What made you UNHAPPY today!

[ChrisJ]

Andy managed to find a plate to match his username.

[Chillidoggy]

At first glance without my specs on, it looked like “Cock”, but on closer inspection I saw that wasn’t the case.

[phil flash]

Essex Police have been pedantic about number plate spacing for many years!  Wrong spacing or font causes ANPR systems problems and much of their traffic control is via cameras. Essex Magistrates support them by going for Max Fine available, last time I looked it was £1,000.

My front plate scrapped along the road after contact with a suicidal hare and wore a corner off before I stopped so I straighten it up by trimming bits off.  Unfortunately a Speed Camera confirmed it can still be read OK ...  

Patrol cars will pull you if their onboard ANPR indicates an illegal plate. It's not the copper being arsey.. an illegal plate is an illegal plate, you're just unlucky to encounter a copper, not many of them around these days. 

[Bibs]

7 minutes ago, phil flash said:

Wrong spacing or font causes ANPR systems problems

Can't see why. It's not 1970 anymore, Google can live translate text so I can't see why ANPR would struggle even slightly with mis-spaced letters. Sounds like a good excuse to pull someone over and also swell some coffers to me.

[C8RKH]

13 minutes ago, Chillidoggy said:

At first glance without my specs on, it looked like “Cock”, but on closer inspection I saw that wasn’t the case.

I tried hard to get that one too!  "C8 CKS" I mean. It would have been so apt.

I also tried to get "TW44 TTY" and "AR53 OLE" but a James Hunt must have beaten me to it.

[Colin P]

1 hour ago, Chillidoggy said:

And demanding to know who paid for the plates.

and why, despite the fact that time is of the essence and you needed them immediately, why you happened to buy them off of someone that you knew already, rather than going through a lengthy tender process.

15 minutes ago, Chillidoggy said:

At first glance without my specs on, it looked like “Cock”, but on closer inspection I saw that wasn’t the case.

 

As my mum said, if the cap fits......

[C8RKH]

1 minute ago, Colin P said:

As my mum said, if the cap fits......

I was so tempted to FTFY but out of respect for your mum. I didn't!

[Colin P]

9 minutes ago, Bibs said:

Can't see why. It's not 1970 anymore, Google can live translate text so I can't see why ANPR would struggle even slightly with mis-spaced letters. Sounds like a good excuse to pull someone over and also swell some coffers to me.

Sainsbury's seems to do a pretty good job of reading them when you drive into the car park. Stupid fonts aside. Spacing shouldn't be an issue.

[windymiller]

its a win win tho as the dvla sell and auction private plates then the olde bill charge you again for using them lols !!

[Chillidoggy]

41 minutes ago, C8RKH said:

I tried hard to get that one too!  "C8 CKS" I mean. It would have been so apt.

I also tried to get "TW44 TTY" and "AR53 OLE" but a James Hunt must have beaten me to it.

At the risk of being pedantic, that should be “Berkshire Hunt”.  Hence, “Some  Berk has half-inched my number plates.”

[exeterjeep]

33 minutes ago, windymiller said:

its a win win tho as the dvla sell and auction private plates then the olde bill charge you again for using them lols !!

I have bought 2 private plates from DVLA and as long as they are made correctly there are no issues.

[C8RKH]

4 minutes ago, exeterjeep said:

I have bought 2 private plates from DVLA and as long as they are made correctly there are no issues.

Same Here.  I have "C8 RKH" as above, but my favourite, at less than £170 delivered, is the one on my supercharged VX220 -  "X22 OSC". Same small plate (335x111) on both but official font, letter size and spacing.

[LotusFella]

I don't understand how a copper would let you off if you had the correct plate in the boot.  Surely that shows a premediated act of deceit and so should be hung drawn and quartered me lord

[exeterjeep]

7 minutes ago, exeterjeep said:

I have bought 2 private plates from DVLA and as long as they are made correctly there are no issues.

I have had other plates made, one pair just said  LOTUS and I have 2 with my post code on outside our house on the road to aid all the deliver drivers.

[Colin P]

I went to school with a guy whose dad raced Alfa Juniors. He also had 2 road cars that were pretty much identical .Used to insure and tax one - they both had the same number plate on them and when parked in the drive together he'd stick the correct plate on top of the false one on the car that wasn't insured. Dodgy bar steward.

7 minutes ago, C8RKH said:

but my favourite, at less than £170 delivered, is the one on my supercharged VX220 -  "X22 OSC". 

I won't tell you how much E17ORA costs me. Lets just say that the cards fell right and I know someone (on here) who offered the guy I bought it off of 10 times what I paid and got turned down .

[phil flash]

1 hour ago, phil flash said:

Essex Police have been pedantic about number plate spacing for many years!  Wrong spacing or font causes ANPR systems problems and much of their traffic control is via cameras. Essex Magistrates support them by going for Max Fine available, last time I looked it was £1,000.

My front plate scrapped along the road after contact with a suicidal hare and wore a corner off before I stopped so I straighten it up by trimming bits off.  Unfortunately a Speed Camera confirmed it can still be read OK ...  

Patrol cars will pull you if their onboard ANPR indicates an illegal plate. It's not the copper being arsey.. an illegal plate is an illegal plate, you're just unlucky to encounter a copper, not many of them around these days. 

I type "scraped along" but bloody autocorrect thought it knew better! 

[phil flash]

7 minutes ago, Colin P said:

I won't tell you how much E17ORA costs me. Lets just say that the cards fell right and I know someone (on here) who offered the guy I bought it off of 10 times what I paid and got turned down .

Mine was already E9 ORA (note the space!) when I bought it and played it's part in the "Yeah, I like that"...  Aquamarine, Oyster, mileage and price were main factors but the plate was 'the cherry on top'..

[C8RKH]

1 hour ago, phil flash said:

I type "scraped along" but bloody autocorrect thought it knew better! 

That's because you had messed with the font and spacing surely!

[phil flash]

6 hours ago, Chillidoggy said:

Presumably, those of us with the EU logo on our plates are now illegal, too.

I followed the instructions of Führer Johnson and stuck a Union Flag over the EU stars.   

[phil flash]

6 minutes ago, C8RKH said:

That's because you had messed with the font and spacing surely!

Ha ha but no.  Lady in the village posted on our village forum that she'd lost 'a batman hen' ... both she and I know she keeps bantams but autocorrect decided otherwise ...

[C8RKH]

1 minute ago, phil flash said:

Ha ha but no.  Lady in the village posted on our village forum that she'd lost 'a batman hen' ... both she and I know she keeps bantams but autocorrect decided otherwise ...

I stole it. Shhhhh.....

[windymiller]

the realisation of how disabled father in law now is and how life can change forever at the flick of a switch

[andydclements]

2 hours ago, windymiller said:

the realisation of how disabled father in law now is and how life can change forever at the flick of a switch

I remember how we had Social Services in to help assess father's needs, we didn't think we needed to make any changes at the time. They left and the list was massive including, shower out swap to wet room, alter doors so that he couldn't fall and prevent access to him,  still didn't think he needed those but they say so.. 12m later and realised that he'd have been unable to be at home at that point and probably would have been like that for months if it wasn't for those things having been done. It was really sobering to realise how things changed in c6months.

[PaulCP]

10 hours ago, C8RKH said:

Next, new cars will have satellite links uploading all your little indiscretions 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and tickets will be automatically issued.

The times, as they said, are a changing.

During my time in Saudi in the early 2010’s they had your car number plate, residence permit and mobile phone all linked to each other. Additionally all car number plates from a certain date (can’t remember which date but it was a few years before I was there) contained a microchip.

The result, I twice received text messages advising me of speeding less than 5 seconds after passing the (hidden) camera. One such message as per below.

Traffic Violation
6011589970
Plate NHA 8722
on 09/02 G
For Details  moi.gov.sa.

If you were planning to leave the country for whatever reason you had to make sure that all traffic violations were fully paid up, or you would be stopped at border control and turned around.

To be fair their system worked well, but it didn’t help the absolutely hopeless driving standards out there where everyone believed they were in gods hands and a red traffic light was merely an invitation to stop if you felt like it😉

Hence why I had a very large 4x4, big enough for the locals cars just to bounce off when they ignored traffic rules. The Nissan Armada was a pretty decent car as well. 5 litre engine which managed 8mpg, but who cares when petrol was cheaper than bottled water🤔

[Colin P]

4 hours ago, phil flash said:

Mine was already E9 ORA (note the space!) when I bought it and played it's part in the "Yeah, I like that"...  Aquamarine, Oyster, mileage and price were main factors but the plate was 'the cherry on top'..

Funny thing was I was playing about with all possible permutations of UK number plates and had decided that the best plate possible would be E17ORA. Coincidentally no sooner had I decided this, lo and behold the guy who had been trying to sell it for years at £20K immediately decided he’d had enough. The stars aligned. I’d also just been renovating my parents new bungalow, so they even bought it for me as a thank you.