Category: Classic Police

Classic and vintage police vehicles. Some are no longer in existence, some are still around today and preserved.

Classic Police

D116 EAJ North Yorkshire Police BMW R45Tic

D116 EAJ
North Yorkshire Police
BMW R45Tic
On display at Ripon Prison and Police Museum, having been donated by North Yorkshire Police. It sits inside one of the old prisoner cells and was a tight squeeze to push it into place. The tax disc shows that it was last on the road in 1997.

Classic Police

D444 KVM Greater Manchester Police Ford Capri 2.8i Special

D444 KVM
Greater Manchester Police
Ford Capri 2.8i Special
This 1986 car saw service in the Tameside area of Manchester based at Ashton-under-Lyne between 1986 and 1989. The car was disposed of by the force when it entered civilian life. The car has had a number of private owners until it was discovered and a full restoration began in 2018 to reinstate it to its police livery.

Classic Police

M752 CVC Metropolitan Police Service Range Rover

M752 CVC
Metropolitan Police Service
Range Rover
This P38 Range Rover was one of a small fleet of police demonstrators loaned by Land Rover to various UK forces. It was then sold to the Met in 1997 and used until 2003 as a traffic car. It is seen here prior to the original livery being restored.

Classic Police

OHO 854G Portsmouth City Police Morris Minor

OHO 854G
Portsmouth City Police
Morris Minor
This replica vehicle was a dog unit. The van had two-tone horns fitted when most other vehicles at the time still used a bell. Each dog handler had their own vehicle that they customised to their liking. The car has a 1.1 litre engine producing 48 bhp.

Classic Police

D882 GEC Lancashire Constabulary Rover SD1 3500

D882 GEC
Lancashire Constabulary
Rover SD1 3500
This 1980s traffic car has been expertly and perfectly restored back to factory condition by James Wade. When the automotive engineering graduate bought the car in 2012 it was in a poor state. Incalculable hours and a lot of money later, it was a star of the show at Birmingham’s NEC classic car show in 2018.

Classic Police

KYP 637D Home Office Austin Gipsy

KYP 637D
Home Office
Austin Gipsy
Police Mobile Column from 1966. This is the only preserved mobile police column vehicle still on the road. The description refers to its use in the Cold War civil defence force that was intended to patrol the UK in the event of a nuclear attack. It was delivered to the Home Office in 1967 but the force was disbanded a year later and the Gipsy was passed to Hampshire Police. After some use, it was superseded by the Ford Transit and so went into storage. After passing through a few private hands, it returned to the UK from Ireland in 2016 and underwent re-liverying back into its original 1966/7 livery. It has never been restored! The interior is totally original and the vehicle has covered less than 6,000 miles in its long life. It is even still using the original exhaust. It is a real time-warp vehicle.

Classic Police

GAR 638T Hertfordshire Constabulary Ford Cortina 1.6 L

GAR 638T
Hertfordshire Constabulary
Ford Cortina 1.6 L
This model Cortina shows what was in use in Herts in the late 1970s. All five generations of Cortina gave sterling service to many Police forces during the model’s twenty year production life, which ended in 1982. The car modelled was used as a Divisional Area Car and was based at Hitchin Police Station. In common with other Hertfordshire Constabulary vehicles it carried dual roof mounted spotlights as well as the equipment required to deal with a variety of emergency situations. All the constabulary’s Divisional Area Cars were ordered in blue to distinguish them from the force’s traffic patrol units, which were white.

Classic Police

L581 GVT Staffordshire Police Jaguar XJ6 PS

L581 GVT
Staffordshire Police
Jaguar XJ6 PS
The ‘Police Special’ version of Jaguar’s 4.0 litre XJ6 model. The car joined Staffs Police from new in 1993. It later moved to be used by the driving training unit before moving to front-line duties as a traffic car. The rear seats were taken out when it was used as a traffic car as the boot was not big enough to accommodate the kit that was carried. The seats were later reinstated so the vehicle could be used to carry detainees. It was the first video car on the central traffic group. It definitely had rear seats but also had a VHS video recorder in the boot as it was in the early days of video cars. The car has been in preservation since 2003.

Classic Police

M751 CVC Metropolitan Police Service Land Rover Range Rover Vogue

M751 CVC
Metropolitan Police Service
Land Rover Range Rover Vogue
This vehicle was new in 1994 when it was part of Land Rover’s police demonstrator fleet. After being passed around a number of forces, it found a permanent home withy the Met Police in 1997 as part of the Special Escort Group. Its most famous moment was escorting Princess Diana’s funeral cortege in 1997. It left police service in 2002.