MOT Fail - Petrol Cap seal?

In my humble opinion that seal is more than adequate to maintain a seal to the filler pipe

I’d agree with rocket

The manual can spawn completely opposite answers from different testers. Given that, I would say it's not a lot of help telling a member of the public where to look. He is asking us for our opinions as testers. Can we supply that help please, instead of fobbing them off?

Sorry jock, I didn't know it was just a member of the public. Next time I won't bother.

Hey dizzy, just probs.some.crossed wires. This is what I find with forums or when you say send a text.message, you can never judge tone. I didn't think you were fobbing me off but since tone cannot be judged I see how.some.may see it that way. Either way I appreciate you taking the time and standing up for trying to make an open and welcoming forum 👍

Interestingly interpretation between people can be significantly different depending how one interprets the written word in the manual!!

Lets look at it...


(b) Fuel system:



(i) leaking, or missing or ineffective filler cap

The first part I have no problem with, a leak is simply leaking. Missing, again no problem but the wording says, fuel system missing?

How can you have a fuel system missing!!!

Ineffective filler cap!!

No mention of the seal then!!

Is that ineffective because it does not fit by a positive means, or the invisible wording about the sealing arrangement that technically could be anything somebody wants to use is not there or not able to seal the flange??

What exactly is a fuel leak as far as the seal is concerned? Are we talking liquid fuel of a full tank or the vapour escaping?? If we were talking vapour then the above seal would leak vapour!!

If the customer runs round with a couple of gallon of fuel all week then the fuel cap will never leak fuel even when its not fitted. 

Has anyone took the opportunity to look into the later idea of the capless filler necks and their little automatic plate that closes after the filler nozzle has been removed. I don't recall seeing a seal round them? Anyone know how they seal the fuel/vapour in?

it's just another one of those very badly worded/half done rfr's by the people who know better. I wonder if "fuel cap missing" actually is still listed on the MTS system? Most vehicles these days don't have a cap anymore.

There’s a spring loaded closer with a seal that closes under the automatic plate to prevent fuel /vapour escaping .
Not much a tester can do with these unless it’s absolutely obvious there’s a defect