be a big deal to do. However, I didn’t have a lot of time, and I didn’t actually know exactly what it was that I was supposed to do. I decided to wimp out and get a dealership to do it. The dealership was more than happy to take $1200 of my money to do this, including getting it registered.
And this is where my real problem was. They were going to try and get a personalized plate for me. The first letter has to start with an R for Regensburg. So of course I asked for R-SR 951. I got R-EM 951. Okay -- so that wasn’t too bad. However, when I asked the dealeship where my Michigan personalized license plate was, they told me that the vehicle registration department kept it, becausethe car is now officially moved to Germany, and that was that. Next, please.
So after counting to a very large prime number, I went to the registration place and begged for my license plate back. I don’t know if a license plate technically belongs to us when we get one in Michigan, but the state has never asked one back from me. I had to give them a reason why I wanted them back. I decided to begging was better than going postal, and this seemed to work.
What bugs me the most is why different countries have different rules for cars.
| << March 2001<< | >> May 2001>> |
(The BahnStormer is the official newsletter of the Rally Sport Region (Detroit area) of the Porsche Club of America. You can contact the editor at .)
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