Formula Moto Turn your old motorcycle into a historic one with ease and take advantage of the new law
How to change your motorcycle to historic service with the new regulations
Since October 2024, so-called historic registration has become much easier. Now you just need to change your motorcycle's service to "Historic".
As you may know, the service is the use that Tráfico records for each vehicle. The typical ones are "Rental", "Taxi", or, as your motorcycle's registration certificate states, "private" service.
Here lies much of the trick that now makes turning your motorcycle historic no longer so expensive or complex. Now there's a new "private-historic" service.
If your motorcycle is over 30 years old and is well preserved, you can complete the process directly at Tráfico while keeping your original license plate.
This is not just a formality, as it has clear advantages. For now, it protects you from environmental restrictions although this may change at any time.
For now, you'll still be able to ride in cities like Madrid. But above all, you have advantages at the ITV. A motorcycle between 30 and 60 years old will undergo inspection every four years.
One over 60 doesn't have to undergo inspection again. Directly.
What motorcycles qualify
Of course, we're talking about motorcycles. If you want to ride your classic moped,here we explain how to access the new historic registration for them.
To be able to make the change, your motorcycle must meet several requirements.
The main one, of course, is its age, which must be at least 30 years since its manufacture.
It must also be registered in Spain, have a current ITV, and not have been significantly modified.
That is, you may have replaced parts with equivalent ones, but not transformed it.
A CB 750 Four can have a "four into two" exhaust from the era but not an inverted fork with radial calipers, for example.
How to change the service
The process is carried out at the DGT, either in person or online.
You request the service change, signing a responsible declaration. You confirm that your motorcycle meets the requirements and pay a fee of about 21 euros.
Once approved, you'll receive a new registration certificate. You'll need to place a yellow sticker with the letter "H" on the front.
From then on, the use of the motorcycle must be occasional. By law, you can't exceed 96 days of use per year.
It's not logically intended for daily-use motorcycles, but as you can see, it has advantages for true classics.
If I don't meet the requirements
If your motorcycle doesn't fall into this group, you can still make it historic although the process will be longer and more expensive.
You'll have to submit a technical report prepared by a Technical Service (the former laboratories) and undergo a specific ITV to obtain a new VH license plate.
This is the new registration procedure as a historic vehicle. Now you skip the step with the autonomous community and the laboratories have national authority, which has lowered and simplified the procedures
In cases where the motorcycle hasn't had a license plate, there's no other option. But if you can avoid it, the service change is much simpler.
The famous reinstatement
The third scenario involves those de-registered motorcycles, with lost documentation or registered to a missing third party but with an old Spanish license plate.
Many enthusiasts ask us how to proceed in this case and it's simple and, in fact, has changed little. It's a process known as reinstatement.
Previously, you requested it at Tráfico. They would write a letter asking the ITV to look for records (original technical sheet, at the provincial office where it was registered). In addition, a review would be carried out to create a new technical sheet.
Now you go directly to the ITV to request reinstatement. They will inform Tráfico that the procedure has started.
Once that review is completed and everything is correct, the ITV asks Tráfico to reverse the de-registration. This way, the motorcycle is re-registered.
However, it will be registered to the person who was the owner when it was de-registered. You will likely have to request, at the same time, the transfer to your name.
For that, you'll need either a sales contract from the person listed as the owner or a statement of facts granted before a notary.
It's a document in which you state and provide two witnesses who know the motorcycle is yours, at least, for the last five years. This is the time the civil code requires to automatically consider you the owner.
This way, you'll have your classic documented, in your name, and ready to get back on the road
An opportunity for classics
This change in the regulations is good news for all of us who love motorcycles with history.
Because it allows them to stay alive, legal, and on the move.
Because it protects the value and identity of models that are already part of our heritage.
Without turning their upkeep into an administrative battle.
If your motorcycle has been sitting in the garage for three decades, now it's easier to get it back on the road.
To keep it going for many more years, with the law on your side.
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