ID: nht71-5.24

DATE: 12/15/71

FROM: AUTHOR UNAVAILABLE; E. T. Driver; NHTSA

TO: Mobilefreeze Co., Inc.

TITLE: FMVSS INTERPRETATION

TEXT: This is in reply to your letter of September 7, 1971, to Mr. Stan Haransky, Truck Body and Equipment Association, Inc., concerning the mounting height of lamps and reflectors on your motor-cycle trailers.

A copy of Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard No. 108, "Lamps, Reflective Devices and Associated Equipment" is enclosed for your information. The minimum mounting height for lamps and reflectors listed in Table IV of this Standard is 15 inches. We do not have the authority to exempt any motor vehicles from meeting these requirements.

Enc.

ID: nht71-5.25

DATE: 12/15/71

FROM: AUTHOR UNAVAILABLE; E. T. Driver; NHTSA

TO: Ambassador Trailers

TITLE: FMVSS INTERPRETATION

TEXT: This is in reply to your letter of November 4, 1971, to the Department of Transportation, concerning lighting requirements on your boat trailers.

A copy of Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard No. 108, "Lamps, Reflective Devices and Associated Equipment" is enclosed for your information. The location of the lamps and reflectors shown on your drawing appears to meet the requirements of Standard No. 108, providing they are mounted to meet the height requirements.

Since the width of your trailer is more than 80 inches, front and rear clearance lamps and rear identification lamps are also required as specified in Table I and located as specified in Table II. Combination front and rear clearance lamps are allowed in paragraph S4.1.1.9.

There are no other requirements for trailers specified in the Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards.

Enc.

ID: nht71-5.26

DATE: 12/17/71

FROM: AUTHOR UNAVAILABLE; Richard B. Dyson; NHTSA

TO: Maxim Motor Division

COPYEE: STAN HARANSKY

TITLE: FMVSS INTERPRETATION

TEXT: This is in response to your letter concerning the requirements of Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard 206. Your letter(Illegible Word) forwarded to us November 10, 1971, by Mr. Stan Haransky. Associate Director of the Truck Body and Equipment Association, Inc.

You ask whether the standard would prohibit the manufacture of fire trucks without side doors on the cabs. According to your letter, the trucks are built without side doors in order to allow firemen to enter and exit the cabs quickly during emergencies.

Standard 206 does not require that any type of motor vehicle be equipped with side doors. The standard requires only that if a vehicle subject to it has hinged or sliding side doors, they must conform with the standard's performance requirements for hinges, locks and latches.

Please write if I can be of any further assistance.

ID: nht71-5.27

DATE: 12/21/71

FROM: AUTHOR UNAVAILABLE; L. R. Schneider; NHTSA

TO: Department of California Highway Patrol

TITLE: FMVSS INTERPRETATION

TEXT: This is in reply to your letter of August 6, 1971, in which you enclosed copies of drawings illustrating clearance and side marker lamps installed on several types of trucks and trailers in compliance with the requirements of the California Vehicle Code and asked for our advice as to whether there are any conflicts with the Federal requirements.

There are several such conflicts, and our comments follow:

1. REQ BUL-3 SUPPLEMENT 1

(a) Page 2 - Standard No. 108 prescribes the general location of clearance lamps and side marker lamps without specifying tolerances. The first sentence of each of the paragraphs on clearance lamps and side marker lamps adequately reflect the Federal requirements. These general requirements of Standard No. 108 preempt the authority of a State to prescribe tolerance for alternate locations of the lamps and subsequent sentences in these paragraphs which do so are improper.

(b) Page 3 - Figure 3, Combination Clearance and Sidemarker Lamps, does not appear to properly illustrate the requirement that a clearance lamp be visible at an angle of 45 degrees to the right.

2. Truck tractors

(a) Statements appear frequently that front amber side marker lamps are "Not required on pre-1969 Tractors." This is incorrect; front amber side marker lamps are required on any truck tractor 80(Illegible Word) inches in overall width, manufactured on or after January 1, 1968.

(b) Various figures illustrate truck tractors with red rear clearance and side marker lamps. It is unclear whether California requires truck tractors to be equipped with these lamps, or whether the figures illustrate acceptable counting locations if a vehicle is so equipped. Standard No. 108 provides that(Illegible Words) preemption provisions of the Vehicle(Illegible Words) to require them.

3. Clearance lamps

(a) The figures do not clearly illustrate whether the widest point of vehicles is the front fender or body (i.e. tank on tank trucks, flat bed on "dromedary" trucks and flat bed trucks, van on van body trucks, body on utility trucks). If the body is the widest point of the vehicle, amber clearance lamps must be mounted there, but if the widest point is at the front fenders, the clearance lamps must be mounted at that location. No alternate locations are permissible, though shown in your figures, and in any event, cab-mounted clearance lamps are inappropriate whether single or combined with another lamp.

(b) The widest point of a horse trailer is the fender, and clearance lamps must be mounted here, not on the body.

4. Logging dolly. Logging dollies are "pole trailers" for purposes of the Federal motor vehicle safety standards and are specifically excluded from Standard No. 108. Therefore, we have no comments on California's requirements.

5. Boat trailers

(a) Clearance lamps are not required if the trailer is less than 80 inches wide.

(b) A combination clearance lamp (amber to front, red to rear) is permitted, if it is located atop the fender, as an alternative to separate amber and red clearance lamps.

(c) The required location of the front amber side marker lamp for trailers (not shown on your figure) is "as far to the front as practicable," with a permissible location "as far forward as practicable exclusive of the trailer tongue."

We are returning to you copies of the drawings you enclosed, marked to reflect our comments.

ID: nht71-5.28

DATE: 12/23/71

FROM: AUTHOR UNAVAILABLE; Lawrence R. Schneider; NHTSA

TO: Volkswagen of America, Inc.

TITLE: FMVSS INTERPRETATION

TEXT: Your letter of July 2, 1971, points out an apparent conflict within the upper torso seat belt anchorage location requirement of standard No. 210. The conflict is between the provision of S4.3.2 that the range of permissible locations is established with the seat back in its most upright position and the provision that the 2 dimensional manikin shall have its "H" point on the seating reference point. The manikin's "H" point may not be capable of being positioned on the seating reference point if the manufacturer has used a "nominal design riding position" other than the "most upright position" in establishing the seating reference point.

We agree that the conflict exists and intend to eliminate it by appropriate amendment in the Federal Register.

We will advise you upon issuance of the amendment.

ID: nht71-5.29

DATE: 12/22/71

FROM: AUTHOR UNAVAILABLE; L. R. Schneider; NHTSA

TO: Holophane Company, Inc.

TITLE: FMVSS INTERPRETATION

TEXT: This is in response to your letter of December 13, 1971, in which you made further comments on the requirements of Standard No. 108 with respect to school bus lighting. You expressed concern over the fact that a company holds a patent relating to the wiring for eight-lamp systems that are permitted (though not required) under Standard No. 108.

Although the existence of patents is one factor that may be taken into account in setting motor vehicle safety standards, it is not the primary one. This agency is charged by Congress with the responsibility of setting standards that represent the best possible resolution of the problems of safety, cost, and technological feasibility. If two alternative regulatory courses of action are found to be substantially equal in other respects, the agency might prefer the one in which the largest number of companies were free to compete at will. But the granting of patents is a long-established policy of our government, administered by the U.S. Patent Office under the direction of Federal statutes and the Constitution. We do not, therefore, agree with your suggestion that it is "against public interest" to issue regulations that have the incidental effect of favoring or requiring the use of patented products.

ID: nht71-5.3

DATE: 11/18/71

FROM: AUTHOR UNAVAILABLE; Richard B. Dyson; NHTSA

TO: Recreational Vehicle Institute, Inc.

TITLE: FMVSS INTERPRETATION

TEXT: As we have advised Ed Bernett of your office from time to time during the fall, a response to your letter on the treatment of removable foam seat cushions under Standard No. 207 has been under review for some time.

Standard No. 207 is essentially a test of the strength of the seat structure. As such it does not prohibit the use of removable seat cushions of the type described in your letter.

We consider it to be the intent of the standard, however, that when the momentum of a cushion is transferred in any way to the seat structure during the course of an acceleration in a given direction, the weight of the cushion must be added to the weight of the seat structure in calculating the force to be applied in that direction under 84.2 and 34.3.2.

ID: nht71-5.30

DATE: 12/27/71

FROM: AUTHOR UNAVAILABLE; Richard B. Dyson; NHTSA

TO: Angle Product Company

TITLE: FMVSS INTERPRETATION

TEXT: This is in further response to the telephone inquiries you made on December 14, 1971, concerning the effective date of Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards 206 with respect to trucks.

You stated that you understood that the original January 1, 1972, effective date had been or would be postponed to September 1, 1972. No such postponement has been made or proposed. The standard will go into effect with respect to trucks on the first of this coming year, as originally scheduled.

Your source of information may have confused the effective date of the standard with that of a minor proposed amendment to the standard. That amendment, which was to become effective on January 1, 1972, is now scheduled to become effective September 1, 1972. A copy of that proposed amendment is enclosed for your information.

You also asked about the existence of a mailing list which would enable you to receive our new standards and amendments to our existing standards. The Government Printing Office periodically publishes supplements to a loose-leaf publication entitled "Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard and Regulations." The most recent supplement, number 5, was published in November of this year. Detailed information concerning this service, including its cost, can be obtained from the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C. 20402.

If you wish to receive our proposed, as well as our final, new standard and amendments, you should consider subscribing to the Federal Register. A year's subscription to this publication, which cost $ 25.00, can be ordered from the Superintendent of Documents.

Please write if we can be of further assistance.

ENC.

ID: nht71-5.31

DATE: 12/27/71

FROM: AUTHOR UNAVAILABLE; Richard B. Dyson; NHTSA

TO: Crane Carrier Company

TITLE: FMVSS INTERPRETATION

TEXT: This is in response to your letter of November 16 and 30, 1971, concerning the application of Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard No. 206 to heavy duty trucks. You reported that you are unlikely to be able to bring the side door locks and latches on your truck into conformity with the standard until mid-1972.

In your first letter, you asked whether the standard will apply to all trucks or only those having a GVWR of more than 10,000 pounds. The standard will apply, beginning January 1, 1972, to all trucks without regard to their GVWR.

In your second letter, you requested for your trucks a temporary exemption of 180 days from the standard. We regret that we are unable to consider your request, since our authority under section 123 of the National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act (15 U.S.C. 1410) to grant such exemptions expired in April of this year.

Beginning January 1, 1972, the manufacture of any truck not in compliance with Standard 206 will be prohibited. Section 108(a) of the Act provides that

"No person shall manufacture for sale . . . any motor vehicle . . . manufactured on or after the date any applicable . . . standard takes effect . . . unless it is in conformity with such standard . . ." (15 U.S.C. 1397)

This prohibition is enforceable by civil penalties under section 109 (15 U.S.C. 1398) and injunction under section 110 (15 U.S.C. 1399). In addition, in the event that a noncompliance were determined to be a safety-related defect, notification of the defect would have to be furnished under section 113 (15 U.S.C. 1402).

Let us know if we may be of further assistance.

ID: nht71-5.32

DATE: 12/28/71

FROM: AUTHOR UNAVAILABLE; Richard B. Dyson; NHTSA

TO: U.S. Suzuki Motor Corporation

TITLE: FMVSR INTERPRETATION

TEXT: This is in reply to your letter of November 17, 1971, enclosing copies of consumer information documents you plan to use to comply with the Consumer Information requirements applicable to motorcycles. You state that you plan to place the information for particular models back to back on the same sheet of paper in order that they may correspond to your specification sheets.

The documents you have submitted, when they contain the appropriate values, will comply with the Consumer Information regulations. There is no prohibition against placing the information for two models back to back on the same sheet as you plan to do.

We are pleased to be of assistance.