There were two types of license (auto only and any) in 73 when I passed my test.
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www.tasom.co.uk/0_facts.asp
says
The 1969 changes were :-
"Vehicles used in the test must not have dual accelerator control unless this has been made inoperable.
A separate driving licence group for automatic vehicles is introduced.
Candidates are required to produce their driving licence to the examiner at the test and sign the examiner?s attendance record. Examiners may refuse to conduct a test if these requirements are not fulfilled.
An up-to-date scheme is introduced for licensing and testing new lorry drivers:"
lots of other interesting facts from 1923 to 2003
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Thanks everyone - obviously my memory at fault here :-)
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I've never understood why, if you took a driving test in an automatic, after x number of years you couldn't just apply for an exchange licence to allow you to drive a manual car.
It's a bit like when, many, years ago, you could drive something like a Reliant three-wheeler on a motorcycle licence but had to have the reverse gear blanked off! Thankfully this stupid rule was changed in the sixties.
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>>It's a bit like when many years ago you could drive something like a Reliant three-wheeler on a motorcycle licence but had to have the reverse gear blanked off! Thankfully this stupid rule was changed in the sixties.
I don't know which part of the rule you are referring to Galaxy, but for the record you can still drive a three wheeler on a motorcycle licence. I am not sure if there ever was a rule regarding reverse being blanked off, this may be a myth from the days when three wheelers were little more than kit cars with a motorcycle engine which did not have reverse, and in fact had to be kick started.
As regards manual/auto, the skill in driving a manual is in co-ordinating the clutch, gears and handbrake. No matter how many years you have been driving an auto these will not come naturally.
Edited by Robin Reliant on 26/11/2009 at 20:06
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The change was expected at the time my mother passed her test in 1966. She took it in an auto but then drove manuals for the next 25 years before reverting to autos after she retired. She'd had lots of practice in manuals though including Dad's Simca 1500 with a reversed gate - ie first selected with lever RIGHT then forwards.
Edited by Bromptonaut on 26/11/2009 at 20:41
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> It's a bit like when many years ago you could drive something like a Reliant
> three-wheeler on a motorcycle licence but had to have the reverse gear blanked off!
> Thankfully this stupid rule was changed in the sixties.
I don't know which part of the rule you are referring to Galaxy but for the record you can still drive a three wheeler on a motorcycle licence.
Yes, of course you can, I never said that you couldn't! But, originally, to drive a three wheeler which had a reverse gear you had to have a full car licence.
> >I am not sure if there ever was a rule regarding reverse being blanked off this maybe a myth from the days when three wheelers were little more than kit cars with a motorcycle engine which did not have reverse and in fact had to be kick started.
I can assure you there was such a rule but I am talking about a very long time ago.
My father owned a Reliant Regal Mark 5 which he drove on a motorcycle licence. When he purchased the vehicle from Pride and Clarke in Stockwell, London, it had reverse gear available. Since he was only in possession of a motorcycle licence at this time he asked the dealer to blank-off the reverse gear to make it legal for him to drive. This was duly done before delivery.
A few years later he heard from somewhere that the reverse gear rule had been abolished and tried to find out how to reinstall the reverse gear. Nobody seemed to know so, in the end, he wrote to Reliant's in Tamworth. They replied that the plate in the top of the gearbox needed to be changed, and a replacement would cost the grand sum of 10s 6d in the old money! This part was then ordered and I helped my dad fit it one Sunday afternoon. It wasn't a particulary difficult job, it was just necessary to remove the transmission tunnel and then the top cover of the gearbox, complete with gear lever. The plate was mounted on the underside of the top cover and all one had to do was to remove the four bolts holding it in place and swap the two plates over.
It's amazing what you can remember 40-odd years on. I must have been at school at the time!
Edited by Galaxy on 27/11/2009 at 20:25
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Some interesting facts, particularly that the driving test was suspended during WWII and not reintroduced until 1957, my recently deceased uncle never took a test and in the 60s and 70s drove high mileages in his job as an engineer, mind you I think you could tell he'd never taken a test really.....
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Some interesting facts particularly that the driving test was suspended during WWII and not reintroduced until 1957 >>
Not what it says in the link:
"Driving tests suspended for the duration of World War Two and resumed on 1 November 1946."
I do remember a distinction being made between a "heavy motor car" and a light one.
I think if you passed the test when under 21 you could only drive a light car, but could apply for the licence to be upgraded later.
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Driving tests were suspended(and the requirement for a qualified driver) in 1957 during the Suez "crisis". Light cars at 17-heavy motor cars added at 21.When I took my HGV(1970's),the class 1 artic was registered as a private vehicle-car road tax.(not carrying goods).
Edited by jc2 on 28/11/2009 at 13:48
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During the seventies the Civil Service in Ireland were on strike long term, something like eighteen months I believe. This included driving examiners, and the backlog of people waiting for tests became so severe that all provisional licence holders were granted a full licence without any requirement to take a test. My cousin got his licence this way, his wife who had let her provisional lapse lost out.
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