UK Police Tagora

[Junkman]

Apparently the CRS in France also used Tagoras.

[Dave_Q]

I've had a quick look on their website, there's nothing for email enquiries, it just directs you to a national police FAQ fob-off site. 

 

There is an address for good old snail mail:

 

General Enquiries by mail
West Yorkshire Police Headquarters
PO Box 9
Wakefield
WF1 3QP

[pshome]

i will try this form with the name and number of the officer on the image

 

https://www.westyorkshire.police.uk/leave-an-officer-a-message

[Louise2cv]

101. For non-emergency Talbot information.

[Louise2cv]

Joking aside, what about enquiring through their Facebook page? I've seen forces sharing old photos, might get some responses from Joe Public about them in the comments too.

[Ghosty]

Aye - try Twitter too, Greater Manchester share archive material on there sometimes, maybe some other forces do too?

[Dave_Q]

WYP do have an official twatter:

 

https://twitter.com/WestYorksPolice

 

This guy is pretty active on twitter, his job title is positive action coordinator. Can't think of an action more positive than trawling through the archives for hot Talbot info.

 

https://twitter.com/WYP_AmjadDitta

[Felly Magic]

There could well be some gubbins in the archives about it. At the time it must have been a really oddball choice for a plod vehicle. 

[Split_Pin]

Felly you've got the wherewithall to make a Police Tagora surely!😀

[Felly Magic]

Not me, but I know someone who probably could. Would require an Altaya Tagora

[alpinerapier]

Cramlington Police had 3 Tagora SX supplied by the local Peugeot Talbot dealer who sold 10 Tagora SX in total. Wimpey had 3, 1 private and 3 to the Police.

Have seen a picture of the 3 Police cars together but can't remember where.  Suspect that it was in Peugeot Talbot News, the internal dealer news paper from the time.

Will keep looking.

[pshome]

Great info. That's interesting, seems there was quite a number of SX with the police and Talbot's prevision of 100 was maybe not that unreasonable.

 

Has anybody copies of  the Talbot news of that time and may flip the pages for more info?

 

Thanks!

 

P.S.

There is a comment by Dave Horn, the owner of the privately owned SX in Cramlington here:

 

http://community.preloved.co.uk/reviews/show/2874/talbot-tagora-sx.html

 

seems that SX still exists.

[montytom]

Nowadays hw is the isle of wight reg code but back then the code was DL

[Junkman]

 

Holy shit!

Am I glad they didn't catch on.

Those could effectively easily intercept a Rover P6 V8!

FTFY

 

 

Hmmmm...

I say. A 3500 S in good tune would have given them quite a run for their money, especially off the motorways.

A rozzer tweaked one would possibly have had the edge, but I assume the police Tagoras weren't entirely standard as well.

[pshome]

Hmmm...

 

Don't underestimate the Tagora handling. They may look odd with the narrow 505 rear axle, but they follow winding roads fast and with no surprises as if it's a railway track. Having 20 Din PS less your Rover will loose any battle...

 

P.S.

We shall have a race!

[Hertz]

Quality thread. Keep searching pshome!

 

Imagine if there was a barn full of retired plod cars in Dewsbury or summat and it was in there forgotten at the back...

[Junkman]

Hmmm...

 

Don't underestimate the Tagora handling. The may look odd with the narrow 505 rear axle, but they follow winding roads fast and with no surprises as if it's a railway track. Having 20 Din PS less your Rover will loose any battle...

 

P.S.

We shall have a race!

 

The Rover has a mere 5 PS less and you can add them with a screwdriver. It also has almost a litre more displacement and we all know what that means.

About 300 Quid add about 40 PS and that's what the police in the UK usually did to their motorway patrol cars.

I'm certainly not underestimating Tagora handling, but whether you can really drive it faster on the woeful British infrastructure is doubtful.

It'll lift off at the first medieval hump back bridge just as well as a Rover does. The Tagora certainly would be superior on a motorway, but since there are

only two of them in the entire UK, the chances you'd have to intercept me on one of them are slim to none.

I'd also quite expect that an 80s car is superior to a 60s one, but the shave would be much closer than you try to make it sound.

[pshome]

The great Tagora vs P6 race shall take place one day!

[Split_Pin]

Good quality audio of the Tagora required during this race. So far the Internet only has one to go around everybody

[pshome]

Tagora Training has already been done and ready for the battle:

 

[dieselnutjob]

I don't know what exhaust manifolds the Tagora SX has.  On the 604 they are very restrictive compared with the Alpine A310 that I saw at Prescott a few year back.

[Asimo]

I don't think exhaust manifolds matter much with 3 cylinders each side, there is 240º between each valve opening so exhaust pulses are not going to interfere. Those cast iron PRV manifolds are heavy though; weight is reason enough to change on a hill climb Alpine.

[pshome]

Tagora has fan type exhaust manifolds made of sheet steel. That certainly makes a difference over the heavy 604 casted lumps for both power and sound.

[pshome]

I don't think exhaust manifolds matter much with 3 cylinders each side, there is 240º between each valve opening so exhaust pulses are not going to interfere. Those cast iron PRV manifolds are heavy though; weight is reason enough to change on a hill climb Alpine.

Don't forget PRV is 90° odd fire.

[Junkman]

Tagora fannymoulds look quite fit for purpose to me.

 

[Felly Magic]

You could almost expect a vid of these introduced by a 'septic' news host with the name Talbot Tagora

[pshome]

Another Poilce Tagora photo surfaced!

 
Thanks to Steve Woodward retired Police Officer from Hampshire for sharing this and to James Burns for passing it on.

[Junkman]

I wonder why no fleet order was placed. Price/purpose ratio must have been alright, one would think.

Would be interesting to find out what they ultimately failed it on.

[AMC Rebel]

It would be interesting to know - I wonder about many such purchasing decisions - then and now.

 

Public bodies can be odd to deal with though.  An invitation to tender for a new software system the company I worked for received from a government agency said they wanted to implement the very latest and most up-to-date packages available - but only those where 5 comparable public bodies were already fully live and using them - who did they think was going to go first?

[Junkman]

I have a book written by an ex CHP copper who is a Mopar enthusiast.

He does elaborate on the purchasing procedures of the CHP, which was at the time the single biggest customer of squad cars

and even had their own proving grounds. Their decisions influenced other police departments' choices, i.e., what's good enough

for those Californian fruitcakes will certainly serve us well.

 

The specifications outlined were much tighter than one would imagine and something as trivial as the wheelbase being half an inch

too short would catapult an otherwise perfectly capable car off the shopping list.

He fully admits that some of those specs didn't necessarily follow rationale or common sense, the minimum wheelbase and heft

of the cars being but two of them. It took them until 1969 to realise that the intermediates were swifter, nimbler and needed less

petrol, thus were actually better suited for many duties than the big cars were.

 

It would be interesting to learn what the requirement catalog for British police cars was and which organisation was responsible for it.