Ford Crown Victoria Goes for a Drive

You join me today in driving one of my absolute dream cars on my list of 10 things I'm going to own soon. I really hope so, it's finally a Ford Crown Victoria, but this is not a police car. I'm proud to be sponsored by Diamondbrite, the car care products that have been keeping the furious fleet looking their best for a long time. To find everything you need to keep your car clean and protected, follow the link below for the UK. Here we have the iconic indestructible police car from Crown Victoria Ford. Built on the unbreakable Panther platform, this is a series 2 car, the series 1 Crown Vic ran from '79 to 1991 and then series two from 1992 to 2011, with several changes between now if you've seen any of my live chats. and things and people often ask me what is my dream car, what am I going to buy next, give them the option, well the answer is not a ferrari or an aston martin or some other kind of exotic supercar or car sports car, it's one of these because if you have an unlimited budget and buyers with very deep pockets, you can build a car that

goes

200 using any exotic materials you want and then only

drive

that car a thousand miles a year if, however, you want to

drive

a car that gets 400, 500,000 miles with basic service abused every day of its working life and driven seven days a week 24 hours a day and surviving and then sold to be used as a taxi.

I have a lot of respect for that and that's what this is. Now although my dream car is a p71, p71 stands for police interceptor, look at the vin number here on the windshield and you can see right in the middle exactly what Full Crown Victoria designation you're looking at on this one, however, it's a p-72. and normally that means heavy duty chassis, fleet sales, so intended for something like a taxi, which also means something else that's not as well known and that's what a GCC or Gulf Cooperation Council car is built to export to Kuwait or Saudi Arabia. arabia, so there are several differences between the US-spec heavy-duty car, which is intended for fleet use, and the gcc heavy-duty car, which was intended for private sales and therefore , it had to be a little more luxurious inside.

It's an interesting comparison between this as a civilian luxury car and the more utilitarian fleet cars we're used to, so here we are at the front of the gcc spec p72 corona

victoria

now it's a strange amalgamation of parts from different cars in all the ranges this grill this chrome grill is normally installed at p71 in civilian or sap appearance package because a corona victim with chrome grill is definitely not a police car or in real civilian cars. I love seeing a Spitfire but they are so loud on the side when looking at this wheel you will notice this. now has a 16 inch steel wheel with dog dish hubcaps, like those found on a typical patrol car or many detective cars, in addition, this car, however, because it was a luxury type car civil, had alloy wheels when shipped.

In the Middle East, the Series 2 cars kept the ventilated disc brakes as before the Series 1 cars, but of course they were now larger discs, so they needed to add 16-inch wheels and then, In 2006, they went to a total of 17.-inches of space now under the hood, all Crown Victorias have a 4.6-liter modular overhead camshaft V8 engine, the same engine found in Mustangs, famous now with many changes over the years and obviously different power outputs, and also each year had two different power outputs. depending on single or dual exhaust so civil or police specs as of 2000 this thing made 200 horsepower with single exhaust or 215 with dual exhaust, in 2001 it gained mustang gt heads which meant the power It was left at 220 or 235 horsepower and then in 2003 a new knock sensor was installed which meant they could increase the horsepower up to 224 or 239 and finally in 2004 the intake was installed. metal air from the Mercury Marauder, which meant it reached its maximum power of 250 horsepower.

The other significant change in its life was in 2005, when it started driving by wire, so cars before 2003 are completely analog, then between 2003 and 2005 there is a strange hybrid of analog and digital and finally, from 2005, it is a completely digital management and dashboard, a significant difference for people looking at police interceptors is the engine is upgraded because there is a lot of additional cooling because there is the anticipation that these cars will be idling on the side of the road for a lot of time waiting for potential perpetrators to pass by to then go straight from idle to full revs in an instant and doing that repeatedly over a long period, so we have operated cooling, we have a transmission cooler, we have an oil cooler, there are all the coldest fluids you can imagine and the car is designed to run hot for long periods and not overheat. and not be damaged and is ideal for a car headed to hot Middle Eastern states, so although the p72 chassis code cards intended for fleet use in the US did not receive all the operating updates heavy, the p-72s that were gcc cars, they did, this is effectively a p-71 engine and cooling system; however under the car the p-72s were headed to be taxis etc in the US they got the fully reinforced heavy duty chassis the p-72 for the golf did too are you with me now ?

I'm sure many of you will be Crown Vix experts and you're already looking at this and you may have noticed this little guard plate which is not suitable for the 2002 car because it arrived in 2003. This little guard here protects the serpentine belt from possible damage to the air conditioner or fan in case it breaks. The car owner added this as an option because prior to 2002 he had a much larger fan shroud that did the same job. Now you may notice that there is no hood liner under here, most cars usually have some type of padded sound insulation.

There's nothing like this because they're obviously made for the fleet police, they didn't get that kind of thing, so if you're buying a car that's been on a hot state police car, you'll often find that the paint is peeling off. peeling or cracked from sitting on a hot engine for so many hours. I'm surprised, although they didn't put sound insulation in a car intended for a luxury market now in the US market cars you will find that the civilian versions came with a small keypad to open the door and trunk in the police cars, the p71 , you didn't have it, you just had a small key later, you got a key fob which could actually open the car, however this is a gcc civilian car so it doesn't come with a keypad, it's surprisingly tight access to Such a big car, but the seats are lovely and soft unlike the patrol cars that work somewhere in the states where you haven't. you have a basic seat, you have a six-way power seat that a year after this car went to an eight-way power seat, the passenger on the right side obviously because the left-hand drive car had a four-way manual seat although you can also opt for a power seat, there are a couple of changes between police and civilian spec cars, notably firstly the upholstery, civilians get nice upholstery, police tended to get vinyl that was wipeable with a cloth for obvious reasons unless it was a car full of detectives or a civilian looking car when they also have velvet in the states however for gcc export cars you have 40 20 40 split bench seats as well which is technically kind of a six seater here, let's take a little look.

There's plenty of headroom inside, there's plenty of elbow room because it's said to be a six-seater, although looking at this huge transmission tunnel, you basically want the person in the middle seat to be a small child or an amputee and the car belt line is pretty high so you're sitting pretty low in the vehicle let's start again with the door like we always do first of all tough rubbery vinyl elephant skin almost always They are this gray color, sometimes there is a little denim blue or sand color later. lit and black towards the end but they are mostly this kind of gray color on the door card, we have a nice solid door handle and a speaker, there are four speakers in the car, the cob cars had speakers too .

Although I think the radio was optional, so we have this nice group of switches and buttons, all typically huge buttons. American cars always have oversized plastic buttons, for some reason, starting at the front we have a small rocker joystick for the electric mirrors, then we have we have door unlock and lock u and l for unlock and lock, then we have four electric windows , a manual touch on the driver's window, full touch on the other three and of course a window lock which is a big old bar that looks a bit like a Cadbury's finger stuck in the door, there is one thing so big and thick plastic now underneath that the bottom half of the door is actually carpeted to give it a bit of luxury and there is a good sized door pocket to store bits and bobs. and then we have one of the changes from the police to the civil specification.

Civilian spec cars always have the trunk relief here on the door of a police car, it's right here in the center of the dash so both occupants can access it because we have police equipment in the trunk, so the passenger you may want to use it in a police car, in the civilian car only the driver has that option and behind it we have another small button that has the fuel cap that is now open. try to remember to close that before we get off the dash the dash is very big and very wide it's a little rough in the contained corners they haven't gone for full thrills the similar period chevy whim was criticized for being just a little too much out there so that Ford reigned in their design and kept it pretty simple and basic, in fact it

goes

back to 70's cars in a way, of course the Panther platform goes back to 79, it's basically a 70's car underneath, so You have this very vertical type of dash panel in front of you in this corner here, past the driver, you have the switch area for the lights, an automatic uh lamp to turn off and park, go down and press to turn on the interior light, yeah, which is It's already on because the doors open and on top of that we have a little rocker cover.

This is a rather unusual arrangement. The panel dims the rocker and at night you can take it down completely so that all the lights go out a bit like the Saab. Gentleman mode, except unlike the Saab, the speedometer also turns black, so you can drive in total darkness. I have no idea how fast you drive. Now let's look at the dials. The dials are very important because I can't identify them. What car do you have? If it is a p71 police car, you will have a calibrated or calibrated speedometer written in the middle of the speedometer like a civilian car.

It doesn't have that. Also, notably, this is a Middle Eastern export car, so the numbers are. actually in kilometers per hour not miles per hour um with a small mph subdial from 2006 onwards they changed the speedometer to be a digital hub so the odometer reading was a rather mechanical digital reading and at the same time gained an hour of inactivity. Counter also so fleet managers knew how long the car had been idling on the side of the road they worked on. About 33 hours of idle time was equivalent to one mile driven, so I could estimate how often I needed oil changes without having driven too far. this is the analog speedometer we also have the reverse park neutral unit two on the prandtl uh gauge below the speedometer and we have a column mounted uh shift lever right there on the left is a voltmeter and a gauge Interestingly, the capsule on the left is from high to low rather than numbers, so charging high or low is pretty basic and an arrow to the fuel door on the right side of the speedometer dial, fuel temperature engine and oil.

Now this shifter is a four-speed. automatic with a manual overdrive button at the end, this car which is from 2002 would be equipped with a 4r 70w transmission starting in 2004 it got the 4r 70e which is a police car with electronic overdrive although it got the 4r75w , which is 4 speedwith manual overdrive. and if you see a police interceptor from later years, it still has a sticker on the dash that says to activate overdrive when in pursuit. Also on the steering column we have a small emergency light switch, a small button, this is the smallest button on the dash, I think on the left side we have our indicator switch and the windshield wiper on the same handle along with the washers, now we have the wheel, this is a typical Ford standard parts bin item that you will find on everything from an econoliner to a city car pretty much don't quote me because this is a kind of rubbery plastic material because a lot of the materials in cars gcc were rubbery and plastic instead of leather because of the temperatures in the car, it's a multifunction wheel so you have our cruise control buttons, it's an airbag wheel because you know, after the bad things, that bag air also works as a button for the horn, that's less impressive than I thought, it's a micro horn, what are you thinking?

Ford finally on the control column we have our camber adjustment lever which appears very quickly, pull the little lever towards you and you can adjust the camber to find your perfect driving position. Now, of course, it's a two-pedal car, it's automatic. Accelerate and brake with your feet and the third pedal is of course the handbrake with a little tag you have to pull to release it like on a Mercedes in Europe. Now, continuing on our big, wide dash, first of all, we have a couple of large air vents, there is very powerful air conditioning in this car and then we have the double DIN radio.

This thing is huge but very basic. It's an FM cassette radio with six huge fat buttons to choose your stations, but quite small buttons to choose your base and treble and that kind of thing which is the thing with American cars, they always have basic looking radios unless you have A big improvement now police cars never had wood. This has a small wooden insert extending from the full width of the dash with the newly placed Victoria

crown

in front of the passenger. Now here in the center is where we would have had the police trunk release or trunk release and below that we have the heated rear display button, which looks like an afterthought the way it's inserted there and to the right of it. we have the ventilation controls, the fan speed, the temperature and then the air.

The normal air conditioning and the maximum air conditioning that if this had landed at its destination would have been set to that almost all the time. Another thing you hear from the steering column that I noticed and forgot to mention is the ignition cylinder, it has a large plastic cover. on it, so it looks like you can have a fun, smart, exciting key with lots of features, but no, you have the most basic 1984 transit key you've ever seen, it just pops in there and the whole thing spins around in the form of a big switch. and thick so Yes, a little disappointing, now under the ventilation controls we have what looks like a huge ashtray and it's good both an ashtray, the cigarette lighter sockets and the cup holders, let's test the T-rack capacity of this car Ah, American. binge car, oh american car, why must you bing now?

These cup holders are quite large and are only about three centimeters deep, so it wobbles a little in there, but I'm surprisingly secure. I think you could probably drive with this glass and it would take a little time. It's hard to corner to lose that cup there, so it doesn't hurt that the owner's phone holder prevents the one on the left from being used with a couple of sides, although in T-shelf terms, you can't put anything high up over there. Okay, because you're opening a box of fries, your hamburger box will open and sit there quite happily, although it's pretty far away, so it's okay.

You can put things down and sit down if maybe you're going to watch a car movie. you can relax there then obviously you want to see out the windscreen, this on a police car depending on the model of course it could be a plastic desk for writing tickets etc and could be used however this is a spec civilian, so it's not as comfortable, so we don't have an armrest, although now on the right side, which is the passenger area of ​​the car, there's a lot of foot room, a big airbag panel here and a large glove box that is full.

It obviously has a label somewhere, so there is something about the gcc speed warning, but it doesn't tell us what the speed warning is. Let's look at the back of the car today, considering it's such a big car that it's actually not that big. in the back, if you've ever been in like a New York taxi and sat behind that perspex screen behind you, you're surprised at how claustrophobic the taxi-shaped kranvik backrest actually is, now there's several options in the back seat if so. a police car in a basic black and white patrol format, this seat would be basically molded plastic with actual cutouts behind the passenger area so someone handcuffed could sit with their hands behind this to a basic padded bench until this quite nice blue for export not many options back here we have a door pull a door handle a small power window switch and I'm going to say speaker and a speaker on the parcel shelf along with some anchor Points for a child seat which of course the police car would not have gotten.

Something we did get are these air vents on the back of the front armrest. This is only available on GCC cars and long wheelbase taxis after a certain date. Lincoln Town cars, this is a fairly specific option for this vehicle and of course the velvet fabric due to the hot country leather was an option but it was not chosen often because it was too hot to sit in a very hot place, although there is room for the head. Incredible, the four-door roof goes very far back and inside this rear windshield, actually quite narrow, it has quite a shallow depth from top to bottom, you think it's a very big piece of glass, but you look through it, It's actually a bit like a letterbox, but still, it goes far enough behind your head, you have plenty of headroom, so no taxi security screen, not that bad, plenty of room for my feet, my Knees are not too compressed, we have an armrest so we can enjoy luxury.

Stylish, there are no cupholders or access to the trunk. One of the things about converting the Crown bike into a police car is the survivability in accidents, such as on a p6 rover from the 60s and 70s, where it has become a kind of real safety point. The fuel tank is mounted between the rear wheels and partially behind the rear seat, so a folding rear seat is not an option. Now around the rear of the car there are many differences, but again this piano black finish is only available on the Detective Package or export cars. the worst victory

crown

only appears on civilian cars or detective packs or export police interceptors they didn't get it because otherwise you could tell it's a police interceptor, although it was given away by the word police interceptor or alternatively , k9 interceptor if it is a dog car.

It was never a dog car, but it got the badge in 2011. I think you really get into the trunk now because it's a typical traditional three-box sedan. You use the button on the door or this key on the lid inside. It is a huge space. It's 585 liters, can you hear the echo? It's a really weird shape though because you've got a big sunken area here in the center, raised areas on the side, and there's a big shelf above the fuel tank where the spare tire is, so I'm actually using that. As a trunk it's not always the best, however, it comes with nice little lights and you get a couple of extra little things on the left side.

There is a sticker to open the emergency fuel tank if the button has broken on it. door and it is also required by law for all American cars to have this trunk emergency exit, so if you have a victim curled up in the trunk area, make sure you have tied their hands first, otherwise they will escape, even if this is Potentially a luxury car in the market it was sold for, there is also no cladding on the boot like there is on the bonnet, so no nice friendly handholds, just a sharp edged sheet of metal. Yes, we had outside in the dirt to close the trunk, so I'm ready. to embark on what is quite an exciting journey but I've wanted a corona victim for years but I've never driven one that's lovely to me don't call me nice so we'll set the air conditioning to normal standard.

The little ones release the handbrake violently, then they go into gear and we are far away, our visibility is quite good. We'll take this out on the highway and see how it goes on a faster highway than this. I think 235 horsepower is wasted in an industrial park. well let's see what it's like, it's a torque converter automatic and old school, but with a big old V8 engine, and it's a fast roundabout, a little lag and then it goes, this is quite nice isn't it? Oh, floating along the road. a heavy car, the first quick braking. I can feel the weight of the car, about eighteen hundred kilos, four thousand and twenty pounds in old money and you can feel every one of them when you stop after driving more than 40 miles.

Now, yes, this car doesn't have abs, which is actually something that I find incredible. I didn't mention it above because I assumed it would be standard, but no export cars got it until 2003. Police cars didn't get it. as an option until 2006. you have to remember that when you look at the speedometer, we are not going 80 miles per hour, we are going 50 kilometers per hour because the big numbers are kph, God, it is very erratic to be sitting here on a smooth dual carriageway and The car still moves quite a bit more than I thought, but there is still power.

Still, you just step on the gas and the car just moves forward a little bit more considering it's a fast chase car, like in the California Highway Patrol, they were just nailing these. stuff everywhere is a very nice and relaxing thing now I'm told that if you turn off the air conditioning and just go into the basic vents it gains a little more power so we turn it off oh yeah the equipment. The change is no longer hunting, that is very interesting. You wouldn't think a 4.6 liter v8 would struggle or have any kind of problem with the air conditioning on, of course the Victorian Crown name dates back to the 1950s when it ran for a couple. of generations of a very different car, in fact, well, that is a very different car because it was also a traditional body-on-frame three-box sedan and when this car was finished, this was the last American-built sedan in the entire world as a solid.

A three-box v8 saloon with rear wheel drive, a proper old chassis and 0 to 60 is hailed at seven point something seconds, but most people generally feel it's closer to eight point something seconds, it's strange actually driving a left-hand drive car, which I'm getting used to again. It arrived pretty quickly, but it's been a while now, you might be wondering why an American company like Ford is ditching its police cars as luxury vehicles in the Middle East. Well, he realized that that particular area had a strong market for big three-door and four-door cars. Box sedans sold well there, um, but people wanted something with more simplicity than a European luxury car like a Howard or a BMW.

They like the idea of ​​the basics of a full-size Ford and also shipped them with five different versions. levels uh a three-box luxury sedan with obviously all the changes we've talked about already all of these cars were built in Ontario the synthesis plant in Canada apparently this is so Ford could get away with avoiding mass consumer attacks of gasoline in the United States and continue to build a v8, so each of the Crown Vics, regardless of specification, came from that same factory and, interestingly, the last car to roll off the line when they closed the factory Thomas's in 2012 was a golf-spec Crown Vic, not this one.

Obviously, that was ten years after this car was destined for Saudi Arabia in 2002, but then the Second Gulf War broke out and the order was canceled and it ended up being bought by a British kite carrier, but this car is so smooth in the road that just drifts the owner said it was a boat and he wasn't wrong I don't like to say American cars a boat feels like it'spandering to a preconceived idea but unfortunately you're floating around, rolling around corners pretty horribly and these were never sold in the UK so they don't have the same kind of cultural link as they do in America but they are the same as when a Rover SD1, a Vauxhall Senator or a Volvo T5 appear in your mirror in the UK if you see those unique squares. lights with the center indicators shining in the daytime running lights in America, you know there's a cop following you because in 2006, 95% of sales were to fleets, the civilian market was practically non-existent, so even cars with civilian appearance package did not fall.

Let's face it, so yes, although we don't have these cars in the UK, we feel familiar with them because we have seen them in many TV shows, movies, they are the background of America, they are part of the road landscape and the landscape of The states and our filmography are shorthand for America in many ways, so it's a shame they've now stopped production and everyone has been retired. The California Highway Patrol actually retired their last CVPs just a couple of weeks ago, but the police and military loved them because they were so tough and indestructible that they could just drive them and drive them and drive them and they wouldn't break.

There were many regular service oil changes and they kept going and working. Good air conditioning in a comfortable chair if you're in the car eight hours a day, that's what you need now. Part of the specifications of a p-71 police interceptor or a police interceptor in general is the ability to be rear-ended at 70 miles per hour and survive the accident. potentially it can also be driven and this solid chassis gives it that survivability, it also means that in a front and rear impact it is also great for survivability and the police car has greater resistance and rollover uh b poles on a pole , so the car will also tip over better, but it's still not a great thing to do in one of these, it's a little fragile if you put it on its side or turn it over, so it's better not to do that other option than They have police cars. what civilian cars didn't have ballistic doors this panel here or behind this panel here may have a sheet of kevlar with a small hole in it so a police officer can take cover behind your car door and shoot through the outside skin.

Police cars also have stab proof seat backs, so if you had someone arrested on the back of the seat, they wouldn't be able to stab you while you were driving the car, obviously civilian cars and taxis didn't fare as well, A pretty taxi driver needed it more than the police officers think so and people looking for a p-71 or a Crown Victor as an everyday vehicle really value this kind of ridiculous police spec stuff that they will never need in daily life, but if you are buying a crown. Vic, it's the kind of thing you really want, I said, talking about someone who really wants a Crown Vic with all that stuff I don't need.

I have to say this feels big in a back lane in England. I know it's a big car. It's apparently 212 inches long, which means nothing to me because those are old-fashioned measurements, but it's big, and in fact, it's bigger than a Seven Series or S-Class currently generating, so yeah, this is a big car. which leads through a bit of a small place. Rural left-hand drive lane. It feels like a big car, but you don't get into one of these cars without expecting it to be big, you know it's going to be a big car when you buy it, it has an automatic transmission, it's very easy to drive, you could put overdrive on now, Are you constantly browsing?

Lower the revs a bit, save some fuel, can't see what reds we have. I'm doing this because, interestingly, there is no rev counter in this car. A small side effect of the overdrive switch on the end of the transmission shifter is that I'm used to cars where, when you select drive in automatic, you push the end of the transmission. So every time I get in the car and start it I keep pressing the overdrive button so I turn it on overdrive by mistake. I'm sure I'll get used to it in no time, although that is an unmistakable sound.

I'm not even stomping it particularly hard, but even with moderate acceleration, this is also an iconic noise. It's obviously a V8 engine, of course it is, but that noise you've heard in a thousand movies and a thousand cop shows, you know? What a Crown Vic sounds like before you even start the engine is objectively not as good as the Tourer that replaced it, but the Taurus could never capture people's hearts the way this is done if you've seen the periodic reviews of cars. of a corona victim he has his little mantra in the background you want to be a policeman you want to be a policeman you want to be a policeman well, actually it's not that it's just a car, it's a part of the history of culture, but it's an icon of the pop culture, wanting a corona victim is like wondering where Levi's jeans are or a jean jacket or something.

It tilts a lot, it doesn't slide easily, although we could really imagine that if they were watching a TV. show and make the corona victim go sideways, they have to provoke them a little. They rewrote the suspension quite a bit in 2003 and the cars became a bit more stable. I've put a few more miles on this thing. I don't feel as nervous in the steering and the power steering is still surprisingly light, so I'm used to cars with a bit stronger steering input, so you feel like you're moving a lot now that you're more used to it, it's like if it feels a little more normal the throttle is pretty light this is still a cable operated throttle in this car there's nothing behind us so I'm going to hit the brakes pretty hard just to see what happens there's no masses apparently there's a braking distance about 145 feet from 60 I think I read it this morning.

I'm not sure how that compares to the Mondeo. Now, strangely, overdrive engages automatically, so you have to press the button to disengage overdrive before starting if you want to drive fast. Now that we are next to a double. roadway so let's see what it's like at ni 60 with the overdrive off, okay, let's go three two one and 60. this is the chase mode and 70. at the bottom of the throttle travel there's another detent that you can press even harder, which is our acceleration point, push it a little bit more now that we're cruising, we can turn off the overdrive again.

It's strange to have an overdrive without being in the 1940s or 50s. I was now considering purchasing one of these for semi-daily use. A while ago but I was worried about fuel economy, apparently on a long drive if you drive steadily, not being stupid and accelerating like an idiot all the time you can get around 30mpg, however when you get to the city, you start to go down. to closer to 15 to just walk around town, which is not so good with that popular fake. No, it shouldn't be in my everyday car, so I'll still be happy.

Thanks for joining me today on this fantastic golf spec. a luxury crown victim. This has been a great experience. The first time I was behind the wheel of one of my dream cars. It's strange that I've driven so many things and haven't driven one of the cars I so want to have, so thank you. Big thanks to the owner, Ben, for letting me drive it today. It has been very fun. If you liked it, please like, subscribe and I'll see you again next time I drive something completely different.