The United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UN ECE) have recently published two new ECE Regulations under the 1958 Agreement. These two new Regulations, ECE 121.00 on the identification of controls and ECE 122.00 on heating systems, provide ECE equivalents to two European Union Directives which have existed for many years.
ECE Regulation 121.00 on the identification of controls, tell-tales and indicators specifies the symbols which must be used to identify certain switches, controls, gauges and tell-tales in motor vehicles. It also specifies which symbols must be illuminated when the vehicle's exterior lamps are activated and defines the colours to be used for tell-tales. Although, ECE 121.00 is basically equivalent to EU Directive 78/316/EEC, as amended by 94/53/EC, its requirements have been updated to reflect the advances in motor vehicle design and equipment that have occurred since the original EU Directive was published (almost 30 years ago!). The main differences between the EU Directive and ECE 121.00 are that the ECE Regulation covers the vehicle's speedometer and automatic transmission lever position indicator, and includes symbols for anti-lock braking (ABS), on-board diagnostics (OBD), airbag failure, passenger airbag disable, air conditioning, power window disable, brake lining wear and low tyre pressure.
ECE Regulation 122.00 on heating systems covers both traditional heater systems and separate combustion heaters, and contains safety requirements for the heating systems themselves and for their installation. It includes requirements to ensure that occupants cannot come into contact with parts of the heating system or heated air likely to cause burns and that the heated air entering the passenger compartment is no more polluted than the air entering the heater system. It also includes limits on the exhaust emissions from combustion heaters. The technical requirements of ECE 112.00 are identical to those contained in EU Directive 2001/56/EC, as amended by 2004/78/EC. However, it also contains some specific requirements for combustion heaters fitted to vehicles used for the carriage of dangerous goods (i.e. ADR vehicles).