Katana Owners Club U.K.

from 2018, if you own a vehicle thats more than 4o years old, you can apply for it to be registered as a vehicle of historic interest, and from that you can be exempted from thee mot test and ved, so tax and mot free. you dont automatically get it, you need to apply when the time comes, but whilst this applys to vehicles dating from 1978, its a rolling exeemption, so will move on every year, meaning that in 3 years time, the first big katanas will become eligible. and 650 and 550 kats will be able to claim the exemption a year sooner.
its not all plain sailing however, beecause it doesnt apply to vehicles that have been 'substantially altered' from stock. although replacement engines of the correct or equivalent sort will be ok, major frame alterations or q latees wont be deemed eligible.

read the details here.

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/s ... idance.pdf

this is an interesting phrase though,

" changes of a type, that can be demonstrated to have been made when
vehicles of the type were in production or in general use (within ten years of
the end of production); "

because unlike many other models, they were still selling katana 1100's new in 2001, meaning that you can fit components from bikes from upto 2011 to a kat if you can justify it as an improvement to efficiency, safety or else an improvement to preserve it if original parts arent available.

cheers for the info John, had read through that when it appeared a while back but will be intriguing to see what if anything occurs.........

full document with further info here albeit it doesn't mention bikes specifically



https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/s ... idance.pdf

Sorry John just realised thats the same link your showed albeit i found it via a different route.........

Cant seem to find a bike specific paper??

does t specifically mention cars either. for thee sake of the law, it just mentions vehicles, and aside from th few exemptions, it applies to all vehicles meeting the age criteria. cars, bikes, mopeds, trikes, vans, campers, busses etc etc.

the whole thing is built round the taxation class of vehicles. at the moment you have multiple rates for cars, and bikes are rated on their engine size. but this law change relates to VHI's, or vehicles of historic interest. and 'historic vehicle' is a single taxation class under the law, once you have registered with the dvla that your vehicle is a VHI, if it meets the age criteria, then it becomes a vhi for taxation and mot purposes, and vhi means that whilst it still has to be 'taxed' that 'tax' is free, you just apply like you would with any vehicle, using the online system, except that you dont need to have an mot, and you now dont have to pay, they will send you a reminder every year so you can re 'tax' it, and thats the lot. so, it doesnt need to mention motorcycles, because VHI is any vehicle thats over 40 years old, be it car bike, scooter, van lorry etc etc.

makes sense i guess to cut red tape..........