Hi there,

My name is Mark and I have just joined the forum. As you may tell from my username I am a Police Officer who has a keen interest in cars. I have just purchased a brand new Octavia vRS diesel hatch in Anthracite Grey from Garlands Skoda in Aldershot, Hampshire (who I must say have been fantastic). As luck would have it the car that I wanted was actually on the books as a cancelled order where the person who had originally ordered the car had pulled out of the transaction. This meant that I would not have to wait the 8 months that I was being quoted on lead times, which was great.

I have always been interested in the Octavia vRS range and always thought they looked really good on the road. The current model, in my opinion looks the most menacing yet.

Not only will this car be the first Skoda I have owned it will also be the first diesel that I have owned too. The car I am trading in is a 59 reg Mitsubishi Evolution X FQ300 SST in lightning blue. Although the Evo is a great looking car that also goes like stink (obviously only upto 70mph on motorways:-)), it has also been a bottomless pit when it comes to running it. £880.00 a month with tax, tracker, fuel, insurance and finance, to be precise. Ouch!!! It still hurts to say that. By changing to the Derv vRS I am not only getting a fantastic motor but am also saying myself more than £400.00 a month in bills.

When I am not fighting with billy burglar and violent thugs I enjoy detailing cars. I can spend literally days cleaning my car, which includes even taking the wheels off and cleaning the inside of the wheel arches. I have attached a photo of the Evo after I recently cleaned it for the valuation with Skoda, to give you an idea of the standard I hope to get the new car to.

Regards

Mark

welcome to briskoda, you will find a wealth of information on here, its a good community, and several officers of the law too

this nice chap generally drives an undercover octy vRS, but came to one of our RR days in a marked scooby!

I answer 999 calls, but I drive a 5 ton van, so not quite as much fun (ambulance!)although I do occationally drive the octy RRV's

Shark.

Welcome to Briskoda,

Any pic's of the Police Mini?

Nice reflection shot on the Evo

Welcome to Briskoda,

Any pic's of the Police Mini?

Nice reflection shot on the Evo

didn't notice that! looks cool!

Thanks for the warm welcome and comments. The Scooby's look great. That particular car in the youtube video was sold at auction at the end of last year.

As well as being a copper myself, I also preserve old Police cars, hence the mini, with belongs to myself and my father together, I also own a 1994 Vauxhall Omega Thames Valley Traffic Car, and am the webmaster for a club called Police Car UK (www.policecaruk.com).

Below should be a selection of photos of the mini and a couple of the Omega. It is worth noting at this point that when they are on the road, travelling to events, the lightbars and police markings are covered up, to comply with the Association of Chief Police Officers guidelines on preserved Police vehicles. The photo of the Mini with the officers in, shows me and my Chief Constable, Sara Thornton at the TVP Force Open Day.

I actually really like the omega, a classic police car, made famous by the start of "police camera action" type shows, just £1500 will get you a good, working,reliable 150 mph 3.0 MV6 nowadays, that would be a fast, luxury car, for a fraction of a new cars price! I very nearly bought one myself.... (we have an ambulance omega in the training school!)

there ya go! http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201124391224904/sort/priceasc/usedcars/engine-size-cars/3l_to_3-9l/model/omega/make/vauxhall/page/1/radius/1500/postcode/ca139yb?logcode=p

just had a look at your site and some of the classic old vehicals are really nice

hello and welcome

My car was actually on an old episode of Police Camera Action when it was used to pursue a stolen Ford Sierra Cosworth through the streets of slough. The pursuit eventually ended in a crash after the car mounted the pavement, avoiding a stinger, and broke Derek Ingrim's leg. At the time he was on normal traffic but on recovering transferred to the proactive traffic department as part of Tango Victor 33, as seen on Road Wars. My car has covered a total of 136,000 miles, which for a Police car that is 17 years old isn't bad. It still pulls like a train, even now, and is a lot of fun to drive being rear wheel drive. I understand the car started out as one of the first batch of Vauxhall Omega Demonstrator vehicles that would have been trialled all over the country, before TVP purchased this one and M908KNP for use on traffic. These were to go on and replace all the Senators (some say the best traffic car Vauxhall ever produced), and the Rovers.

TVP now still use Vauxhalls on traffic but they are now Vectras or Insignias. We are currently trialling the Volvo V70 D6 as a long term replacement for Vauxhall, who don't seem to be able to produce a decent traffic car anymore.

well the ambulance service up here are all skoda... we use the octavias in normal or "scout" models, the scouts are much better with the 4WD as with all the equipment and medical gases on board, the 2WD models understeer like pigs..... the front is SO light its a joke! (the back being bogged down with the weight ect) the big 3 litre V6 Fiat vans are better!

but surely the VXR insignias are stupidly fast, not much would get away from them.... the vectras I'm sure understeer like all fast vauxhalls, but arn't the insignias 4WD? (I haven't driven any of the new vauxhalls so don't know whether they are good or bad...)

welcome to briskoda nice evo

well the ambulance service up here are all skoda... we use the octavias in normal or "scout" models, the scouts are much better with the 4WD as with all the equipment and medical gases on board, the 2WD models understeer like pigs..... the front is SO light its a joke! (the back being bogged down with the weight ect) the big 3 litre V6 Fiat vans are better!

but surely the VXR insignias are stupidly fast, not much would get away from them.... the vectras I'm sure understeer like all fast vauxhalls, but arn't the insignias 4WD? (I haven't driven any of the new vauxhalls so don't know whether they are good or bad...)

Hi there,

The skodas that the Ambulance Service use always looked the dogs. M&L use a VRS Octavia Estate in Reading sometimes, and it always turns heads when it goes back. I can imagine with the kit you guys and gals carry onboard the 2wd is a bit of a pig to drive. We have issues with the Astras at work sometimes when we are three up with fast roads equipment and kit bags on the vehicle. I imagine the V6 Fiat vans are good fun to drive, with plenty of poke. I remember the Sherpa vans with the Rover v8 engines in the 80s and they, apparently, were fantastic to drive on blues.

You are right about the VXR insignias in that they are very quick. Unfortunately South Yorkshire are the only force so far to introduce the VXR Insignia on their traffic fleet. The rest of the Insignia's you see around at the moment are either diesel 2wd or 2.0 litre petrols, which we use in the TVP and they are naff. They handle like the old high performance vectras did, ie, you couldn't send them around corners without understeer, and the boot space is a joke. I remember going to the Police Vauxhall Demonstration Day at Millbrook where the sales guy told us that the equipment required for roads policing would fit in the boot with no problem. I said, being a pain in the bum, "go on then, show me!" He then proceeded to pile everything up in the boot. Yes it fitted, but you couldn't get to any of it quickly.

In the end I attempted to load the boot, with the assistance of some of my RPU colleagues how our vehicles are loaded and found we had to leave 6 cones out of the vehicle. Not what you want really when you are trying to do a 300 metre taper on the motorway, with stuff bearing down on you at 80 - 90mph.

I am told that if we get the Volvo V70's on traffic we may have issues with understeer and torque steer. I know the old model used to wheel spin and torque steer in second gear. Still, suppose it's better than walking.

Welcome to Briskoda

Welcome to the forum

Thanks for the welcome messages.

I was informed yesterday that the car will be with me on Monday next week. Can't come soon enough. I so excited!!!

Another great thing about the new car is that my insurance company are giving me a £157 refund to swap to the vRS from the Evo X. This means my insurance is only costing £338. Result!