How to spot an unmarked police car

How to spot an unmarked police car

Author
Discussion

TheOversteerLever

1,340 posts

212 months

Wednesday 15th March 2017
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They never seem to have any dealer branding on either the rear screen or number plates.

Dave Hedgehog

14,541 posts

203 months

Wednesday 15th March 2017
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fastbikes76 said:
IanH755 said:
The Octavia seems to be a popular choice in Kent recently, seen 3 different ones (2x Blue, 1x Grey) on the M20/M2.
They have a Lime green, blood red and electric blue Skoda estates running round Kent with GN prefixes.

  • not correct colour names but that's my take on them.
they had a met brown one as well a while back, soiled myself when the lights lit up behind me ...


esxste

3,665 posts

105 months

Wednesday 15th March 2017
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I've seen an unmarked Focus ST estate in Essex biggrin

Also a fairly old green Vauxhall smile



Guvernator

13,104 posts

164 months

Wednesday 15th March 2017
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Possibly funny anecdote about this. A friend of mine got given a white Fiesta as a courtesy car once. This was back in the days when normal cars had hubcaps and steelies rather than 19" alloys and white cars weren't as popular as they are now. Being a courtesy car they'd taken the hub caps off too. He came to pick me up in it so picture the scene, two youngish white males in a white fiesta with no hubcaps.

So we were driving along a dual carriageway when I noticed we hadn't been overtaken by anyone for a few minutes and when I looked behind us, there was a half a mile tailback of cars just following us very carefully and slowly. Having twigged on I told my friend to slow down from 50 and see how slow we could go, we eventually got down to about 25mph before someone was brave enough to overtake our "police car" and even then they were crouched down sheepishly, fastidiously avoiding eye contact with us.

After laughing a bit we eventually turned off the and stopped at some traffic lights when I noticed the two spotty youths who had pulled up in the car next to us didn't have seat-belts on. I wound my window down and in a very stern voice said, put your seat-belts on lads. You should have seen the look of shock on their faces and the mad scramble for the belts with a profusion of "sorry sirs". They then pulled off VERY slowly while we sat there pissing ourselves.

Riley Blue

20,915 posts

225 months

Wednesday 15th March 2017
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Marty Funkhouser said:
- Likely to be a saloon, SUV or estate
But by no means exclusively. A few years ago an old shape metallic silver Ford Galaxy stopped next to me as I was waiting to cross a junction (I was on foot). A few hundred yards round the corner it had stopped a car and the single, very large copper inside was having a word with the occupants, the Galaxy's concealed strobes flashing away.

SS2.

14,455 posts

237 months

Wednesday 15th March 2017
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cbmotorsport said:
I've got a white Octavia VRS Estate, it's clean and relatively new, I often get the car in front slowing to the speed limit, and checking their rear view mirror far more than they normally would.
Same here, although mine's Race Blue.

Happens quite frequently, especially if I have a hi-viz draped over the passenger seat. laugh

Bennet

2,119 posts

130 months

Wednesday 15th March 2017
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Is it an old shed? - No
Does it have rear doors? - Yes
Not modified or rare or otherwise unusual? - No
Does the driver look like they could be police? - Yes/I can't see

It should probably be considered a possible candidate.

SilverSixer

8,202 posts

150 months

Wednesday 15th March 2017
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Here's a good one I've spotted on two unmarked police cars recently. Thames Valley Rozzers, this is, 5 Series BMW saloons. They have built their rear facing camera in to the rear bumper with the lenses seeing through holes cut out of the plastic, covered the holes over with a black-on-white oval GB sticker, making sure that the black of the G and B are covering the lenses, and cut out holes in those letters so that the cameras can see through them. The lenses are thus camouflaged pretty well and can only be seen close up. The font of those stickers though is quite square for want of a better word, and they do look a little oddly positioned and draw the eye of a detail obsessed nerd like me.

Like I say, I've seen this twice and both times the cars are being driven by Huniformed Hoccifers and carry some of the other giveaways too, like the wee funny aerials and lights under the grille.

This is ninja level plod-spotting, and I thank you.

PurpleAki

1,601 posts

86 months

Wednesday 15th March 2017
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I haven't seen it mentioned, but the obvious one is extra aerials.

ez64

233 posts

161 months

Wednesday 15th March 2017
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OU on the reg for Thames Valley for quite a number of years, bulk buying plain cars along with the marked ones probably not a brilliant idea....

HantsRat

2,369 posts

107 months

Wednesday 15th March 2017
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ez64 said:
OU on the reg for Thames Valley for quite a number of years, bulk buying plain cars along with the marked ones probably not a brilliant idea....
Along with every other oxford registered OU car in that area! Hardly makes them stand out. There are thousands of OU cars in the Thames Valley area.

HantsRat

2,369 posts

107 months

Wednesday 15th March 2017
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SilverSixer said:
Here's a good one I've spotted on two unmarked police cars recently. Thames Valley Rozzers, this is, 5 Series BMW saloons. They have built their rear facing camera in to the rear bumper with the lenses seeing through holes cut out of the plastic, covered the holes over with a black-on-white oval GB sticker, making sure that the black of the G and B are covering the lenses, and cut out holes in those letters so that the cameras can see through them. The lenses are thus camouflaged pretty well and can only be seen close up. The font of those stickers though is quite square for want of a better word, and they do look a little oddly positioned and draw the eye of a detail obsessed nerd like me.

Like I say, I've seen this twice and both times the cars are being driven by Huniformed Hoccifers and carry some of the other giveaways too, like the wee funny aerials and lights under the grille.

This is ninja level plod-spotting, and I thank you.
Most of TVP and Hants cars have the ANPR camera in the rear licence plate behind a mirrored letter. Impossible to spot unless you shine your phone on them and see the IR light coming through. Something I wouldn't recommend doing while driving!

Medic-one

3,105 posts

202 months

Wednesday 15th March 2017
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And then when you finally manage to recognise one it turns out it's an unmarked ambulance or fire service response car.... biggrin

We have a fleet of unmarked cars (old/new and all sorts of different makes) which are mainly used by ambulance management (major incidents etc) but sometimes when we got problems with our normal fleet of marked response cars we use them as well.

SilverSixer

8,202 posts

150 months

Wednesday 15th March 2017
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HantsRat said:
SilverSixer said:
Here's a good one I've spotted on two unmarked police cars recently. Thames Valley Rozzers, this is, 5 Series BMW saloons. They have built their rear facing camera in to the rear bumper with the lenses seeing through holes cut out of the plastic, covered the holes over with a black-on-white oval GB sticker, making sure that the black of the G and B are covering the lenses, and cut out holes in those letters so that the cameras can see through them. The lenses are thus camouflaged pretty well and can only be seen close up. The font of those stickers though is quite square for want of a better word, and they do look a little oddly positioned and draw the eye of a detail obsessed nerd like me.

Like I say, I've seen this twice and both times the cars are being driven by Huniformed Hoccifers and carry some of the other giveaways too, like the wee funny aerials and lights under the grille.

This is ninja level plod-spotting, and I thank you.
Most of TVP and Hants cars have the ANPR camera in the rear licence plate behind a mirrored letter. Impossible to spot unless you shine your phone on them and see the IR light coming through. Something I wouldn't recommend doing while driving!
Well some don't, and they've been rumbled! I expect the ones I'm talking about are older perhaps and have been replaced by the arrangement you describe. Would that be it?

SamR380

725 posts

119 months

Wednesday 15th March 2017
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slipstream 1985 said:
It's just not cricket nowadays. You used to see a vauxhall omega in your rear view mirror and 101% of the time you knew.
One of the few advantages of owning an Omega back in the day!

ashleyman

6,963 posts

98 months

Wednesday 15th March 2017
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littleredrooster said:
My experience, after looking around a good few Police compounds is slightly different:

- Car never likely to be more than 3-4 years old Oh no - some are right old nails!
- Will be in good condition ...unless they're as rough as a badger's botty!
- Will be relatively clean Erm, no. Often filthy to blend in.
- Unmodified Agreed, probably
- Likely to be a saloon, SUV or estate Yup
- Likely to be a well known manufacturer - BMW, Volvo, Ford etc Yup
- Should be a driver and a passenger Almost all recent 'pulls' I've seen on the motorway were single-crewed
- Likely to follow at a set distance for a mile or so Not sure
- Likely to be Grey, White or Black - i.e. unlikely to be bright red Oh no - I collected a fluorescent yellow demonstrator from a Police force not so long ago; it had been used as an undercover surveillance car... smile
I know of an unmarked car operating between Slough and Surrey that had a headlight out at one stage!

Also, usually the rear of the car sits quite low due to all the gear in the boot.

HantsRat

2,369 posts

107 months

Wednesday 15th March 2017
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SilverSixer said:
Well some don't, and they've been rumbled! I expect the ones I'm talking about are older perhaps and have been replaced by the arrangement you describe. Would that be it?
Are you sure they are TVP? I've never seen as you describe above which is strange considering I'm in that department.

SilverSixer

8,202 posts

150 months

Wednesday 15th March 2017
quotequote all
HantsRat said:
SilverSixer said:
Well some don't, and they've been rumbled! I expect the ones I'm talking about are older perhaps and have been replaced by the arrangement you describe. Would that be it?
Are you sure they are TVP? I've never seen as you describe above which is strange considering I'm in that department.
That's a fair point, but both that I've spotted were driving in Reading, so I assumed TVP. Both times on the IDR, very close to the cop shop. Maybe they were visiting officers from another area I suppose. I don't recall the reg numbers, which is odd for me.

HantsRat

2,369 posts

107 months

Wednesday 15th March 2017
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Hants ones - http://superunleaded.com/spot-one-latest-unmarked-...

Although even this is dated now as the newer unmarked as basically impossible to spot.

PoleDriver

28,616 posts

193 months

Wednesday 15th March 2017
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HantsRat said:
Hants ones - http://superunleaded.com/spot-one-latest-unmarked-...

Although even this is dated now as the newer unmarked as basically impossible to spot.
That's really useful info, being as that's my local car! smile