[remus]

If you're feeling keen you can browse the legislation here https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1984/27/contents

[danm]

OK, I was bored and read it. Looks like you're fucked if unladen weight exceeds 3.05 tonnes even if you've re-registered as a motor caravan. It makes sense if the vehicle category relates to the unladen weight, as this won't change?

[Duma]

The unladen weight doesn't exceed  3.05 tonnes.

[Duma]

The policeman I'm emailing is claiming that the speed limits come from the the vehicle category. I'm 99% sure this is not true. A motor caravan that fits the definition I quoted earlier, and less than 3.05 tonnes unladen weight, should be subject to the same limits as a car.

The confusion comes from the fact that its been converted, but the dvla don't change the vehicle category (N1 or M1) when you get the registration updated.

What makes me really angry is that although I'm right, it's probably not worth going to court, and the situation for converted campers is unclear enough that I can't get this guy I'm corresponding with to understand.

[205Chris]

Can you ask the policeman to provide evidence of why he believes that (reference to relevant part of the law etc).

I've got a converted van under 3T classified as a MH and have always been of the belief car speed limits applied. Would be interested to know for sure if I'm in the wrong.

[gollum]

My understanding is that any vehicle that was able to have the logbook changed applied the speed limits associated with that vehicle and that the change last year was to prevent the change to the vehicle type, which then meant that the speed limits for vans apply.
Logic would suggest that the change in how a vehicle was registered, means that you are absolutely right that it doesn’t apply in your case, as the vehicle has changed previously.
Generally speaking changes to legislation do not apply retrospectively.
Interesting, insurers seem not bothered in the slightest by the changes and finance companies aren’t that concerned either.

[Duma]

Hi gollum, what do you mean by the change last year?

[gollum]

DVLA changed the rules last year for changing the type of vehicle to be classified as a camper last October, although mine couldn’t be changed in September.

Effectively meant that conversions are unlikely to be changed, as one of the criteria is a high top.

 
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/converting-a-vehicle-into-a-motor-caravan/converting-a-vehicle-into-a-motor-caravan

[205Chris]

The DVLA changed the rules last year that made it much more difficult to classify a van (like a T5/6, Transit or similar) as a motorhome. The rule change has no effect if your vehicle had already had the logbook changed.

For what it's worth my V5 states Motor Caravan with vehicle category N1.

For speed limits I use: https://www.gov.uk/speed-limits

On that webpage it lists the speed limits for Motor Caravans

I'd argue that if your V5 states Motor Caravan and you weren't exceeding the limit stated on the gov website for a Motor Caravan then you're in the right.

For me the policeman needs to do more than 'claim' speed limits come from motor category and instead show you evidence of where this is the law.

[lagerstarfish]

from

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/converting-a-vehicle-into-a-motor-caravan/converting-a-vehicle-into-a-motor-caravan

"The body type does not affect the insurance category of the vehicle, or have any effect on speed limits or other legislative requirements. It is only used for establishing vehicle appearance and identification."

[Duma]

Yes, but:

In the UK, according to The Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984, motor caravans are subject to the same speed limits as passenger cars unless they exceed 3050kg unladen weight.

The Act also states that “motor caravan” has the same meaning as in Regulation 2(1) of the Motor Vehicles (Type Approval) (Great Britain) Regulations 1979.

In this Regulation it states: ' “motor caravan” means a motor vehicle which is constructed or adapted for the carriage of passengers and their effects and which contains, as permanently installed equipment, the facilities which are reasonably necessary for enabling the vehicle to provide mobile living accommodation for its users'

so while having your logbook changed doesn't technically do anything - converting the vehicle does (the "or adapted" bit above) - and since to get your logbook changed you need to provide evidence of it being

adapted for the carriage of passengers and their effects and which contains, as permanently installed equipment, the facilities which are reasonably necessary for enabling the vehicle to provide mobile living accommodation for its users

this is basically the same thing.

[Duma]

tbh, and I don't mean to sound ungrateful, but unless anyone has actually been through this situation, or has links to case law etc that could show a definitive answer, I don't think going back over something which has been covered ad infinitum on the t4 forums and many others is going to add anything.

[Fultonius]

There are plenty of forums (pepitoo?? Or something similar?) that can help with this kind of thing.

If it was in Scotland I'd imagine the procurator fiscal wouldn't prosecute if you chose to go to court, not sure in England.

I've been driving at bang on 60 on the A9 for years (Ave speed cameras) and never had a. Ticket, we'd be 50mph if we weren't, so bound to have had a ticket by now.

2 of the guys at work have been caught out in the past as our work vans (Peugeot partners) are taxed commercially, and therefore subject to the lower "van" speed limits.

I would be fairly sure the police don't have a clue what the law actually is (no offence meant to policemen, but it's a nightmare keeping up with all the changes.)

[Duma]

Follow up: the email exchange basically came to a stalemate, in the end I ran out of time so had to return the form (drivers details etc) to stay within the 28 day limit. I included a covering note stating it was a motor caravan of less than 3.05 tonnes and therefore not subject to the reduced speed limits. Wasn't expecting much after the email exchange, but got a letter today confirming they'd dropped it!

YYFY!

[tomtom]

Result! Duma 1 : System 0.

[gollum]

Good stuff!!!!!

[andy_e]

Looking into ways of powering my laptop for (even more) remote working. Has anyone on here gone about this? I'm thinking leisure battery (also possibly solar charger) with a laptop car charger (that I already own). My laptop is a bit of a hefty unit, how long could I expect from one charge roughly?

[Fultonius]

Recently chucked a 100W solar panel on the van (£125). Laptop charger is about 80W probs at full power, but most of the time a lot less. You're going to need an absolute minimum of 32ah "available" capacity (which means a 64ah battery, as you don't want to regularly go below 50%), say, 50W average load over 8 hours to get a full day of use if it's raining etc.

For re-charging, 2 hours driving would get you about 40ah (well, likely less due to losses etc.). Solar will get you 5amps (assuming 100w panel), so 5ah/hr. i.e. 5 hours charging would put 25ah into the battery (assuming you're not simultaneously using power....)

You'd need solar controller. Our relay (VSR) had died, so we upgraded to a CTEK DC-DC charger & solar controller seems to get about 10% more capacity out the batter which is nice! Not cheap at £220 but a great bit of kit.

What's your laptop's power supply rating?  It's kind of hard without measuring your actual current draw to guess what your average consumption is. You could check your laptop batter capacity and then work it out from how long it normally takes to discharge...

[tomtom]

(and add in a hefty percentage (20-40%) for losses in charging the laptop...

[andy_e]

According to this, it has a 32Wh battery and 65 Watt, 20 V, 3.25 A power adapter output 

On a leisure battery, if it has 200 cycles, is that 200 times from full to no power before it needs replacing?

[remus]

Looking into ways of powering my laptop for (even more) remote working. Has anyone on here gone about this? I'm thinking leisure battery (also possibly solar charger) with a laptop car charger (that I already own). My laptop is a bit of a hefty unit, how long could I expect from one charge roughly?

I've got a solar setup on my van which I mainly use for charging my laptop (plus a few LED lights and a small water pump). Laptop car charger is a good shout as using an inverter to power a standard mains charger is typically pretty inefficient. In terms of the solar, I've got a ~200w panel with ~240Ah of battery capacity which is about enough for doing a few weeks remote work in the UK from march to october kinda time.

What sort of spec you go for depends on how much use you want to get out of it. If you're just going to be doing the occasional charge while away on weekends you can get away with a pretty slim setup, but if you're going to use it a lot or you want to work in your van through the depths of scottish winter then you'll want to overspec it quite a bit (both in terms of the panel and the battery). Bear in mind that the performance of your leisure battery will degrade over the course of a few years so it's worth adding some capacity to account for this. As was mentioned you also dont want to discharge the leisure battery below 50% capacity.

Solar panels themselves are relatively cheap but bear in mind you'll need a charge controller. I bought all my solar parts from these guys who were really good https://www.bimblesolar.com/

[Fultonius]

According to this, it has a 32Wh battery and 65 Watt, 20 V, 3.25 A power adapter output 

On a leisure battery, if it has 200 cycles, is that 200 times from full to no power before it needs replacing?

You should always try to avoid going to no power. Aim for sticking between 50% and 100% or you'll quickly kill it. Your 200 cycles is likely to mean 200 cycles at 50% depth of discharge. You might get 60 cycles at 100% DoD.

Google says your laptop is likely to last 4 hours on battery. 32wh @ 12v = 1.6ah for a full charge. That also means the average power consumed would be 32wh / 4 hours = 8 watts. That seems very low, so if you're doing anything demanding I'd expect that to at least double, if not tripple. Lets assume 32 watts to be safe.

32watts, running 8 hours = 21 ah. (42ah battery required, plus maybe 50% for losses etc.)

Is this actually a campervan? Do you want any other electrics? Lights, mobile phones, fridge?

[andy_e]

Is this actually a campervan? Do you want any other electrics? Lights, mobile phones, fridge?

No, it's just a weekender van, all my lights in it run off battery, and my radio supercharges my phone when I'm driving, so it would just be to power a laptop for a day or two here and there. I might park the solar idea for now.

Anyone got any decent leisure battery recommendations?

[tomtom]

Would have thought your van battery was good enough for the odd charge. Esp if you drove in between - or charged up yer laptop while driving somewhere etc... most newish laptops don’t use that much juice...

[andy_e]

Yeah potentially, but I'm thinking of sitting on it for an 8 hour day and I don't want to come to switch on the engine to discover I've got nae juice and have to walk 16 miles to the nearest croft to ask for a dig oot.

Laptop battery only lasts 1.5-2 hours when I'm doing GIS/writing papers/making figures so ideally need to keep it plugged in.