police cars with Air the 70's

[1930fordpickup]

Toledo Police DepartmentLike Page

1tS7t Splehoennrsshuored · 

On this day: April 30th, 1974

Toledo Police Division acquired 40 patrol cars with air conditioning to be used on a trial basis. There had been much debate and several studies that found that the interior temperatures in the cars could approach 120 degrees on some summer days. #toledopolice

This is from another social media source. I found this interesting that it took this long. 

[1972coronet]

California Highway Patrol  1972 Polara were ordered with A/C ( some sectors' vehicles had units with A/C as early as 1969 ) . That makes the 1972 models a "first & last" : first with A/C ; last with the white steering wheel .

[unclescott58]

During the late 1960's, early 1970's, the Minnesota State Patrol drove Maroon cars with White roofs. The reason the White roofs? To help keep the cars cooler inside in the summer. Because they were not equipped with air conditioning. Starting in '73 they got air conditioning in their cars, and went back to all Maroon colored cars. 

An odd side note to that. Before 1968, Minnesota drove all Maroon cars. But, with a large White star in a circle on the roof. The reason for that? So airplanes looking for speeders could identify the State Patrol cars from the air. 

[Danno]

In many locales it wasn't so much officer comfort that drove the migration to air-conditioned cars as it was economics. 

The bean-counters figured out that consumers would pay more for surplus police service cars if they had air conditioning.   Thus, officers got air-conditioned cars so the agency could sell their used cruisers for more $$ at the back end, recouping more of the capital investment.

Plus, the air-conditioning option became cheaper . . . more cars were ordered/sold with air-conditioning than without.  As a result, it became more costly to single out air-conditioning-delete cars on the assembly line.  In effect, it was cheaper to build nearly all cars with air-conditioning than it was to build some with and some without. 

Think of radios.  High cost option when they were first available, but before long so many cars were ordered/sold with radios that it became too troublesome and costly to build them without.  Hence, radios became standard equipment. 

[Agent G]

6 hours ago, Danno said:

In many locales it wasn't so much officer comfort that drove the migration to air-conditioned cars as it was economics. 

The bean-counters figured out that consumers would pay more for surplus police service cars if they had air conditioning.   Thus, officers got air-conditioned cars so the agency could sell their used cruisers for more $$ at the back end, recouping more of the capital investment.

Plus, the air-conditioning option became cheaper . . . more cars were ordered/sold with air-conditioning than without.  As a result, it became more costly to single out air-conditioning-delete cars on the assembly line.  In effect, it was cheaper to build nearly all cars with air-conditioning than it was to build some with and some without. 

Think of radios.  High cost option when they were first available, but before long so many cars were ordered/sold with radios that it became too troublesome and costly to build them without.  Hence, radios became standard equipment. 

To add to my brother's comments:

I started in late 1979 and every car I drove had AC. As mentioned above, it was not for the benefit of the end user, us flatfoots, it was extra value at the end of the road. Commanders BTW, had big fully equipped Mercury Marquis. 

All our cars prior to the 1982 model year not only had the "radio delete" option, they had the techs mount the police radio in the dash in it's place. We were strictly forbidden from listening to or even having a small portable radio in the car. ( St Louis Cardinal games were the one exception).1983 saw the advent of the Celebrity as a radio car. They had radios in place when delivered and the "powers that be" lost their collective minds. Budget and Finance announced that "times were a changin'" and that the deletion of the radio by the factory was not only cost prohibitive, it lessened any trade in value our dogs would have in the future. Fast forward to 1993 when a portion of our Caprice fleet came with power windows, power seats and GASP!!!, CARPET! 

Imagine all wool uniforms, long sleeve shirts. ties and hats in 99% humidity at 90 degrees without a cloud in the sky. There's a reason old skool coppers looked grumpy.

G 

[Danno]

Reason old skool coppers looked grumpy?  10-4 that!

This string of comments reminds me of one of my all-time favorite stories related to resale value of used (surplus) police patrol cars taking on an all new significance. 

The bean counters at one large agency were increasingly disgusted with the small residual value of surplus cars. They consulted 'consultants' and discovered that the lousy resale value was due to the overall condition & high mileage but aggravated by all the body holes (mounts for spotlights, emergency lights, sirens, antennas), the leftover mismatched panels (black & white scheme), and the various sticky/gummy/dirty areas where markings were pealed off. They devised an unusual plan to increase the resale values of surplus cars.

They ordered all new cars in random factory colors (no two tones) with air conditioning (new that year) and no windshield pillar spotlights. They employed gutter-mount light bars (new) with radio antennas mounted to the light bars. They used reflective signs attached to the light bars to identify them as police cars. There were no other exterior markings. They installed hand-held spotlights in the interiors, and created a radio/PA/siren control head "stack" attached only to the floor. It was innovative and radical, but it worked!  The cops loved it and the shocked citizenry quickly adapted to the absence of the old black & whites. Crime scenes seldom drew two or more police cars of the same color.

The experiment was successful, but not without at least one memorable episode. The last dinosaur was a remarkably low mileage leftover black and white. The brass refused to surplus it until it reached the requisite mileage and it was far short. Yet, its very black-and-whiteness was a sore thumb, stick in the eye of the boss.  So one notable day a second tier chief-type took it to the city shops and commissioned a makeover. A cheap makeover. He directed that they strip the decals, removethe roof-mounted siren-light and pillar-mounted spotlights, patch the holes, and install the new-style gutter mount light bar, etc. The shop guys asked what color he wanted it painted. He said whatever they had that was cheap as long as it wasn't black or white.

Shop guys being shop guys, the police department got their low-mileage straggler back . . . with the new-style equipment, but painted bright baby blue!   The car remained very low mileage . . . none of the cops would drive it. They found all kinds of excuses to not drive it . . . legend has it more than one officer went home right after roll call with a sudden onset of illness (maybe blue flu . . . baby blue flu?).  After a few weeks of that, the car mysteriously vanished . . . reportedly auctioned for next to nothing. 

[Tom Geiger]

Interesting! I never saw a problem with used police car value. In New Jersey these heavy duty sedans were sought after by taxi fleets. A police Vic with 100,000 miles on it still had a few hundred thousand miles of taxi service left in it.

In fact there was one shop that did nothing but paint old black and whites taxi yellow. On one side of the building were all police cars and all taxis on the other.

We did see the quest for resale value with New Jersey state cars. They were originally institutional colors with state seals on the doors. Cheap fleet strippers that no resale customer would want. I remember one used car lot that had a whole row of 1973 Valiants in an awful yellow with green interiors with the state seal hastily scraped off the doors. 

The state went to small American sedans like Dodge Aries and Chevy Cavaliers outfitted like rental cars in an array of normal colors. They moved the state seal and “For Official Use Only” to on the rear door glass, which was easily removed without harm for resale.

NJ also had a reputation for maintaining their vehicles well and the engines got steam cleaned at every service. My father and I went to a few state auctions and were amazed at the prices they sold for. 

Later on the state, counties and towns were feeling budget crunches and kept cars in service longer. Instead of buying new cars for employee use, they’d reuse used police cars for less critical roles. In my last NJ town the building inspector pulled up in an old Crown Vic.

Gone were the days of changing out cars on a quick schedule. Back in the years of waste and excess my father was an army officer and his staff car was changed out every two years. I remember having a 1968 AMC Ambassador and having it replaced with a new 1970 Falcon, which was the fleet low end Torino. My father complained that this was wasteful since the AMC was only used on post and had less than 10,000 miles on it. 

These were miserable strippers in army green. Lord knows what the US Army did with these in Germany! They couldn’t dump them on the local market, but the cars just disappeared. They probably crushed them. And as wasteful as the government was, they probably shipped them back to the USA and then crushed them 
 

 

Edited May 2, 2020 by Tom Geiger

[Danno]

Speaking of taxis . . . 

At one point an agency which will remain nameless (I might have worked there) took a patrol car and painted it yellow, slapped some phony taxi decals on it and used it for undercover and surveillance.

Another time a sedan was removed from patrol service to be reassigned to the detectives. The Assistant Chief groused about having a police car for detective work, so he worked a deal with a local body shop. Next time we saw the car, it was pure white with two subtle blue and gold stripes from grille to rear bumper, just like the local Ma Bell telephone company's fleet cars, most of which ran around with only the stripes and no door markings.  The Chief had a minor cow, complaining loudly that the phone company might sue us!  It took a deft eye to recognize how clever the Assistant Chief had been:  the stripes were swapped, left for right. Most people who saw the car saw a telephone company car and Ma Bell couldn't sue us for trademark infringement because the stripes were different from theirs.

[Tom Geiger]

59 minutes ago, Danno said:

Speaking of taxis . . . 

At one point an agency which will remain nameless (I might have worked there) took a patrol car and painted it yellow, slapped some phony taxi decals on it and used it for undercover and surveillance.

And then there was this one....   I saw this car in person back when I worked in this town.  I was surprised how easily I found this photo just now!

 

[Joe Handley]

The C&NW made the same discovery with A/C on their trucks, increased the resale value no matter how hard the trucks got hammered on while on the job, especially when combined with a good detail job!

[unclescott58]

All the talk about different colored cop cars, brings up a strory on the site MaroonCruisers.com. A site dedicated to history of the cars used by the Minnesota State Patrol. For several years in the 1950's the MN State Patrol used cars in many different colors. But, in the mid-50's the AAA started making a big push for all state patrols around the country to start going to consistent colors for their cars. Since Maroon and Gold were our state colors, Maroon was the color they picked for all their cars starting 1958. 

The Maroon used on MN State Patrol cars has not always been consistent. At times the shades varied depended on the manufacturer. One year, in I believe the late 1980's, Chevrolet delivered a bunch of Caprices in an odd shade of "Maroon." Not all that close to what was used before or since. The biggest problem with this paint? The paint of these cars started fading almost immediately, to a very unattractive shade of pink. I don't remember the whole story, I'm sure it's at MaroonCruiser.com, but I believe Chevrolet had to repaint the cars. 

Also intresting, to me at least, in 1974 they added one AMC Ambassador to fleet. This car was not used for patrol duties. But, for other functions. I'm surprised they only had one the Ambassador? Plymouths were their main choice of cars at the time. But, Ambassador's little sister, the Matador, built on the same but a shortened wheelbase version of the platform used by the Ambassador, was a very popular choice as a police car at the time. And I think that the one Ambassador was the one and only AMC product the MN State Patrol ever had? 

If your interested, the website MaroonCruisers.com is pretty interesting. I know it only deals with Minnesota's State Patrol cars. But, there quite a few interesting explanations for why they used certain cars, and certain equipment over the years. And how and why things changed as time went on. I wish there were more sites like this one on other states and municipalities police cars. 

 

[unclescott58]

A modification needs to be made to the above. I went back on MaroonCruiser.com just for the pleasure of it. It turns out I was wrong about them having only one '74 AMC Ambassador. They had one for each district head to drive. And this was done as an economy move. The regular Plymouth patrol cars ran with 440s at the time. The Ambassadors were a little more economical, power by AMC's 360. 

Also some new info was added since I was on the site last. In fact the whole site has been update and enhanced. But, apparently in 1980, they had they're second run of AMC's. This time Concords. They and some Chevy Citations were added. But not for patrol or pursuit work. Yet they indicated on the site that the Concords actually pretty fast. A 258 straight six Concord could outrun an '80 Plymouth Gran Fury with California emissions equipment. 

Edited May 3, 2020 by unclescott58

[The Junkman]

10 hours ago, unclescott58 said:

 

Also some new info was added since I was on the site last. In fact the whole sire has been update and enhanced. But, apparently in 1980, they had they're second run of AMC's. This time Concords. They and some Chevy Citations were added. But not for patrol or pursuit work. Yet they indicated on the site that the Concords actually pretty fast. A 258 straight six Concord could outrun an '80 Plymouth Gran Fury with California emissions equipment. 

That's like saying a bog standard VW Beetle could outrun a class A motorhome.  I lived through that.  The 1980 St Regis (and the Gran Fury) had an emission strangled 318ci that was good for about 140 to 160hp.  All those ponies were pushing about 4800-5000lbs of police car/beefy dudes/radios/flares etc.  I had one that on a straight, flat Interstate (I-680 in Milpitas/San Jose) that after being floored-literally floored-after 6.5 miles was doing just about 100mph.  A rise in the roadway, just a rise and not a hill, would noticeably cause the car to slow.  The only good thing about that POS was that it came with the first installation of halogen headlamps.  40 years later I still shake at the memory.  It did have a/c though.

Edited May 3, 2020 by The Junkman

[Agent G]

In the Anti-Crime Unit we took an old CVPI, had the department body shop paint it red and then added "Laclede Cab" decals obtained from the local company. Radio techs took the police radio and programmed it to display "TAXI-01, 02 etc. instead of the normal district numbers. Taxi drivers were required to wear white shirts and black trousers so that's what we wore when driving the car. Made a great ride for decoy operations. Of course sitting in midtown protecting the straights visiting the entertainment district, I would always get someone trying to hop in for a trip home. I probably should have done it for the extra cash...…Coppers will recognize the significance of the fender number. 

Edited May 3, 2020 by Agent G

[The Junkman]

Well, with the CHP 10-21 was to call someone as in "10-21 the Sgt" (which was never good).  The only one worse than that was "10-19" which meant go back (usually to the office) as in "10-19 and see the Sgt" which was never-ever good.  I'd get one of those and would re-double my usual search for a drunk driver so I could put that meeting off.

Edited May 3, 2020 by The Junkman

[Agent G]

Yup, 10-21: Call by phone. 

A little code talking for a UC vehicle.

G