Legality of Harnesses and Roll Cages
 

Hey RS Constables,

I picked up a car recently and it has 5 point Simpson harnesses and a full 6 point bolt-in cage. It needs to be OOP inspected and when I looked at the MVA, there does not seem to be any specific guidelines on whether these are road-legal or not?

The MVA states that seat belts must be certified but no mention of harnesses. I couldn't find anything on cages at all.

Previous threads on RS weren't conclusive apart from anecdotal evidence and uninformed opinions...

Thanks in advance. :)

Here is what is required. If your harness meets these requirements then it is legal. As you have removed the required equipment (220 (3) ) then I don't see how it can.

Safety belts

7.13 (1) In this section "safety belt" means a single occupancy safety seat belt for use in a motor vehicle.

(2) The manufacturer of a safety belt assembly shall not sell the assembly or offer it for sale unless

(a) it conforms to the standard of performance for safety belt assemblies made by the Society of Automotive Engineers or the Canadian Standards Association, and

(b) it bears an identifying mark showing compliance with the standard of performance for safety belt assemblies made by the Society of Automotive Engineers or the Canadian Standards Association, as the case may be.

(3) No person shall sell or offer for sale a safety belt assembly unless the assembly bears an identifying mark as required in subsection (2) (b).


Seat belt assembly
220 (1) In this section, "seat belt assembly" means a device or assembly suitably fastened to the motor vehicle composed of straps, webbing or similar material that restrains the movement of a person in order to prevent or mitigate injury to the person and includes a pelvic restraint, an upper torso restraint or both of them.

(2) A person must not sell, offer for sale or operate on a highway a motor vehicle required to be registered and licensed only under this Act and manufactured or assembled after December 1, 1963, other than a motorcycle, unless it is equipped with not less than 2 seat belt assemblies for use in the front seat in accordance with the regulations.

(3) A person must not drive or operate a motor vehicle on a highway in which a seat belt assembly required under this section or the Motor Vehicle Safety Act (Canada) at the time the motor vehicle was manufactured, assembled or imported into Canada has been removed, rendered partly or wholly inoperative, or modified to reduce its effectiveness.

a lot of people that have harnesses in the car (4pt, 5pt, 6pt, what have you) they leave the factory seatbelt installed for street driving.. at least that is what all the people i knew did...

but op, as long as you have the factory belt there, the harness should be a non-issue. the cage on the other hand may be a sticking point..

Cages should be fine, at least they were when my dad was rolling around in his pro street Chevy II...

my understanding is that cages and harnesses are illegal. pretty dumb if you ask me. i drive my race car a few times a year on the street with a full cage/door bars and 5 pt harnesses. all of it meets strict race standards. it's basically a tank compared to another similar vehicle. (at least the cockpit is)

but i do get that many people to shit installs making thing more dangerous. in the end it's their life they are risking though.

People seem to think the street is for racing still?

Wow.

Take your harness, and your car you think really needs it, to the track where it belongs.

Ever consider the fact that some cars used for racing are also street cars? Just because it can go fast, and is safer than a regular car, does not mean that we are racing around in them on the street. It would simply be more of a hassle to remove all the safety equipment and install stock equipment just to drive (responsibly) on the street, which is why people leave it on.

Come on now, were you drunk when you wrote that?

As long as you haven't removed, rendered partly or wholly inoperative, or modified to reduce its effectiveness the factory seatbelt you should be fine.

Thanks Zulu. And do you have any insight on what the legality of a roll cage would be? I'd most likely be leaving the rear half cage in but taking out the door bars.

That's debatable. :devil:

Sorry no...but I don't have access to the Provincial inspection manual. A look in the "Body/Interior" sections may be of help, depending on what you removed/installed as part of the process.

I'm not entirely sure but I always thought as long as you left the windows in and they could roll up/down then the car would be legal. Rollbar padding where you may strike the cage is also a must for your own safety... head + force of impact + bar = broken egg

Another look at the Body section of the MVA and there doesn't seem to be any mention of roll cages. Anyone here have anecdotal evidence of going through an inspection with one installed?

In Alberta there are a pile of JDM cars that pass inspection with bolt-in cages. It seems like a non issue here. I have a 6pt roll bar in my ITR and it passed inspection last year with no issues at all. The mechanic didnt even mention it......

Yeh....I ran across a few mechanics like that....several no longer inspect vehicles for a living. :)

^ I think they got in trouble for overlooking the lack of DOT lights etc.. not sure if the roll cage played a part in that?

im curious for this as well,

I have a 10 point cage in my car, and I really dont want to tow it to meets, itd be nice to be able to just drive it with a stock exhaust on to meets and dinners and stuff.

so far leaving the stock seatbelts bolted in is a must

The intention of the MVA section quoted by skidmark is that people do not modify or remove seatbelts *to reduce their effectiveness*.

Part of the issue is that when you wear a seatbelt, you click it in and it just "does it's job" in an accident, with all the pre-tensioners and other hardware working automatically.

Harnesses, on the other hand, require being extremely tight to work properly. They don't have moving parts that work "automatically" the same way oem seatbelts do. Let's be honest, if we cruise around on the street with our harness on, we are NOT pulling them as tight as we would in a full on sanctioned wheel to wheel race at Mission (most people don't even pull them tight enough on track days)

Thus, they are actually LESS effective than regular OEM belts unless adequately tightened and installed. Most police officers will have no way of knowing if harnesses are correctly installed and you are wearing your harness properly. MOREOVER, most harnesses, even when SFI or FIA approved, are not actually approved for road use; only track/racing use. The fact that they are 'safer' in our opinion does not change whether or not they are legal.

Finally, in a race car, surrounded by the rollcage (which in a proper race car has 2 different types of SFI/FIA padding to protect your soft, fleshy body parts) you also wear a helmet. Most people driving a racecar on the street would not be wearing a helmet. It's just not practical. Therefore, if you get T-boned, you are more likely to get injured.

Basically a race car, a PROPER race car, is just too sketchy to drive safely on the street. I've done it, and I feel super uncomfortable doing it, and I don't recommend that anyone do it regularly.

If you have gone to the point of putting a full cage in your car, it should be a race car only. And race cars belong on the track.

If you have gone and put a full cage in a STREET car that sometimes does track days - you are DUMB. :)

Cages are fine just pad them thats all an inspector needs to see.

Thanks Phil.