How to spot an unmarked police car
Discussion
My late father used to enjoy scaring the crap out of people on the motorway - using a combination of the following factors:
- He drove a clean-looking Volvo V70 in a sober metallic colour.
- He worked for the Fire & Rescue Service, so was often in a white shirt, black tie and epaulets.
- He'd sit in the inside lane, doing 60-ish mph.
Having been a passenger in his car when he was in uniform, it's amazing just how many t
ts would come racing up behind, slam their anchors on, and crawl past him at 65, before booting it again, 1/2 mile up the road.
Never failed to amuse my Dad, that.
- He drove a clean-looking Volvo V70 in a sober metallic colour.
- He worked for the Fire & Rescue Service, so was often in a white shirt, black tie and epaulets.
- He'd sit in the inside lane, doing 60-ish mph.
Having been a passenger in his car when he was in uniform, it's amazing just how many t
ts would come racing up behind, slam their anchors on, and crawl past him at 65, before booting it again, 1/2 mile up the road.Never failed to amuse my Dad, that.
MorganP104 said:
My late father used to enjoy scaring the crap out of people on the motorway - using a combination of the following factors:
- He drove a clean-looking Volvo V70 in a sober metallic colour.
- He worked for the Fire & Rescue Service, so was often in a white shirt, black tie and epaulets.
- He'd sit in the inside lane, doing 60-ish mph.
Having been a passenger in his car when he was in uniform, it's amazing just how many tts would come racing up behind, slam their anchors on, and crawl past him at 65, before booting it again, 1/2 mile up the road.
Never failed to amuse my Dad, that.
A friend of mine was a senior officer in the St John which meant at times traveling latish wearing HiViz with epaulets. That bought more than a few cursory glances - He drove a clean-looking Volvo V70 in a sober metallic colour.
- He worked for the Fire & Rescue Service, so was often in a white shirt, black tie and epaulets.
- He'd sit in the inside lane, doing 60-ish mph.
Having been a passenger in his car when he was in uniform, it's amazing just how many t
ts would come racing up behind, slam their anchors on, and crawl past him at 65, before booting it again, 1/2 mile up the road.Never failed to amuse my Dad, that.
HantsRat said:
If there are no crashes to go to then traffic cops will patrol the motorways looking for offences including speeding which again is that they would be doing in this scenario. Likewise if wombles have no crashes to go to, they will patrol as well.
In pairs? I wonder why they would do that 
yonex said:
Greendubber said:
HantsRat said:
yonex said:
Great use of tax money right there 
What do you think unmarked motorway patrols actually do? Their job is to patrol motorways and deal with offenders which is exactly what they're doing.Motoring offence: waste of money, I should be able to ignore the limits because I have an MX5 and I dominate the roads.
Any other offence: what do I pay my taxes for, police didnt solve a protracted enquiry within 5 minutes...#angryface
It's all about the safety.
I guess all those prisons filled themselves then.
HantsRat said:
Yes on a daily basis. I'm guessing you haven't had a family member killed by a speeding or texting motorist before?
Have you? I have had close friends who have died on the roads, yes. Have you also dealt with theft in your own home, your possessions, then had to deal with the inadequacies of the local plod? They are just not set up for localised crime sprees, the focus is elsewhere, as I have indicated.
HantsRat said:
yonex said:
I guess, there's a lot of money safety concerns on the roads to take care of?
Yes on a daily basis. I'm guessing you haven't had a family member killed by a speeding or texting motorist before? yonex said:
HantsRat said:
Yes on a daily basis. I'm guessing you haven't had a family member killed by a speeding or texting motorist before?
Have you? I have had close friends who have died on the roads, yes. Have you also dealt with theft in your own home, your possessions, then had to deal with the inadequacies of the local plod? They are just not set up for localised crime sprees, the focus is elsewhere, as I have indicated.
Our current force targets are burglary, theft from the person and domestic violence. Absolutely to expectation of anyone, other than traffic to go and enforce any speed limits what so ever.
So your opinion on where the 'focus' appears to be is more than likely wrong.
Which force area do you live in out of interest? I reckon there will be something on their website about current priorities.
yonex said:
Have you? I have had close friends who have died on the roads, yes.
Have you also dealt with theft in your own home, your possessions, then had to deal with the inadequacies of the local plod? They are just not set up for localised crime sprees, the focus is elsewhere, as I have indicated.
Yes I have actually. One of the many reasons why I decided to specialise in roads policing. Yes I had a theft of a bike once, It was just recorded as a crime over the phone. That's life not everyone gets caught. I don't expect them to the send a CSI squad round for a little bike theft when they are so short staffed and could be dealing with more important crimes. Have you also dealt with theft in your own home, your possessions, then had to deal with the inadequacies of the local plod? They are just not set up for localised crime sprees, the focus is elsewhere, as I have indicated.
Although I fail to see how that in anyway relates to roads policing as being discussed on this thread. Roads policing officers will not be investigating a theft. In hants roads policing officers account for less than 3% of total officers.
Edited by HantsRat on Thursday 16th March 14:03
HantsRat said:
Yes I have actually. One of the many reasons why I decided to specialise in roads policing. Yes I had a theft of a bike once, It was just recorded as a crime over the phone. That's life not everyone gets caught. I don't expect them to the send a CSI squad round for a little bike theft theft when they are so short staffed and could be doing more important crimes.
Although I fail to see how that in anyway relates to roads policing as being discussed on this thread. Roads policing officers will not be investigation a theft. In hants roads policing officers account for less than 3% of total officers.
As I see it the roads aren't 'policed' they're set up to generate as much revenue as possible, education is what is needed not this very odious system we employ, that's if this is about road safety, which it isn't IMO. Of all the stops how many are really finding wanted felons, are you seriously trying to suggest that the primary reason of an unmarked car is not to catch speeding motorists, it would seem entirely the opposite to most people?Although I fail to see how that in anyway relates to roads policing as being discussed on this thread. Roads policing officers will not be investigation a theft. In hants roads policing officers account for less than 3% of total officers.
yonex said:
As I see it the roads aren't 'policed' they're set up to generate as much revenue as possible, education is what is needed not this very odious system we employ, that's if this is about road safety, which it isn't IMO. Of all the stops how many are really finding wanted felons, are you seriously trying to suggest that the primary reason of an unmarked car is not to catch speeding motorists, it would seem entirely the opposite to most people?
Unmarked cars have many uses, targeting known criminals without being seen, sitting up on intel for drug dealing and drink drivers as well as blending in to pick up on traffic offences such as texting while driving.I would say 1 in 10 stops for a minor offence leads to something such as no insurance/no licence and approx 1 in 50 routine stops will dig up a wanted person.
Education is offered such as the speed awareness course if you meet the threshold. There are also online courses for seatbelt offences.
Before each shift we have a briefing which included intel for drink drive / no insurance, The unmarked cars are brilliant for this.
yonex said:
As I see it the roads aren't 'policed' they're set up to generate as much revenue as possible, education is what is needed not this very odious system we employ, that's if this is about road safety, which it isn't IMO. Of all the stops how many are really finding wanted felons, are you seriously trying to suggest that the primary reason of an unmarked car is not to catch speeding motorists, it would seem entirely the opposite to most people?
I don't have any problem with unmarked cars. I got caught once fair and square, went to court and took my punishment. The officers don't set the limits and given the standard of a small minority of idiot drivers in this country they need to be enforced otherwise these morons will undoubtedly kill themselves and other people. I asked the original question on this thread as I think its fair enough to know what to look out for - this is only going to make you more vigilant as a driver? I got stopped by an undercover traffic car (14 plate Audi A4, navy) in Swansea at Christmas time after finishing work at 4am on a sunday morning.
..Took it to court and the case was thrown because the traffic car was not equipped with video camera equipment, which i found totally bizarre. So there was no evidence.
Generally speaking if im driving 'enthusiastically' i will always calm down when over taking a newish BMW saloon (3 or 5) or Audi (A4 maybe A6) which are usually in perfect lease spec. i.e rarely no m sports or s lines etc, and usually they have small wheels. I could be wrong but i havent ever seen South Wales Police with anything spicy as an undercover car.
Similarly in the mirror at night when its hard to identify whos on your bumper, if i spot xenons from Audi or BMW headlights i'll also back off the throttle. Not to say all undercover cars have xenons, just a bit of my OTT observation!
..Took it to court and the case was thrown because the traffic car was not equipped with video camera equipment, which i found totally bizarre. So there was no evidence.
Generally speaking if im driving 'enthusiastically' i will always calm down when over taking a newish BMW saloon (3 or 5) or Audi (A4 maybe A6) which are usually in perfect lease spec. i.e rarely no m sports or s lines etc, and usually they have small wheels. I could be wrong but i havent ever seen South Wales Police with anything spicy as an undercover car.
Similarly in the mirror at night when its hard to identify whos on your bumper, if i spot xenons from Audi or BMW headlights i'll also back off the throttle. Not to say all undercover cars have xenons, just a bit of my OTT observation!
irfan1712 said:
I got stopped by an undercover traffic car (14 plate Audi A4, navy) in Swansea at Christmas time after finishing work at 4am on a sunday morning.
..Took it to court and the case was thrown because the traffic car was not equipped with video camera equipment, which i found totally bizarre. So there was no evidence.
Bizarre indeed...Took it to court and the case was thrown because the traffic car was not equipped with video camera equipment, which i found totally bizarre. So there was no evidence.
Stories here remind me of the time I was nabbed by an unmarked car on the A1(M). A black Skoda Octavia vRS came charging up behind me, and stayed glued to my rear bumper. "I'm not having this", I think to myself, drop a couple of cogs, and blatt off up the road, leaving the Octavia in my wake.
I think nothing more of it until I am exiting the motorway. Said Octavia pulls up next to me at the slip road traffic lights, and I can see in my peripheral vision that the driver is gesturing to me.
The wife (in the passenger seat) tells me the chap in the car next to me wants a chat. I tell her to ignore him, as it's probably some road rage idiot. Then I hear a quick burst of "whoop whoop" from the unmarked Octavia's sirens.
Oh crap. I pull over, the copper gets out, and proceeds to give me the bking of my life. He then catches sight of my missus, who has her arms firmly folded, and a face on her like a slapped arse. All of a sudden, his attitude changes, and he says "nothing I do to you is going to be as bad as what she's going to do to you... Keep the speed down in future". He then sent me on my way without a ticket.
The drive home was a bit frosty, I have to say.
I think nothing more of it until I am exiting the motorway. Said Octavia pulls up next to me at the slip road traffic lights, and I can see in my peripheral vision that the driver is gesturing to me.
The wife (in the passenger seat) tells me the chap in the car next to me wants a chat. I tell her to ignore him, as it's probably some road rage idiot. Then I hear a quick burst of "whoop whoop" from the unmarked Octavia's sirens.
Oh crap. I pull over, the copper gets out, and proceeds to give me the b
king of my life. He then catches sight of my missus, who has her arms firmly folded, and a face on her like a slapped arse. All of a sudden, his attitude changes, and he says "nothing I do to you is going to be as bad as what she's going to do to you... Keep the speed down in future". He then sent me on my way without a ticket.The drive home was a bit frosty, I have to say.
I'm currently building a tetra/airwave detector. Similar to the Python or Target BlueEye.
Built using a Raspberry Pi 3, an SDR and a small LCD screen. Just need to write a python or C++ gui for it and it'll work. I can already scan the relevant frequencies and identify the uplink radio chatter, but until I create an interface I can only see it on a waterfall graph or in raw csv data files.
It isn't breaking the law as the device is incapable of decrypting the traffic, and in this instance is not even capturing encrypted data samples, it simply scans the relevant frequencies several times over 4 seconds then reports back the strongest signal found.
After calibration it should be able to tell you roughly how far the nearest active (ie. switched on) tetra mobile unit is.
I'll set it to display a dB output, but depending on results of calibration I might also create:
I then plan to add a Bluetooth media player, GPS speedo, and possibly add two remote HD cameras to make a dashcam. Will also put it into a case and maybe add battery/ups power.
I expect it to be reasonably useless in urban areas, especially leaving home as I live by a fire stations, and you are never very far from an ambulance, policeman, pcso or fire engine. But it should still show rough distance and whether sources are getting closer or further away.
Built using a Raspberry Pi 3, an SDR and a small LCD screen. Just need to write a python or C++ gui for it and it'll work. I can already scan the relevant frequencies and identify the uplink radio chatter, but until I create an interface I can only see it on a waterfall graph or in raw csv data files.
It isn't breaking the law as the device is incapable of decrypting the traffic, and in this instance is not even capturing encrypted data samples, it simply scans the relevant frequencies several times over 4 seconds then reports back the strongest signal found.
After calibration it should be able to tell you roughly how far the nearest active (ie. switched on) tetra mobile unit is.
I'll set it to display a dB output, but depending on results of calibration I might also create:
- a graph output
- an indicator of whether receive strength is currently rising/falling (ie. likely moving away or towards source)
- number of active channels identified (identify higher/lower number of different sources)
- approximate distance (probably fairly coarse... something like <200m, <500m, <1mile) - this will be indicative only due to lots of factors (reflection, original signal strength, etc)
I then plan to add a Bluetooth media player, GPS speedo, and possibly add two remote HD cameras to make a dashcam. Will also put it into a case and maybe add battery/ups power.
I expect it to be reasonably useless in urban areas, especially leaving home as I live by a fire stations, and you are never very far from an ambulance, policeman, pcso or fire engine. But it should still show rough distance and whether sources are getting closer or further away.
Edited by spookly on Friday 17th March 10:52
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