Originally Posted by Aviatrix
You mean... you don't have road worthiness tests in the USA???
I never knew that... it's amazing what one learns on FT.
We have them here in the UK (yearly - I believe it's only every other year in Germany), and I always assumed all civilised countries did.
I knew this from previous experience, but no one in Europe ever believes me when I tell them if they haven't seen it for themselves.
There's a program on MTV called Pimp My Ride which will probably never be copied in Europe for the very simple reason that these hopeless hunks of junk that are refurbished on the show would have made their way to the junkyard ages ago.
A great number of the cars still driving (if you can call it that) on American roads are accidents waiting to happen. I certainly wouldn't be driving at 220 km/h in one of those things. But if you've got a car that is up to that kind of performance, then it's all not a problem, provided you stick to one simple rule: keep right whenever you can. This will solve 90% of your problems when driving in Germany.