Police car service schedule - BS?
Discussion
andy118run said:
Secondly, it was passed to the 'Ulster Constabulary where it was Chauffeur driven for the Chief Inspector'. Do Chief Inspectors really get chauffeur driven cars!? Chief constable, possibly.
Well the RUC hasn't existed for 15 years anyway.I guess it's just a terminology thing - but who knows what's true in that ad?
ChemicalChaos said:
I remember reading in a well-respected motoring magazine that pursit vehicles are indeed serviced at half intervals, including having new tyres and brake components when only half worn
Complete rubbish I'm afraid. I drive m/way cars and they are serviced to manufacturer intervals.
We are very hot on our tyres, but they won't even change them now until they are below 3mm (even then they pull their face). Our cars used to be changed at 130000m. Two thirds of them now have 200000m+ and have become very unreliable. I definitely wouldn't touch one with a barge pole.
a lot has changed since that car was new, including 8 years of police budget cuts
10-15 years ago police vehicles may well have been over serviced, but what does being over serviced gain for you. Servicing at half interval provides no provable increase in a vehicles life, but indisputably doubles the risk of failures due to incorrectly complete maintenance.
10-15 years ago police vehicles may well have been over serviced, but what does being over serviced gain for you. Servicing at half interval provides no provable increase in a vehicles life, but indisputably doubles the risk of failures due to incorrectly complete maintenance.
Back in the late 70s a City of London driver of a response car (there were only two) hit a bus at speed. He stated that the brake pedal hit the floor during a high speed run. There was medical evidence to support this as his right leg was fully extended at the time of impact going by the damage to his hip joint and pelvis. The rebuild, he told me, was often referred to in medical teaching.
He was a mess.
The vehicle was sent to an outside agency - non-police - to check, as if he'd been telling porkies he would have been charged with reckless driving. Passengers on the bus were injured and the conductor (who remembers them?) was thrown the full length of the lower deck and suffered injuries to shoulder and head.
It was discovered that the brake fluid had taken on a degree of 'water' that was sufficient to cause the brake problem described. The argument was technical and out of my depth. The service record showed that the brake fluid had been changed according to the schedule.
There was a recommendation that brake fluid should be changed annually, i.e. at half the time of the schedule. The City took this on board.
I would assume that the accident raised the insurance premium the following year.
Brake fluid, I was told, can be easily checked for the degree of water in it. I seem to remember a service schedule that requires the fluid to be checked for water every service.
He was a mess.
The vehicle was sent to an outside agency - non-police - to check, as if he'd been telling porkies he would have been charged with reckless driving. Passengers on the bus were injured and the conductor (who remembers them?) was thrown the full length of the lower deck and suffered injuries to shoulder and head.
It was discovered that the brake fluid had taken on a degree of 'water' that was sufficient to cause the brake problem described. The argument was technical and out of my depth. The service record showed that the brake fluid had been changed according to the schedule.
There was a recommendation that brake fluid should be changed annually, i.e. at half the time of the schedule. The City took this on board.
I would assume that the accident raised the insurance premium the following year.
Brake fluid, I was told, can be easily checked for the degree of water in it. I seem to remember a service schedule that requires the fluid to be checked for water every service.
Service records used to be kept in the back of our vehicle patrol diaries and log books. All of the cars were serviced regularly at manufacturers intervals - with certain classes of service carried out depending on mileage intervals and works carried out. All brake work was recorded in red. Certainly never over serviced. We'd do oil top ups ourselves-recorded in a separate register.
You might get more than you bargain for with an ex police car, I sort of know a guy who worked at a BMW main agent and he reconnect that whenever a police car came in everyone in the workshop would leave a small gift in the car,a couple of pubes on the drivers seat, a bogey on the steering wheel etc
t factor is strong with this one.hora said:
Seen many ex plod cars with slightly above average miles (seen a few advertised like that...).
True?
I always thought they'd do easy 20k+ a year?
Depends what it's based as well. One of the response vehicles I've used has 7k on it. Another one (same year) has nearly 40k. True?
I always thought they'd do easy 20k+ a year?
I wouldn't touch a police vehicle mainly for who's been sat in the back.
Only ones I would are driver training or possibly Firearms as they don't transport.
I know that the bulk of this thread is about police car servicing, but I used to be closely involved with fleet servicing for MOD 'Green Fleet' vehicles.
All our scheduled servicing was done 'in-house' by the drivers of the vehicles. Two drivers were also seconded (on rotation) to run the servicing bay. In a previous unit an MOD employed civilian ran the servicing bay and supervised the 'chimps' when they brought the Landrovers and Bedfords through for servicing. So from an MOD perspective, I'd take any servicing claims on ex Green Fleet vehicles with a massive pinch of salt. There'll have been more corners cut by lads desperate to get an early knock-off than I don't know what.
About 15 years ago, there was a scientific/engineering study conducted by a number of units (mine was one) where *DERA/DLO required units to sample the oils and fluids from a given number of vehicles before they were serviced. Lab tests were then conducted to establish the efficacy of servicing to schedule. They were looking to reduce costs, long term, by working out how degraded the various oils and fluids were based on both mileage and time. Many military vehicles are under-utilised, due to their specialist nature, so large capacity engines were sometimes having their oil swapped after barely 1k miles, simply because the manufacturer's schedule required an annual change. I seem to recall that, as a result of the study, there was talk of extending the mileage based service intervals, as well as the time based ones, due to the study finding that fluid degradation was far less of an issue than it was thought to be.
Modern MOD 'white fleet' vehicles are almost all leased, and are sent off-site to dealer servicing garages to be serviced just the same as any other civilian car. I don't think they are sold off as "ex military" at the end of their service life, either. They are just disposed of by the fleet lease company the same way as any of their other vehicles. They'll have been driven hard, too, by drivers with no attachment to the vehicle. They also tend to be over-utilised 'high milers', as only the bare minimum of cars will be held at unit level, with specific stuff ordered in from the lease/hire pool as and when required.
All our scheduled servicing was done 'in-house' by the drivers of the vehicles. Two drivers were also seconded (on rotation) to run the servicing bay. In a previous unit an MOD employed civilian ran the servicing bay and supervised the 'chimps' when they brought the Landrovers and Bedfords through for servicing. So from an MOD perspective, I'd take any servicing claims on ex Green Fleet vehicles with a massive pinch of salt. There'll have been more corners cut by lads desperate to get an early knock-off than I don't know what.
About 15 years ago, there was a scientific/engineering study conducted by a number of units (mine was one) where *DERA/DLO required units to sample the oils and fluids from a given number of vehicles before they were serviced. Lab tests were then conducted to establish the efficacy of servicing to schedule. They were looking to reduce costs, long term, by working out how degraded the various oils and fluids were based on both mileage and time. Many military vehicles are under-utilised, due to their specialist nature, so large capacity engines were sometimes having their oil swapped after barely 1k miles, simply because the manufacturer's schedule required an annual change. I seem to recall that, as a result of the study, there was talk of extending the mileage based service intervals, as well as the time based ones, due to the study finding that fluid degradation was far less of an issue than it was thought to be.
Modern MOD 'white fleet' vehicles are almost all leased, and are sent off-site to dealer servicing garages to be serviced just the same as any other civilian car. I don't think they are sold off as "ex military" at the end of their service life, either. They are just disposed of by the fleet lease company the same way as any of their other vehicles. They'll have been driven hard, too, by drivers with no attachment to the vehicle. They also tend to be over-utilised 'high milers', as only the bare minimum of cars will be held at unit level, with specific stuff ordered in from the lease/hire pool as and when required.
- Defence Evaluation and Research Agency/Defence Logistics Organisation
Derek Smith said:
I would assume that the accident raised the insurance premium the following year.
Happy to be corrected on this but AFAIK government vehicles don't have insurance, HMG is big enough to self insure so just pays out themselves. This was certainly true at Land Registry not many years ago when I worked there, I don't imagine it's changed.I can't imagine what the premium would be for police cars!
Interesting point - when police officers insure their private cars do they have to list accidents? Have you had any accidents in the last 5 years?... Yes 17, but 13 of them were intentional when I rammed other people off the road!
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