police spec!

[blackrat2]

guys

i too am plod, i have had an R reg, T reg and am now the owner of a W reg phase 2 ex plod car. The R was extremly quick even with 175 thou on the clock , the T was 100 thou and was the slowest thing i have ever driven... as for the W reg this is ex Devon/Cornwall with a new engine 50 thou ago and feels really tight.
It is a lottery, our cars are regularly serviced and looking at the history i got from Devon on my car, this has been really well serviced. I dont think our cars are chipped but that said the first Omegas we got for the Force were really quick but the ones we got afetr that went back on more than one occasion before Vauxhall admitted to doing up the trial cars before we took a contract with them....
Have to say the new six speed cars are great

[Wobbly Dave]

Blackrat (sounds very 007)

Have you thought of tuning the new one?

[blackrat2]

i have to say at this stage yes, i havent made any enqs though...
ref the name couldnt think of anything better at the time, i will get round to changing it sometime

[Wobbly Dave]

No the name is fine mate. Pretty cool.

I know some pretty groovy peeps in Bromsgrove who can make your car go really fast by emptying your wallet of any unnecessary cash. It's magic you know. I am talking about HLM Chip Tuning (aka Volvotuning).
RICA is a fab way to go and comparitively cheap for the performance gains.
They have a phase 2 as well which is slowly being turned into a ferrari killer.

[t5uk]

Blackrat.........met pol traffic?

[blackrat2]

No mate.... i work Surrey, as i said couldnt think of a name off the cuff despite looking at the site for the last few weeks when i had to give a name thats all i could come up with... to get the plod element in.
Anyway ref getting RIC'D i have read some of the stuff about the full upgrade or just the 280, i am abit tight for money what do you guys suggest?
I have to say the 280 seems to be the one im leaning towards at the moment.

[Sp00ky]

something the little lady has picked up on, if, indeed the Police spec are T-5's with a T-5 R ECU... then does this not void your insurance??

[Al115]

A good question. An even better question is, if your T5 has a R or other "Police" ECU, and you don't know about it, does it void your insurance???


Alastair

[mas]

I can only speek for Met and Herts Police cars up to 2000 , cos since then I have had nothing to do with them.

These cars are NOT chipped and do not have non standerd ECUS.

Didnt really want to enter this particular discussion but I know they are not.
The person who mentioned that there may have been some cars on trial with non standerd ECUS may have a point but this wouod have been done without Police knowledge ( or officers evaluating trial cars would have been told) but this would be a rarity if indeed it happened at all.

They do of course have uprated suspension and brakes

As an aside because it was rather funny I evaluated a Golf VR6 once , part of the bottom end of the car fell out on to the road , at great speed as I was
' evaluating it' !. I think it may have resembled a sump

Several others fell apart in other ways as other advanced drivers
'evaluated them' and they were swiftly returned with a

' thanks but no thanks'

Also re the well maintained , that they may be but the reason you see police officers post here that they would not buy an ex plod car is simple.

The method taught by most police driving schools does 'sort of' teach 'respect the car'. BUT the way it is then put in to practice rather more resembles a highly trained thrashing. If someone gave you a 155 mile per hour car and said , you can speed and not get nicked , brake as late as you like
and you wont have to pay for the tires and servicing how much would you respect the car BE HONEST

That's why they are sold off pretty damn quick

[madness]

I would like to add my bit here since i work for a dealer. - The cars are standard police spec from the factory. They do have slightly different spec , but only due to their heavy work load.
The engines ARE completely standard.
We work very closely with our local force and also have contact with volvo special vehicles dept.
the different spec goes no further than a couple of interior changes, the larger of the brake sizes and uprated suspension due to all the items they carry.
This has always been the case, and i am told they are not allowed to modify the cars outside volvo spec, as they have to be approved by the home office.
They rely heavily on the warranty, and if modified this would be void.

[Al115]

We can say that most, perhaps nearly all, police cars are built to standard spec. Mine wasn't! And I have it here on my drive to settle any disputes!

Don't know how they got Home Office Type Approval though...


Alastair

[mailee]

It looks to me as a bystander that the early T5's owned by the police may have had some sort of performance upgrade and indeed been well manitained as far as services go. However given the economic climate of todays cut back policies I would imagine most cars supplied are standard in the respect of performance. Of course forces may be supplied with the latest/fastest standard spec cars to keep up with the new supercars on todays roads but I should imagine that is at the discretion and budget of the various forces around the country and their need for them. Why nowadays would they particularly need a tuned performance car when they can just radio up the Heli and have him pace the offender and road blocks set up? I should imagine most of the decisions of todays police forces as the rest of industry is based upon budget which is much lower than those of yesteryear. I work at a foctory that takes in the Volvo imports before they are destributed throughout the UK so I do have a little knowledge of them, in case you were wondering. Just my few pence worth.

[Rooster]

I work at a dealership we get both customers and police cars in to work on and sometimes you seem to just get T5's that standard but seem a dam site quicker than others.

We get a V70 from the police driver training centre in and that is just stupidly fast so i have a feeling thats been play with but from driving them i wouldn't say police cars are played with at all engine wise.

[t51995]

I am a retired police officer and quite interested by the myths I have read on this forum. As far as I am aware, and this obviousy only applies where I worked, the engines on patrol vehicles are not upgraded in any way. Don't forget that police officers are trained to drive well and fast under all conditions, with the maximum concentration and application, so the standard of driving is second to none, although I understand that less time is spent training these days. As for buying an ex police car, I would say it's a lottery unless you can find out a cars history. I have known cars to have new engines fitted, and then the car is auctioned 2 weeks later!
If I purchased one the first thing I would change would be the brakes and tyres, they can really be abused, not only from brakeing and cornering but also from kerbs and pot holes.
As for servicing, I would say it's generally good, most of the drivers know the mechanics and they don't take shortcuts. The best parts are also used.

So if you fancy your chances against a class 1 driver you will need to be pretty good!

G'night all!