I would agree that many cops might see that in passing and wonder if it is unsafe. Not knowing there is a real door under the sheet metal.
Knowing that some people are drawn to the police force for the wrong reasons, I suspect that such modifications might get you a lot of grief from a few police officers. Maybe more than a few.
I know this is GQ, but from your OP
It might help. How thick is it? A quick glance from a police car will not be able to decern if that really isn’t some sort of ammor. Or an attempt at it.
And then -
So. You want it for aesthetics, but don’t want it judged on it’s aesthetics?
Maybe you could stick to whether the car is legal, instead of trying to shit all over the guy’s ride, yeah?
The thread appears to be about if the fellow will get harshed by the fuzz, not soliciting your opinions. I’d be miffed too. Giving negative, unsolicited critiques is rude.
I’m glad that you’re planning to remove the sheet metal mods, especially since I would be concerned about what would happen to the pop rivets at highway speeds (assuming that you ever go on the highway).Would the pop rivets fail, causing the sheet metal to fly off the car and into someone else’s car?
I can’t speak to what the laws overall are like here, but if you’re concerned about a worst-case scenario in dealing with individual police officers (which doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with the courts), California has had some notably unfortunate incidents. Wildly isolated cases, but there is a certain argument in favor of not making waves.
The pop rivets are quite solid. I have been on highways many times with them, they don’t come out. I’ll check them out again after taking the sheet metal off.
Ocean Beach isn’t an option on the immediate horizon. For a while, anyway, it will be La Jolla. I’ll check it out it anyway.
That ain’t gonna fly. I do this for my own amusement, and whomever ends up appreciating it. Aesthetics can, and in my opinion, should be taken subjectively, so the aesthetic value is as applied to me alone in both contexts, meaning, in the end, it is not something warranting discussion given the topic. Or you trying to catch me in a contradiction.
I’m repeating stuff that was already said by other people here (thank you!), in the hope that it will eventually sink in. I guess I should have expected this kinda stuff. :rolleyes:
As the past and current owner of many, um, unique looking vehicles, I can tell you that the degree to which your car will be hassled by the authorities is HUGELY dependent on what other people think of it. Pretty much every city has weird laws about overnight parking, or on-street “storage” that never, ever get enforced unless someone complains, or the parking enforcement just doesn’t like the look of your car. I had an old beat up pickup I drove to work every day that would still get tagged as an “abandoned vehicle” every so often. Meanwhile my neighbor’s [del]boring[/del] respectable-looking Honda snapped a timing belt, didn’t move for 6 months and gathered about two inches of dust, but not even one of the parking peoples’ “move your car” reminders that I seemed to get on a daily basis.
I’m a little unclear on one point. Is the car in the photos the “finished product,” as it were, or a “work in progress.”
I have a nephew who’s a motorcycle cop in Riverside county; if those pics are what you’re planning to drive around here, I can alert him to this thread and ask his opinion.
I’m also unclear on how far that thing on the door handle extends. A photo clarifying that might be helpful.
It is by no means a finished product, but, I do drive it.
By all means, I would be very interested in actual cop’s thoughts on it.
I’ll get a door handle pic in the morning. Off-hand, I’d guess 1 inch to 1.5 inches from the body, but that is definitely a possible subject to revision.
I wasn’t trying to catch you in a contradiction. It was just there and I pointed it out.
The thing is, those particular aesthetic values are going to be applied to you. Mostly in the form of flashing lights. That’s what you where asking about in your OP. To paraphrase “Are the cops going to pull me over”. “ Yep, probably”. Has been the answer.
But, Ok. Whatever floats your boat.
I just took up the banjo a year ago. It’s mine. Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s great to express yourself.
The thing is, since I’m not yet a very good banjo player, I don’t force people to listen to me. It looks to me that you are just trying to force people to look at you. That’s not always a good thing to do.
Which suggests you fundamentally don’t understand the categories and properties being used. Saying, post my response, that a contradiction was there, when I just showed, albeit very briefly, that it wasn’t, suggests you think that I did not show a lack of contradiction. But then failed to show, let alone suggest, where my error was.
Trying was probably the wrong word. Even if there had been a contradiction, which I will contest until you can give either an argument or an explanation for there being a contradiction, I don’t believe it would be worth bringing up. Except for being a smart-ass upon recognizing what you perceived to be a contradiction.
As to the rest of it, I am taking the answers into account.
I asked him to post pictures because I thought it would help people determine how much police attention the modifications would draw. I didn’t ask him to do it because I wanted to judge his car.
That is the most retarded thing I’ve read, and I’ve been to /b/. As if he’s going around pinning other drivers down, forcing their eyelids open and making them stair in horror at his ride.
We get it, you don’t like his car. To bad for you you’re not car-dictator and it’s a free country.
Really, what the hell did the OP do to you to solicit your attacks? Are you that fucking petty about other people’s aesthetics?
I don’t think anyone can really give you a definitive answer to this, but my prediction is that eventually you’ll get pulled over and given a “fix-it” ticket, just because it looks like an unsafe replacement door. If the cop that stops you actually exams it and can determine to her/his own satisfaction that it’s safely mounted, she or he might just tell you to make it look more secure to avoid future hassles.
This will more likely happen sooner in La Jolla “proper” than most other parts of San Diego, but really, the places that people call “La Jolla” are so varied (everywhere from the Village to UTC), it’s going to depend on where you actually spend your time, and whether you just drive on large, main drags, or go off into the ritzy neighborhoods and happen to pass a cop without anything more pressing to do.
As for OB–where I grew up–you’re more likely to have a chance of getting known by the cops who work that very small community, but that won’t guarantee anything. If it should happen, it’s possible they’ll just let it slide. (This probably isn’t going to happen in any part of the many vast areas that people like to call “La Jolla” – it’s part of the larger Northern Division of the PD)
Here in L.A., you’d probably also eventually get a “fix-it” ticket, but it would take longer–though it might happen a lot sooner if your driving habits should draw any attention.
…probably be better looking for the “armored” aspect and easier over time to cut out smaller plates like 4"x4" squares and rivet them on individually. Since there is less loading per rivet it will be far less likely you will lose a piece.
In addition you could far more easily piecework them in as time permits with a stack of them precut/drilled.
Once you have 2 paralell rows of those plates you could “layer” them in staggered rows so the outer plate covers the gaps in the inner plates.
Use aluminum, will still slow down stray handgun rounds, but will be less weight.
This is a good idea. I didn’t really think too much about the problems of attaching sheet metal, and given all the problems the first attempt at it caused, a different approach is needed. Thanks
