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I would hope the police when they see them would have a word, but I'm not sure they would.
They certainly don't seem bothered about altered spacing, 11 made into H with a black screw head, etc.
On the other hand it does identify the driver as someone who might be of interest. People who openly flout the law are more likely to be worth looking at from the police POV, and the rest of us can keep our distance.
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If I wanted to carry on a semi-criminal lifestyle, the last thing I'd do would be draw attention to myself.
I'm not sure that people who do funny/clever/ridiculous things with their number plates are anything other than silly individuals who want to show off.
That said, I personally find it irritating and pointless. Half the time it's impossible to work out the message is.
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Although many years ago i liked the one in chelsea
505EXY..
favourite ones in switzerland were VD000000
Edited by oldroverboy. on 14/08/2017 at 14:16
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Paul Daniels owned MAG iC (don't know if Debbie McGee kept it on).
Jimmy White has CUE 130Y.. He once sold it to Ronnie O'Sullivan for £2,500. Ronnie only had it for a fortnight when he gave it back to Jimmy as he disliked the attention it brought him.
I must say, with one or two notable exceptions, I find "cherished" number plates just about the most naff adornmrnt to a car the owner can add. Most of the time they mean absolutely nothing to anybody other than the owner and his acquaitences but more importantly they often hinder the prime (or even sole) purpose of the number plate - to quickly and easily read it so as to identify the vehicle. It should not be necessary to go through a number of permutations to interpret the dsplay.
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I have a couple of 'cherished' numbers. Neither gives a clue to my name, they are both just interesting dateless numbers that are mine. The plates are legal, and plain. I can reel the numbers off like my mother's Coop number or my NI number. They were cheap, and my heirs can probably get a bit more for them than I paid, should they so choose.
I admit to 'judging' people who mess about with the letters and the spacing. And despite the obvious stupidity of having an illegal plate while breaking other rules, it does seem that shady types often do it. That said, a very moral and upright friend has one that must have used an entire bag of black-headed screws and some very creative spacing.
What I would like to have is the number from my father's first car, a Morris Minor, OYG 7. It is unlikely, because AFAIK DVLA does not reissue numbers and it isn't currently in use, so has probably gone.
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As this old faithful has resurfaced, I would remind you of the old Aberdeen 'plate ORG 45M. I saw it advertised for sale some time last year IIRC.
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On the other hand it does identify the driver as someone who might be of interest. People who openly flout the law are more likely to be worth looking at from the police POV, and the rest of us can keep our distance.
Speaking as a former Police Officer, that's bang on. Just about everyone I pulled over for illegal plates played stupid, yet they'd happily talk to you about their car, its performance and what mods they were thinking of buying. A lot of the time these same people didn't have insurance, tax or an MOT.
Quite why someone would drive with obviously illegal plates whilst also flouting other legal requirements has always remained a mystery to me...
Edited by Bicycle_Repair_Man on 14/08/2017 at 15:47
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I too, with very few exceptions, do not see the appeal of the personal number plate. Back in the early 90's i worked at a saab dealership in Aberdeen and the boss, Adrian Smith, was really, really into personalized number plates. During the 4.5 years i was there, most of the demo's and courtesy cars (and the van we used for parts delivery) had a personal plate, usually something ending in SAB. But the best by far, and one of the few i really liked was FLY 900T, which was on a 900 turbo 16S. He still has that plate, and it is still on an immaculate classic shape 900 turbo 16S. I know this because i saw him in it the day me and my wife ordered our new honda jazz back in March!.
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I have seen this plate fairly locally, its the only plate SWMBO wants.
AR51COW
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"AR51COW"
Maybe I'm really thick or something, but what does this even mean?
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Try reading the 5 as an S.
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"Try reading the 5 as an S."
Thanks - I tried that. Still doesn't make sense. Is "arsi" or even "arsy" a word?
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a***y
informal
1.
-
BRITISH
bad-tempered or uncooperative.
"I was half an hour late phoning her and she didn't get all a***y about it"
Edited by Manatee on 15/08/2017 at 10:08
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My initials are DKE, and I used to be in the fire service. I saw X999 DKE for sale a while back for around 500 nicker plus the transfer fee, and I was really tempted. But I didn't buy in the end because it seemed not only extravagant but rather pompous, given my lowly financial status, to have a private plate.
Looked again a few weeks ago and it was still for sale.
Dilemmas...decisions....hmmm. After all, I do have a credit card.
Edit: just looked again and its £650 including VAT and transfer fee. So they can shove it.
Edited by argybargy on 15/08/2017 at 10:41
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So you have to equate "AR51" (on the number plate) with "ARSI", with another word that is two letters different.
What is the point? And - why on earth do people pay money for this sort of thing? Why do people spend good money on a piece of illiteracy?
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I guess folk spend good money on numerous things which are pointless to anyone else. Dishwashers, cruises, garden water features etc, etc. (In my view!)
Personal plates always mean more to the owner than the onlooker and I agree some you can't even make out the message.
A local car to me has HU11YOB, no messing with letters needed - always makes me smile when I see it.
I like the fact that they hide the real age of a car and take away the 'must have new reg wannabe'.
I personally think we should all have our own number which stays with us whenever the vehicle is swapped and I guess there would stop the bi annual stampede for the latest number.
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A local car to me has HU11YOB, no messing with letters needed - always makes me smile when I see it. ...
Is this because you live in Kingston upon Hull where the yobs come from?
I though Hull was renowned as the city of culture 2017.
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Kingston upon Hull has yobs? But you live in the city of culture 2017!
'Oh no the neighbours from Hull' , as the Private Eye cartoon put it.
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In his earlier life an acquaintance of ours, a retired solicitor, was expected to maintain appearances within the practice by driving a fairly recent motor. He didn't really want to do that so put a 'cherished' plate on it so it was harder to tell the difference.
There can be all sorts of reasons.
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Beverley to be more accurate!
And for those who may be wondering, it wasn't on one of John Prescott's Jags!
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Years ago (1968) a guy who played rugby for our team had a green and white Austin Mini with the number plate 0000 77. Wonder where that is now and what it may be worth. Bet he wished he had kept it. Cheers Concrete
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I remember seeing two "posh" cars many many moons ago (prob 40 years) in a pub carpark near Bowdon (very Posh) with the regs.... BBC1 & BBC2......Never forgot that...is was in my motorbike days so cant remember the cars but either jags or Rollers.
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Years ago (1968) a guy who played rugby for our team had a green and white Austin Mini with the number plate 0000 77. Wonder where that is now and what it may be worth. Bet he wished he had kept it. Cheers Concrete
That's not a UK format number - the letters could be O (Birmingham), OO or OOO (both Essex) on the original system of OO (Oxford) on the current system - 077 isn't valid as leading zeros aren't used.
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I saw a car in North Yorkshire with the plate: AN08EDS, I must have a dirty mind but I saw the funny side.
I have also seen a car in Burton on Trent with the plate:101NCH which reads 10 1NCH.
My latest company car since April is one with a personal plate at last, the first two letters are YR, to me means Yo Rob.
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Years ago (1968) a guy who played rugby for our team had a green and white Austin Mini with the number plate 0000 77. Wonder where that is now and what it may be worth. Bet he wished he had kept it. Cheers Concrete
That's not a UK format number - the letters could be O (Birmingham), OO or OOO (both Essex) on the original system of OO (Oxford) on the current system - 077 isn't valid as leading zeros aren't used.
It was the number and it was legal. I was not dreaming it. It was quite common to have 4 numbers and 2 letters for a registration plate in the late 50's early 60's. My first car was 1787 KW so 0000 77 could easily have been a number issued well before number plates became symbolic. I am sure some research may confirm this. The guy that owned the Mini was an engineer at a local company and very straight laced, I doubt very much if he had either the wit or intention to perpetrate a fraud. Cheers Concrete
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Years ago (1968) a guy who played rugby for our team had a green and white Austin Mini with the number plate 0000 77. Wonder where that is now and what it may be worth. Bet he wished he had kept it. Cheers Concrete
That's not a UK format number - the letters could be O (Birmingham), OO or OOO (both Essex) on the original system of OO (Oxford) on the current system - 077 isn't valid as leading zeros aren't used.
It was the number and it was legal. I was not dreaming it. It was quite common to have 4 numbers and 2 letters for a registration plate in the late 50's early 60's. My first car was 1787 KW so 0000 77 could easily have been a number issued well before number plates became symbolic. I am sure some research may confirm this. The guy that owned the Mini was an engineer at a local company and very straight laced, I doubt very much if he had either the wit or intention to perpetrate a fraud. Cheers Concrete
I know that two letters and 4 numbers were common, before being replaced by three letters and three numbers - but leading zeros weren't normally permitted - so OO 0077 isn't valid, neither is OOO 077 - regardless of the spacing.
The only form of leading zero permitted are special cases, like G0 and S0 for the Lord Provosts of Glasgow and Edinburgh respectively. Leading zeros are also permitted on trade plates but none would yield that combination.
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I bow to your superior knowledge RT. I have just checked with an old friend and he thinks the number plate was 00 7777. It definitely was something along those lines. I take your point regarding leading zeros, but could this have happened before the realisation that leading zeros could be misleading? 00 was either a Birmingham or London registration. DC and XG were the local ones to me when I was a lad and it was common to see DC 1234 or XG 1234 for example, so could the same have applied to the 00 designation? Just a thought. Cheers Concrete
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I bow to your superior knowledge RT. I have just checked with an old friend and he thinks the number plate was 00 7777. It definitely was something along those lines. I take your point regarding leading zeros, but could this have happened before the realisation that leading zeros could be misleading? 00 was either a Birmingham or London registration. DC and XG were the local ones to me when I was a lad and it was common to see DC 1234 or XG 1234 for example, so could the same have applied to the 00 designation? Just a thought. Cheers Concrete
OO 7777 is indeed a valid number from before 1963 - OO was Chelmsford. Many Ford press cars had OO registrations. Although Birmingham had O and many O- combinations, it didn't have all of them
OO 7777 is currently on a black 1980 Mercedes-Benz 4.5 - according to it's MoT history it's only done 18 miles in 4 years
After 2001 OO for Oxford couldn't have a 4-digit number attached
Edited by RT on 16/08/2017 at 18:22
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<< OO 7777 is indeed a valid number from before 1963 - OO was Chelmsford. Many Ford press cars had OO registrations. >>
Essex was one of the first authorities to run out of the old-style ABC123 number sequences. To keep things ticking over they were allocated OO and WC - the first had been avoided because of confusion with letters, the second to avoid offending sensibilities.
The final handout was BF (which may seem inoffensive these days, but certainly wasn't in the early days of the system) and that went to Staffordshire.
RT may know more details .......
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Plenty of coach companies seem to do this. So the punters who want to ride in a new glossy coach get an older glossy one.....
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Plenty of coach companies seem to do this. So the punters who want to ride in a new glossy coach get an older glossy one.....
They seem to like dateless Irish numbers.
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I had an old 100E with the registration OO 3273. Flogged it for a fiver with a rear spring hanger poking through the boot floor and big-ends rattling.
Had V107 FET which some folk seemed to think said violet. It was on the car when I both bought and sold it. I certainly didn't pay a premium for it, nor did the buyer when I sold it on.
I understand they're termed 'prat plates' in the trade. Can't understand why, as a prat is someone who prattles.
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There's a drain-clearing company (for want of a better word) in this part of the world who got hold of ___POO and ___PEE for their vans.
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