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astra_conv:approval:approval

administrative tasks

This chapter covers the non-technical preconditions to get a self-converted car on the road - specific to Austria.

approval process

In order to receive road admittance, the vehicle must be approved by the governmental regional inspection authority (“Landesprüfstelle”) of the Austrian province where the owner of the car has his main residence. The requirements of the inspection authority are specific to the laws of the respective province.

The tests can be done by an approved accreditation institute, such as TUEV Austria (www.tuev.at). Theoretically, a civil engineer could also do the accreditation, but I could not find one who would claim himself competent.

The accreditation institute will then do the required tests and hand the results over to the inspection authority, who will then hopefully issue the road admittance.

If the rest of the car (axle loads, wheels, steering …) stays in line with its certificate of conformity, an EV conversion can legally be treated as an engine swap. That is, the accreditation will focus on properties related to the engine/motor. Note that this proceeding only applies to the simple “engine swap type” conversion like the one I did, with the electic motor flanged to the conventional gearbox, and no further changes to the drivetrain.

For electric propulsion, the inspection authority will generously set aside an analysis of the exhaust fumes. Till shortly, they still required a (very expensive) test whether the noise emissions dont exceed the limits, but this has luckily be changed meanwhile.

An even more expensive test for electromagnetic compatibility may be required depending on the province's laws.

Most important is an electric vehicle's accordance with the European regulation ECE R-100, that mainly covers safety aspects of the electric circuitry and of the handling of an electric car. I have mentioned ECE R-100 frequently in above chapters, since numerous measures had to be taken specifically to meet it's requirements.

Even exceeding the R-100 scope was the requirement by TUEV (and governmental inspection authority) to include a permanent check of the isolation between the car's chassis and the traction circuit, and to even couple its output to the immobilizer (see the respective chapters above).

insurance and tax

A motor liability insurance is authoritative. In Austria, a motor-dependent tax is levied together with the insurance rate. Fortunately, electric propulsion is freed from the motor-dependent tax, so only payment of the insurance rate is required.

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astra_conv/approval/approval.txt · Last modified: 2014/04/23 19:01 by richard