Governments create regulations of varying strictness for vehicle manufacturers to follow, and those companies follow them – or evade them – with solutions that range from clever to head-clutchingly stupid. Some examples of the latter type include British Leyland raising the entire MGB an inch in order to get the headlights up to new US-market minimum-height standards (because it would have cost too many pence to redesign part of the car’s snout). Or Subaru bolting some extra-dangerous plastic seats in the bed of the BRAT, to convert it from truck to car and avoid the dreaded Chicken Tax (thus making a lot of American personal-injury attorneys quite wealthy). The list goes on and on. What’s the regulatory workaround you think is the most maddening?
Question of the Day: Worst automotive regulatory workaround?
Jacking up the entire car to meet headlight-height laws, adding sketchy plastic seats to a pickup bed to skirt the Chicken Tax… or worse?
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