Tag Archives: police

Auto Industry, Electric Avenue, Four Wheels

Ford Mustang Mach-E Passes Michigan State Police Testing

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You’re not going to see Ford Mustang Mach-E police cars in your rear view mirror next week. But in the future, you could.

The Michigan State Police have pretty much established the standard when it comes to testing cars for police use. They put cars through grueling acceleration, top speed, braking, high-speed pursuit, and emergency response handling tests. This is where the Dodge Intrepid’s brakes were found to be not up to the task, catching fire in the process. The Ford Mustang Mach-E, though, passed all these tests with flying colors — the first electric car ever to do so.

It didn’t even have a cop motor, cop suspension, cop shocks… Ford submitted a bone stock example for testing. The only modification was stickers (which, arguably, do add horsepower). We won’t know exactly how the Mustang Mach-E stacks up against traditional police cars like the Ford Explorer, Dodge Charger, etc. until later this fall, when the Michigan State Police will publish test results for all cars they’ve tested during the past year.

According to Motor1.com, Ford does not currently intend to build a police version of the Mustang Mach-E. Seeing how well the regular version did in these tests establishes a baseline for its performance. I expect that when the full test results come out, Ford will see in what areas other cars beat them, then design improvements that will address those shortcomings.

Electric cars, in general, make a ton of sense when it comes to police use. Most of the time they sit around, idling, wasting gas. Electric cars, by their nature, don’t do that. They also have a massive battery, which is necessary to run all the lights, computers, radios, and other emergency equipment. Additionally, when it comes time for hot pursuit of them Duke boys, there’s nothing quite like the acceleration of an electric car. Tesla’s made it famous, but all electric motors generate maximum torque from zero RPM, making them quicker off the line than any fossil fuel car can be.

It’s an intriguing concept. The only issue is with departments that keep their cars on the road 24/7, rotating multiple officers through them as they go on and off their shifts. That doesn’t leave any time to recharge.

Autonomous Overlords, Four Wheels

Tesla On Autopilot Crashes Into Police Car — Again

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Further validating the NHTSA investigation into such things, another Tesla flying on Autopilot has crashed into a police car conducting a routine traffic stop, this time in Florida, reports Automotive News.

It may or may not be the fault of Autopilot itself. It is certainly the driver’s responsibility, because either way, he shouldn’t be allowing his car to smash into police cars on the side of the road. Jalopnik makes a convincing argument about how awful Level 2 autonomy systems such as, but not limited to, Autopilot are. They can drive under ordinary circumstances, but it doesn’t take much to confuse them, at which point the human driver is expected to take over immediately. We’re bad at doing this. It’s not that we’re bad drivers (well, some of us are) — it’s just human nature.

At this point, just add one more incident for NHTSA to investigate, and be glad that nobody got hurt — especially the cop who might’ve been standing on the side of the road if the timing had been different.

Car Culture, Four Wheels

This Crusty Cop Beetle Visited My Elementary School

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I was in first grade when this car paid a visit to my elementary school in Acton, Massachusetts. I remember it clearly because my mom had a 1974 VW Super Beetle in Screaming Yellow Zonker (I’m almost positive that’s the factory’s name for the color), and this was a police Beetle, which I thought was the coolest thing ever. My teacher didn’t like me, and falsely accused me of pushing my way through the crowd to get a better look before sending me back to the classroom to miss the rest of the presentation.

Mustie1 goes into the car’s history a bit in this video, but I can shed some light as well. The car traveled around Massachusetts making presentations to young school kids like myself. During a bit of automotive archeology he finds a cassette tape of a school bus safety presentation — the same presentation my first grade teacher kicked me out of. It plays through the PA system. The front of the car resembles a face, complete with the police hat. The hood has a motor to make it open and close to make it look like the car is talking. That’s why the lower part of the trunk area is painted a very non-police pink color, to look like the inside of a mouth. I spent most of this video wondering if this was really the same car that visited my school 40 years ago. This detail confirmed for me that it is.

Mustie1 actually manages to get this long dead car running again in his second video (it’s over an hour long, so “Buckle up, America,” like the bumper sticker he found inside says). To someone like me who grew up with fuel injected cars, it’s amazing to me just how simple the process of getting it running it. It certainly doesn’t run well, but he manages to not only start it, but also drive it around a dirt lot (with practically no brakes, but who needs those?)

It’s amazing what memories can be tied up with a car, especially when I saw far more of it in these videos than I did back in first grade. Particularly thanks to my mean first grade teacher.

Auto Industry, Electric Avenue, Four Wheels

Boulder County Sheriff’s Office Tests Tesla Model Y

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Cop cars are known for being cheap to buy, cheap to run, run hard, and put away wet. So why has the Boulder County Sheriff’s Office splurged on a not-so-cheap Tesla Model Y? Fuel costs, says Elektrek. They believe that in 6-18 months, the savings in gas will offset the additional cost of purchasing the car.

There’s a lot to that. Police cars run almost constantly, and burn a ton of fuel just idling. I mean, who’s going to steal them? An electric car completely eliminates this waste. It also has at least as good, if not better acceleration than the Explorers, Chargers, etc. currently in service. Finally, police run an insane amount of electrical equipment. All those flashing lights, sirens, radios, computers, radar, and other stuff sucks down a lot of power. Traditional cruisers get upgraded alternators to keep up with the demand. An electric car can already supply it, straight out of the box.

We’ll have to keep an eye on this one. If Boulder County is right, we may start to see a surge in electric police cars over the next several years.