Pass rate
Above average — 12.4 pts ahead of the 86.0% that cars this age and mileage manage.
Across 123 recorded tests.
Typical repair bill £54–£134
Pass rate
Above average — 12.4 pts ahead of the 86.0% that cars this age and mileage manage.
Across 123 recorded tests.
Typical repair bill £54–£134
Most common fault
Brakes
41.7% of faults · 20.9% nationally
mostly worn pads and discs, corroded pipes and a handbrake that will not hold.
Which year to buy
Across the 19 years on record, a spread of 9.4 points. See every year →
The 2017 Morgan 4/4 MOT pass rate is 98.4% of its MOT tests — 12.4 points ahead of what its age and mileage predict. Brakes is the biggest single reason it fails, at 41.7% of what testers record.
Expert verdict
Brakes make up 41.7% of everything recorded on the 2017 Morgan 4/4, against 20.9% nationally — 20.8 points above. Have the discs and pads measured rather than glanced at, and ask whether the handbrake holds on a slope.
Written from this page's own figures: fault shares against the national composition, the like-for-like pass rate, and the priced repair list. How these are worked out
Watching a Morgan 4/4? Get an email when these numbers change .
Cars of this age and mileage average 86.0%, so this figure is 12.4 points ahead of what its age and mileage predict. On a first attempt, before any retests, the figure drops to 98.3%. The median 2017 Morgan 4/4 in this dataset had covered 6,439 mi.
Pass rates also shift with the test month: tests recorded October–March passed 100.0% of the time, April–September 97.1%.
The single most recorded failure item is "Steering rack gaiter missing or no longer prevents the ingress of dirt", noted on 1.63% of tests.
Figures count every completed test on this vehicle-year in the dataset, including retests. See methodology for the exact definition.
Source: DVSA anonymised MOT test data (2023–2025), OGL v3.0.
Steering Rack
Typically a garage job — get quotes before committing.
Pass rate by odometer reading. Bar lengths start at 90% so small gaps stay visible.
Across all 4/4 model years on record (2000–2018): 1,372 Morgan 4/4 cars tested in a recordable postcode area, across 3,089 tests. Ashford (TN) has the most, with 93 cars tested there. Cars are counted by the postcode area of the MOT station, so this is where they were tested, not necessarily where their owners live.
| # | Postcode area | Cars | Pass rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Ashford (TN) | 93 | 91.9% |
| 2 | Milton Keynes (MK) | 60 | 83.3% |
| 3 | Worcester (WR) | 60 | 93.7% |
| 4 | Reading (RG) | 45 | 95.7% |
| 5 | Bristol (BS) | 44 | 95.3% |
| 6 | Exeter (EX) | 38 | 87.9% |
| 7 | Chelmsford (CM) | 37 | 92.9% |
| 8 | Crewe (CW) | 37 | 96.8% |
| 9 | Salisbury (SP) | 35 | 90.1% |
| 10 | Preston (PR) | 33 | 100.0% |
| 11 | Doncaster (DN) | 32 | 95.9% |
| 12 | Gloucester (GL) | 30 | 87.9% |
| 13 | Ipswich (IP) | 30 | 100.0% |
| 14 | Perth (PH) | 28 | 91.9% |
| 15 | Stevenage (SG) | 27 | 98.4% |
| 16 | Guildford (GU) | 24 | 86.8% |
| 17 | Poole (BH) | 23 | 85.7% |
| 18 | Coventry (CV) | 23 | 80.4% |
| 19 | Southampton (SO) | 19 | 87.2% |
| 20 | Derby (DE) | 18 | 85.4% |
The twenty areas with the most Morgan 4/4 cars in the record, sorted by car count — sort the columns for a different question. Cars tested at a station whose postcode area could not be resolved are counted in the model's total but in no area, so the shares add up to slightly under 100% even across every area, and an area's cars are a subset of the model's. Pass rate is blank below 30 tests in an area, where a percentage is noise rather than a finding. How this model's pass rate varies by postcode →
| Region | Tests | Pass rate |
|---|---|---|
| South West | 29 | 96.6% |
| South East | 23 | 95.7% |
| North West | 20 | 100.0% |
Regions come from the postcode area recorded at the test station. Areas on region borders are assigned to the region with the majority of their population.
Everything a tester recorded on this vehicle, grouped into the inspection sections that produced it. The notch on each bar is the national share, so you can see at a glance whether this car is unusual or just ordinary.
A test can record several items, so these percentages do not add up to 100%. The exact strings, with prices, are in the full DVSA record at the bottom of this page.
Before your test
These are not generic tips — they are the faults recorded most often on this exact model, rewritten as things you can check yourself. All three take about ten minutes and cost nothing.
Check the steering 1.6% of tests
“steering rack gaiter missing or no longer prevents the ingress of dirt”
With the wheels straight, rock the steering wheel gently with the engine off — more than about an inch of free play before the wheels move is worth investigating. Split rack gaiters are cheap to replace and commonly recorded.
Check the brake pipes 0.8% of tests
“flexible brake hoses slightly chafed”
Brake pipes run under the car, usually in front of the rear wheels. Flaking or crusty metal is what fails; a light dusting of surface rust does not. Worth asking a garage to look while it is on a ramp.
Check the wipers and washers 0.8% of tests
“washers provides insufficient washer liquid”
Run the wipers with the screen wet: they should clear it in one sweep without smearing or juddering. Top the washer bottle up and check both jets hit the screen.
Shares are the proportion of tests on this vehicle that recorded the item, so they overlap: one test can record several.
Across the 5 items that are recorded most often on this model, the average repair comes to £54–£134 — and 33% of those repairs are parts that cost under £30.
Estimates from typical UK parts prices, weighted by how often each item appears in 123 MOT tests on this vehicle. They exclude diagnostics, retest fees and garage labour where the part is a DIY fit, and they are not figures from the DVSA dataset. Older and higher-mileage examples cost more than the average. How these estimates are built → · All MOT repair costs → · Cheapest cars to put through a test →
19 model years on record, from 2000 to 2018. Across them the pass rate runs from 89.0% to 98.4% — a spread of 9.4 points. The bar under each year is the item that failed it most often.
Colour is the pass rate on a fixed scale, so a block means the same thing on any model. Each year links to its own page with the full fault breakdown.
The raw pass rate mostly measures age. The year comparison adds the like-for-like figure, the mileage bands and the repair bill.
Closest pass rates among 2017 cars with at least 2,000 tests, so a small sample cannot flatter itself into the list. See the full rankings: best and worst MOT pass rates.
Shares of the 24 individual items recorded on this vehicle, and the same share across all cars nationally. A single test can record several items, so a row is not a percentage of tests.
| Category | Items | This car | Nationally | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Brakes | 10 | 41.70% | 20.89% | +20.81 |
| Suspension | 5 | 20.80% | 20.98% | −0.18 |
| Tyres | 5 | 20.80% | 19.76% | +1.04 |
| Visibility | 2 | 8.30% | 4.97% | +3.33 |
| Steering | 2 | 8.30% | 2.57% | +5.73 |
| Recorded item | Severity | Tests | Est. cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Steering rack gaiter missing or no longer prevents the ingress of dirt Steering | Rectified | 1.6% | £120–300 |
| Flexible brake hoses slightly chafed Brakes | Minor | 0.81% | £25–70 |
| Valve stem seriously damaged Tyres | Major | 0.81% | £45–95 |
| Washers provides insufficient washer liquid Visibility | Major | 0.81% | £5–15 |
| Wipers blade defective Visibility | Minor | 0.81% | £8–22 |
Severity is as recorded: Major and Dangerous fail the test outright; Minor and Advisory do not. Costs are estimates from typical UK parts prices — see how they are built.
Advisories are the early warnings — the same parts a year or two before they fail. Reading them is how you tell a car that has been maintained from one that has been patched.
| Recorded item | Severity | Tests | Est. cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Brake discs in such a condition that it is seriously weakened Brakes | Advisory | 3.3% | £45–110 |
| Pins and bushes pin or bush excessively worn Suspension | Advisory | 3.3% | £40–150 |
| Tread depth below requirements of 1.6mm Tyres | Advisory | 3.3% | £45–95 |
| Brake pads less than 1.5 mm thick Brakes | Advisory | 2.4% | £18–45 |
| Rigid brake pipes excessively corroded Brakes | Advisory | 0.81% | £80–180 |
| Service brake performance excessively binding Brakes | Advisory | 0.81% | £60–150 |
| Mileage | Tests | Pass rate | Median odometer |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0-30k | 121 | 98.3% | 8,690 mi |
| 30-60k | 2 | 100.0% | 32,870 mi |
Source: 123 recorded tests on this vehicle-year. Every row above is recomputed from the same DVSA extract as the rest of the page — see the methodology.
98.4% of the 123 2017 Morgan 4/4 tests in this dataset passed, against a national average of 86.0% for cars first used in 2017. First-attempt pass rate: 98.3%.
The three most recorded items are steering rack gaiter missing or no longer prevents the ingress of dirt (1.63%), flexible brake hoses slightly chafed (0.81%), valve stem seriously damaged (0.81%). Percentages are the share of tests on this vehicle that recorded the item.
Yes. Cars under 30,000 miles passed 98.3% of the time, falling to 100.0% for those over 120,000 miles. The median 2017 Morgan 4/4 in this dataset had covered 6,439 mi.
Tests recorded in the winter months (October–March) passed 100.0% of the time; summer months (April–September) passed 97.1%. Brakes, tyres and lights are tested harder in bad weather, but the difference is small on most models.