When the 'n' metres of insufficiently engineered lighting support eventually fails .. as some surely will with age the whole bloody thing becomes a total road hazard. 

What on earth was wrong with simply revising/reinforcing the regulations to require mounting a lighting board adaquately on the back of the load/boat ?  Did that obligation not exist already ?  Looks like a cobbled bit of regulation put together by people who have insufficient engineering/design experience or expertise that addresses 'the problem' by 1) increasing complexity 2) increasing cost 3) increasing inconvenience for all 3) wastes resources 4) makes boat trailing potentially MORE hazardous to road users. 

Where were 'our' representatives ? ... er the 'RYA' would have seemed appropriate to represent us when you needed them ... Did anyone think about it in that corner ?

Anyway - seeing this complete c*ck-up coming along a way back I made sure I had a personal 10" wheeled 'traditional' combi base in good time .. and it will be maintained to the point if necessary when there is only 1% left from the original.  It WILL last me a lifetime  ! 

My advise if you have not got a 'decent' (ie traditional) combi - buy a good used one asap before the prices soar !

A last thought .. anyone fancy fighting the case when a 'new style' lighting bar suffers metal fatigue after bouncing up and down for 'n' million cycles, drops off and goes through the windscreen of another car ?  .... Oh yeah - it will surely have been up to  the owner to 'adequately maintain' the useless things of course.

In Germany we always have and still are trailering dinghies even though we are not allowed to put the lighting board on the transom. 

(In fact dinghy trailers already benefit from an exemption as trailer lighting would need to be absolutey fixed to the base trailer and not be removable otherwise.)

A lightly tensioned strap around the hull and the “extensions” supporting the board will stop them from bouncing up and down and life just goes on.

I understand that it the other way is quicker and I definitely would like our trailers to be cheaper (even when not paying HARBECK prices), but I always wondered why people think it is a good idea to put all the stress from the vibrating/shaking lighthing board and mast on the poor rudder pintles.

A lightly tensioned strap around the hull and the “extensions” supporting the board will stop them from bouncing up and down and life just goes on.

Without a full regulation detail in place on 'elastics' that sounds a bit suspect itself.  Surely the 'load' should not be involved in any way as that is the 'logic' in place in any event behind these crazy extension bars .  While we are at it define 'light tension' - believe me somebody will if any potential litigation can be sniffed out !!  

Why not come up with a proper engineering solution if you must  ....  or recognise we have always been required to have appropriate lighting anyway. 

Should have been in an 'exempted' category if anyone had bothered to argue the case from a positon of some expertise / knowledge.  BTW .... All this is only partially to do with Brussels - we already have our own set of bureaucrats working under umbrella 'SI's' to screw things up from a remote desk somewhere in the UK and have done for decades.    They also now have a very convenient 'Brussels excuse' to go alongside the all to readily used 'Computer Error' story to hide behind.    

I had a little look around the standards and directives availible online and I don't think it is as bad as some are making out.

The recent change is that to manufacture or sell a trailer it has to be to type approved. To type approve a trailer it will have be assessed to comply with the applicable standards including those for lighting. Therefore the trailer has to be designed and sold with a set of compliant lights. You then get the extension bars as it does not make sense to design a trailer that can’t be legal when the intended load is carried.  

However, the new requirements are for the sale of trailers and don’t seem to cover the use, so it would seem that providing your lighting arrangements still comply with The Road Vehicles Lighting Regulations 1989 then lights mounted on the boat could be an acceptable means of compliance.

It also looks like this is a UN driven idea to harmonise vehicle standards across countries as an aid to movement of vehicles that is being implemented by the EU rather than originating in the EU.