Ex police cars - good buy or not?

[stripped fred]

Does anyone have any experience of ex police cars? Although most are still out of my price range at the moment I wouldn't mind a V70 or Octavia. I've been looking at this website:

 

http://expolicecar.co.uk/stock.asp

 

Just looking for anyone with any experience of buying one. I know they get well serviced but also I assume most of them get ragged too unless they are CID or staff cars? Are they uprated in any way or is that a myth?

[D Spares & Tyres]

From what I`ve seen there are good and bad, just have to take each one on it own merits i`m afraid.

[cort16]

They have a really hard life. The interiors are usually fucked because of all their gear screwed into them . They're well serviced but they need to be because they're ragged mercilessly . I also see the police are farming out their servicing to halfords these days .

[alf892]

A mate of mine works at a place that converts vehicles to police spec..........basically all electrical work these days as in hiding lots of pretty lights on covert cars.

 

The bit about them being so well serviced is overstated and done to death too......

 

Some of them probably have the bigger engines in lower trim spec motors but in reality that will be your lot.

 

So just another high mileage company car really.........

[spike60]

Many years back I had a Sd1 v8, one careful owner, -Strathclyde Traffic Dept. No particular problems except it had a lashup speedo connection as had been fitted with a Vascar(?) but they had kept that. Rover gave it quite enough impediments, just as well the police hadn't. Probably not relevant at all in 2015!

The bit about lower trim bigger engine used to be true, mine had no PAS!

[cort16]

I wonder if the story about forces stock piling sd1s is true? I suppose they make a pretty good police car other than the fuel consumption

[danthecapriman]

A mate of mine had an ex traffic police mk2 Granada 2.8. It was fucked! Just totally worn out.

 

I'm not sure I'd want an ex plod car, imagine some of the dirty little scroates that have been sat in the back!

[stripped fred]

Halfords, i wouldn't trust that lot with changing my wiper blades! Yes i suppose like most cars there are good and bad examples. I wonder if many of them have replacement panels through tpac manoevers or have I been watching too many police interceptors episodes??

[spike60]

A dodgy acquaintance of mine offered to  hoover mine out if he could snort the hoover bag afterwards........

[Bobthebeard]

Elwood Blues says go for it. It's got a cop motor, a 440 cubic inch plant, it's got cop tires, cop suspensions, cop shocks. It's a model made before catalytic converters so it'll run good on regular gas. What do you say, is it the new Autoshitemobile or what?

[DVee8]

Do you watch police interceptors ragged,rapped and repaired.

Some little scrot gobbing,puking or wiping snot all over the rear.

[Dead_E23]

When I used to do occasional bits of driving for a used car dealer, he had a couple of ex Kent traffic cars; one a 2.8 mkII Granada and the other a 2.9 Sierra 4x4.  They both had knackered base-spec interiors with zips in the headline and holes all over the place where things had been removed, but I didn't mind that.

 

Both felt quicker than standard, but we understood this to be due to meticulous running in rather than any kind of performance mods.  

 

My brother obtained details of the running in schedule from a friend in the force and tried it out on his works van, a Fiat 127 Fiorino.  It went like the wind afterwards, so we reckoned there might be something in it.  I doubt modern cars would benefit as much because they're manufactured to closer tolerances in the first place.

 

One thing that would put me off an 'ex-job' (as they call them) car is the amount of time they spend idling.  I'd also take claims about Volvo T5s being mapped to 300bhp with a large pinch of salt.

[New POD]

Apparent ex police range rovers had a particular problem with reverse gear being fecked, due to them reversing at speed on motorway hard shoulders.

 

I would have liked a police spec cav turbo because NO sunroof.

[purplebargeken]

Vastly over-rated. 

[alf892]

Unrelated....

 

When I worked at Marshals at Bedford we used to do warranty work on some police stuff. We also used to use a bit of (limited iirc) dual carriageway for road tests.

 

We used to set it up so ordinary car passes police car and driver opens window to give wanker sign....just for fun.

[Uncle Jimmy]

No. Personally I wouldn't want to go sloppy seconds after the coppers. I'm not sure Talbot Tagoras were ever used by Gloucestershire constabulary neither.

[Uncle Jimmy]

....won't be long before they're running shagged Fiat Puntos we've sold them

[Bobthebeard]

From PCUK, Buying your first police car:

 

Quote " So what sort of vehicle are you looking for? Old, new, car, bike, van, American, original, replica, in working order or restoration project? Is this an additional car just to be used at shows or will it be your everyday driver? How much money have you got to spend on its purchase and its upkeep? Have you got somewhere secure to store it? What about all the Police equipment, where are you going to obtain that from? What’s the law concerning its use on the road? What on earth will your friends and neighbours think? These are all questions that should be uppermost in your mind before you even start looking. We all have our own personal tastes when it comes to our modes of transport, some of us like Jaguars, others prefer Fords, and I even know people that like Vauxhalls! Only kidding, I don’t know anybody that likes Vauxhalls. Whatever your choice this is usually where we start from. You have a penchant for a particular make and model and an unexplained interest in that some of these cars were once used by the Police. Now mix the two and hey presto we’re off buying arm falls of classic car mags, scanning the internet and contacting the relevant car club. If only it were that easy. You see classic Police cars/bikes are actually quite rare, no matter what type of car/bike you are considering, its highly likely that if you find your dream car that it will be the last of its breed. Why? Because Police cars, no matter which era they hail from, get a really hard life. They are on the road 24/7, get caned by a variety of drivers that frankly don’t share your interest or enthusiasm and have no intention of making sure its treated nicely because one day it might be a show car. Yes they get well serviced, but most have high mileage and the occasional knock both inside and out. After serving the Police for a year or two they go off to auction where the second hand trade buy them up cheap and sell them on cheap. A lot of them get a second round of tough knocks when they become taxis and the high mileage is doubled again. Others get purchased by people not willing to service them properly and as the values depreciate so does the care and eventually it’s off to the scrap yard. Some of the bigger, heavier cars like the Westminster, Wolseley 6/110, Austin 3 litre, MK1 Granada and Volvo 144s have suffered a rather undignified end on the banger racing track. That sadly is a brief potted history of your average Police car. So if you find a survivor its likely to be the only one left, unless it’s a Morris Minor panda car of which there are about 20 that we know of. I think somebody has a farm somewhere and they are breeding them! Therefore if your dream car is a Wolseley 6/99, a Ford Anglia 105E or a series 1 XJ6 then forget it, because as far as we can ascertain there aren’t any left, they’ve all gone. Unless you know better, in which case we will all be delighted, but the bottom line here is that we have already lost a fair number of iconic Police cars and if you do happen to locate an old patrol car then grab it with both hands."

Unquote.

Not my words!

[NorfolkNWeigh]

I've had a few over the years including manual SD1s and a 2.8 carb Granada both with no power steering, neither was direct and had many cheapskate owners between the Old Bill and me. They were less shagged than similar age cars at the time and went like feck.

The trick when buying direct from the Police ( via auction ) is to be selective, I got to WOMA in Witney occasionally and the difference between obvious inner city patrol cars and well maintained regional gems is amazing, but you have to be prepared to pay decent money for decent cars. At the moment my brother has got a lovely 1.6 Tdi Focus estate on a 59 plate with about 95,000 on it that he paid £2,000 for just before Christmas. It didn't need any bodywork apart from 5 holes in the roof, the interior was fine,just needed a stereo and he put a set of genuine wheeltrims off ebay on it. All told with an MOT he's spent about £350 on it, it's got a full printout, brand new Michleins all round and had new discs a week before it came out of service ( your tax money in action) . It was a village Bobby type car in rural Northamptonsire judging by stickers in the windows and random bits of paper under the seats.

I tried to buy an Ex-Met X5 a couple of months ago but a couple of 58 plate cloth seated low spec with mullered dashes made £8,500 , by the time you'd made them presentable that would be £11k, stil be silver, they'd still have little wheels and no leather. For 12 you can get a drug dealer spec one in a proper colour.

[Lacquer Peel]

Be sure to add random aerials, a CB radio on the dash and wear one of these.

[EssDeeWon]

Unless it was stupidly cheap (and I mean Cheap!) I wouldn't buy one.

 

There is a marque for these ex plod cars, blokes who want to go down the pub and tell his mates he has an EX POLICE CAR! Its special mate, will do 500 mph, been serviced every Wednesday from new etc etc... No it isn't and No it hasn't. Its a shagged Octavia that makes the 200k mile taxi your going home in tonight look good!

[mat_the_cat]

FIL bought an ex-Police Omega (MV6 estate) a few years back, which seemed to be the perfect buy on the surface as it was used as a training car hence low mileage - backed up by the official service history. Plus unlikely to have had 'passengers' in the back...

 

He bought it at 8 years old and around 60k miles, which he doubled in 5 years. I drove it quite a bit too, and by that time it was starting to feel very tired. Lots of evidence of previous accident repairs coming through, and a general sloppiness to everything. Also, the additional wiring was done pretty badly in places, made worse by simply cutting away parts of it to remove equipment. That was presumably down to how it was prepared for sale so may not be representative though.

 

It was quite good fun to watch how quickly people moved out of my way on motorways though, especially if I accidentally left my yellow workman's jacket draped over the seat...

 

EDIT - here is a picture of it with a hen house strapped to the roof. And why not?

[Richard]

A friend of mine had an ex-police V70 T5. It was blue (or maybe black, I'm not good with colours) and you could still see the outline of the police crest on the bonnet. He bought it because he wanted a T5 and that was the only way he could afford one. It had all the issues mentioned- lots of accident damage, gaping hole in the dashboard and general shonkiness.

[wuvvum]

My Vectra C estate was ex-plod.  That had done a lot of miles but didn't feel knackered at all.  I got the Thames Valley Police service record with it, and it had been fairly well looked after.  That was an odd spec - I think it was basically an SRI (cloth seats and keep fit rear windows) but with the 3.2 V6.  Didn't hang about.

[DS20]

From what I've seen of discarded police vehicles (at auction), they tend to be really high-mileage, really low-spec (E39 BMW 5-serieses with no A/C weren't sold to Joe Public in this country, but were sold to plod fleets), and mostly with absolutely hanging interiors.  IMHO they tend to be snapped up by two types of buyer: people who can't afford a lower-mileage, non-plod version of that model (fair enough), and people who get off on the police thing.  Personally, I find the second group a bit strange - it's almost like they wanted to be a policeman but never applied / were rejected, and want a way in to that world.  There's a similar vibe from the subset of Land Rover owners who buy up ex-MOD 90s and 110s and then make war-ready re-creations, with dummy weapooons and so on  

[Bren]

Motorway cars can be a good buy.

 

Avoid "panda" cars, they have a VERY hard life and pick up lots of damage (much underneath), you cannot sit outside somebody's house waiting for the turbo to spool down with cool oil while somebody is getting twatted.

[Barry Cade]

It depends what type of Police car you buy- I had a plain white 850T5 Estate which was an Ex Devon and Cornwall Armed Response Vehicle. Plain white, no holes anywhere,blue cloth and manual. No aircon or sunroof. It went like STINK. I've driven many T5's, but none went like this- would light up the tyres easily in 3rd, the engine was covered in "Shell Test Engine" stickers for some reason, and it felt fit even with 235K on the clock. Had the big T5R brakes too, as I found out when I tried to buy pads for it. No one ever got in my way driving this thing when I wore my breakdown jacket

 

[Junkman]

Give me a 9C1 Caprice any day. Questions?

Alternatively, a '74 Monaco with a broken cigarette lighter will suffice.

[xtriple]

Had a 'thing' for MK2 Grannies back in the day and I bought (deliberately) an ex plod 2.8 Granada. Manual, 4 speed and injected. Very weird spec as everything but the steering was keep fit/manumatic. It was absolutely mint everywhere except the boot floor which no longer existed. Just not there at all - no signs of rust so it hadn't fallen out...

 

No idea about that one.

 

But, it went like shit off a shovel and handled superbly, it was a real joy to drive and I smoked it quite a bit for about 6 months (after the insertion of a boot floor and an MOT). I also bought a load of ex plod Escorts (mk3,4 and 5s) all direct from Devon and Cornwall police via Exeter auctions. They were all bloody good. Don't think I ever bought a nail of a plod car (plenty of not plod nails though!). It was obvious they were looked after, they all ran really well and passed their mot's instantly (they don't come with MOTs when you buy them) and apart from zips in the roof linings and grommets in the roofs they were all well.

 

I sold them as ex plod and they all sold easily but a lot of traders used to disguise them and try to pass them off as 'normal' cars.

 

Obviously, this was back in the 80s when the Police still had a couple of quid to chuck at oil and filters every now and again. I believe the situation is much different now as the cars are pretty much run until too buggered to perform reliably. Back then, they were sold at 2-3 years old and quite low miles - rare to have more than 100K on the clocks.

[maxpower]

Talking of police vehicles...i saw a strange sight yesterday... plod merc..(mini bus type) in full police livery with a strip of black tape through the word police on all sides..but still driving on public road and blue lights stil attached...hmmm baffled me.