Well, the day came after around 8 years of not having an MOT. Mancbuses finally after many false starts got it to the MOT testing station. We use Martin’s MOT Test Center which is in Middlewich. We used these for the Volvo B10 about 3 years ago and the tester remembered us even though we hadn’t been back since.
Trying to get a vehicle that has been off the road for so long through a test is not easy by any means. In this post, I am going to go through the things we had to do to get it to Pass. Yes, we did get a pass but it wasn’t as simple as turning up and passing.
As in the video with the B10 which you can find here, This time I didn’t film inside the test center, but it was the same test. Starting off outside the test area check all the Lights and Beam angles from the headlights, wipers, and washers.
Once this has been checked its moves forward to the Emissions test. Now this engine has sat a lot of idling which being a Cummins they do not like to be idling for long periods of time so having been sat for an hour outside the test center idling a level of Smoke had built up and took about 4 attempts to pass the test but it did which is important. As I will state in a video coming soon the guy who does the testing is brilliant and understands if you tell him and he will help you pass it without cheating it.
Next is the move forward again to the Shaking plates and Jacks. where they will inspect the steering and chassis etc. Finally is the last move forward to the brake tester. This for us was a total level of unknown and turns out the front brakes are really good. and the rears not so much but he could see that they were getting better as they warmed up.
The results the first time around were.
| Service Brake | NS | OS | Imbalance | System Efficiency |
| Axle 1 | 0739KG (L) | 1400KG (L) | 47% | |
| AXLE 2 | 1261KG | 1233KG | 02% | 35% |
| PARKING BRAKE | NS | OS | IMBALANCE | SYSTEM EFFICIENCY |
| (APP) AXLE 2 | 1217KG | 1255KG | 03% | 19% |
RESULT = FAILED
Test 2
| Service Brake | NS | OS | Imbalance | System Efficiency |
| AXLE 1 | 1003KG (L) | 1318KG (L) | 24% | |
| AXLE 2 | 2134KG | 2010KG (L) | 06% | 49% |
| Parking Brake | NS | OS | Imbalance | System Efficiency |
| (APP) AXLE 2 | 1915KG (L) | 1938KG (L) | 01% | 29% |
RESULT = PASS
As you can see it took a little to get a pass and a certain way of braking it also required us to leave the testing lane to go up and down the road with the handbrake on warming up the rear brakes in order to get greater efficiency out of them as he noticed the more he pushed them the better the brakes was getting so quickly sent us away to warm the brakes up and build full pressure.
At the end of all the stress and upset we have had we got the pass and we will be out of the road now planning trips etc that people can come and join us on.