Interpretation ID: nht92-9.55

DATE: January 9, 1992

FROM: Paul Jackson Rice -- Chief Counsel, NHTSA

TO: John H. Heinrich -- District Director of Customs, U.S. Customs Service

TITLE: Case No. 92-2704-00015

ATTACHMT: Attached to letter dated 12/05/91 from John H. Heinrich and Kathleen M. Tobin to the Office of Chief Counsel, DOT (OCC 6758)

TEXT:

This responds to your letter of December 5, 1991, enclosing a petition for relief from the forfeiture of "200 Spinner Wheel Nuts" seized by the Customs Service as violative of 49 CFR Sec. 571.211. The petitioner expresses the opinion that the wheel nuts should be exempt from DOT regulations, stressing safety considerations and the need to replace worn parts on vehicles manufactured in the 1950's. You have also enclosed a copy of the petitioner's own parts list that identifies the wheel nuts as part of a conversion kit, intended to replace disc wheels with wire wheels.

Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard No. 211, Wheel Nuts, Wheel Discs, and Hub Caps, 49 CFR 571.211, precludes, for use on passenger cars, wheel nuts that incorporate winged projections. The chrome wheel nuts depicted in the Moss Motors catalogue page which you enclosed (Parts Nos. 200-210 and 200-220) clearly incorporate winged projections, and are the type of wheel nuts that Standard No. 211 addresses and prohibits. As such, they may not be imported for sale in the United States.

We have discounted petitioner's safety arguments. This is the first allegation in the nearly 24 years that the standard has been in effect that the spinners are required to replace original equipment, implying that there is no acceptable substitute that would conform with Standard No. 211. In our view, no justification has been shown for granting the petition.