Portable Tire Pump

The portable tire pump does not just save you the inconvenience of going to the filling station or the few cents you may be charged for using the filling station pump. As would be expected, it is generally slower than its filling station counterpart due to the size of its motor. Those that pump quickly tend to drain the battery fast, and even if the engine is on the battery may not recharge fast enough. All things considered, it tends to give better accuracy for two reasons:

1. You have the luxury of checking your tire pressure in the morning before you drive off. A tyre that has been working or exposed to the sun tends to have higher pressure that a cold one.

2. It is better maintained. It does not go through the rough handling such as being banged, dropped and poorly stored as its filling station counterpart experiences.
Benefits accrued from having the correct tyre pressures are longer tyre life, better handling in adverse conditions, improved fuel economy, and most importantly fewer accidents. By the way, the recommended tire pressure can be found at the sticker on the driver's side door, the owner's manual and not on the tyre wall.

Here are some of the things you need to take into account while choosing a portable tyre pump:

Ease of use: The cable must be long enough to reach all tyres. While you think this should be obvious, not all pumps meet this basic criterion. A cable length of 9 feet would be sufficient. Still on this point, you should be able to use it without needing someone to hold the pump nozzle for you or help you remove it from the tyre valve. Quite a number of well known brands are not exactly user friendly and tend to be either too loose or too tightly gripped at the nozzle that keeping the nozzle on the tyre valve or even removing it becomes an unpleasant experience.

Capacity: It should have a pressure range of between 0 - 150 PSI. Another measure of capacity is how quickly it fills up the tyre. Just like anything else you buy do not take the seller's word for it. Search the net reviews about the product in places like amazon about its performance before you make a commitment.

Versatility: you do not just want a "one trick pony". Most pumps come with adapters for bikes, air mattresses and football. Make sure these come with your portable tyre pumps.

British Number Plates

Car number plates have been a feature of British motoring since 1903 when the first ever vehicle registration number was issued. This car number plate was A 1 issued in London. At this time it was the role of councils to issue vehicle registration numbers the alpha characters were used to represent the issuing office, the numerical characters 0-9 being the random component.

The vehicle registration index in England, Wales and Scotland excluded the I & Z's characters. The I & Z characters were used in Northern Ireland who had their own unique system for car registration numbers. G, S & V and their double letter combination characters were originally to be used exclusively for Scotland. This had to be abandoned due to increased demand although I and Z were only used in Ireland.

Dateless Number Plates

The term dateless referrers to registrations that have no age indicator. The earlier car registration numbers were all dateless. There are still thousands of dateless registration numbers on the road today in the United Kingdom. These however are now private number plates. They are a great way for there owners to make a statement about themselves and their personality. Some dateless registrations are used to display the owners initials others reflect a name, hobby, football team, company, qualification, children, grand children or whatever is personal to the owner.

Suffix Number Plates.

The dateless registration number was limited to the amount of possible combinations could be issued. As popularity of the motor vehicle increased the DVLA had to come up with a new scheme to accommodate the volume of new vehicles being registered. Hence the suffix registration was born in 1963. The Format of the registration was three letters excluding I,Q & Z, this represented the issued office. Followed by three numerical characters 0-9, this was the random part or the registration number. The final component was the Suffix character, a single alpha character to represent the first year the vehicle was registered. Each year a new suffix letter was issued reflecting vehicles first registered. This worked really well for many years with motorists seeing who could be first to get a new vehicle on August the 1st, the first day of the registration year. Today private number plates in the suffix style are increasing in popularity.

Prefix Number Plates

By 1983 the Suffix registration number system was exhausted and the DVLA yet again have to rethink the vehicle indexing system. Having had this problem previously they were well equipped with what to do.

As with dateless numbers when the need to increase the available numbers they had reversed them. Essentially that is what happened to suffix DVLA number plates, introducing the prefix car registration numbers. The first Character was an alpha character, representing the vehicle age. Followed by three numbers, 0-9, this was the random component in the vehicle registration number. Then the alpha block, three letters excluding I,Q & Z that reflected the registering office.

The motor trade were delighted in August when there sales rocketed as motorists rushed to get a new registered car, for 12 months everyone would know that had a brand new car quiet a status symbol.

The problem for them was this huge peak in their selling calendar and for years the motor traded lobbied for a change. In 2001 they got their way and since then there has been two registration number changes a year March 1st & September 1st.