GasGas:
But the senior plod would miss out on their trips abroad and other perks.
Where I used to live, the ambulance fleet was suddenly and unaccountably replaced with Dodge ambulances, which were based on a bonneted light truck platform. The crews hated them, and maintained they were unsafe at over 30 mph.
But it tuned out the guy who signed off the order had a nice trip over that Atlantic to ‘see them being PDI’d’ with a tour of Niagara Falls and other nice things thrown in.
I may be wrong, but I think in the end the things were weighed and found to be very overweight, hence they were a bit wobbly at speed.
I think one of the reasons Sprinters are now used as emergency Ambulances is, quite simply, they are very fast and sure-footed.
etc.
quality 
dont you will get him started on V8,s again
Truckbling:
Why whinge when hardly any of us own British made vehicles. Does it really matter anyway? How many of you drive British trucks? what was that, nobody? well hang your heads in shame.
actually some of us do still use british made wagons i will be running an ERF C series once the hiab and bodywork is finished for my hiab training
DAF (UK market leaders) are all assembled in UK (admittedly much of the componentry is sourced elsewhere). The LF is a British design too and the 6-pot ones have a British-built engine (the 4-cylinder engine was designed in Britain, but is built in China).
And some very high-value technical components in ‘foreign’ trucks are designed and built in UK: Delphi fuel injection and ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ turbos being two good examples.
Most British vehicles have major components imported from abroad (ZF gearboxes for example),but a surprising amount of British automotive componentry (everything from sunroofs to complete engines) gets exported to foreign manufacturers.
Andydisco:
Truckbling:
Why whinge when hardly any of us own British made vehicles. Does it really matter anyway? How many of you drive British trucks? what was that, nobody? well hang your heads in shame.
actually some of us do still use british made wagons i will be running an ERF C series once the hiab and bodywork is finished for my hiab training
The police don’t buy 20 year old motors though do they.
pierrot 14:
Carryfast:
There probably isn’t such a thing as an all British made car now as there would have been on the police fleets during the 1970’s in the case of Jaguar/Rover/Triumph.A British assembled car containing lots of foreign manufactured componentry made by a foreign owned firm is about as close as it gets now.Ironically ever since Thatcher effectively closed down our manufacturing industry helped in large part in her election victories by the Sun.
flickr.com/photos/totalemergency/5680717144/
Nothing to do with the unions then that kept forcing their members to go on strike for whatever reason that came into their heads, trying to convince the workers ( their high paying members) that it was for their benefit. ■■?
Don’t remember her having anything to do with the closure of the old docks in London, Liverpool , Southampton etc., Was it her that was involved in the demise of the motor manufacturing industry in England. ? A lot of the causes that ended the once great manufacturing industry, here in England, can only be blamed on the unions
CF stop living in the past. Move on in life. It might be a start and update your TV to a HD with freeview installed?
Herongate:
Even worse than that, the Royal Mail is currently updating it small / medium van fleet…… to PEUGEOT…!!!
Not down in Devon, they are starting to get Fiat Doblo’s, I doubt the will last a quarter the life of the Ford ■■■■■■ vans or Vauxhall combos they had.
smokinbarrels:
I’d say its the case with all blue light services. Fire service going with Scania, Volvo and Merc, the Ambulance service going with merc and Renault.
SB
Devon fire service have a few MAN’s
Gas Gas might be Sprinter vans are used because Mercedes Benz also offers ‘big bungs’ indeed I believe Daimler were fined $180million in the USA for that very reason.
GasGas:
I worked in the motor trade in the late 1970s. I seem to remember long waiting lists for Rovers & Jags, because on paper they seemed very good value for money for what they were.
And yes they were cheap: because each one that rolled off the line was subsidised by the British taxpayer, most of whom could not afford to buy a new luxury car.
.
Ford privately purchased a Mini and stripped it down.
Then they stood round trying to figure how Leyland could knock them out so cheap.
It was eventually worked out Leyland was losing £30 per car or there abouts a figure Leyland later adnitted and agreed to.
They claimed they made the £30 back across the full Leyland range by offering seat belts,radios and left hand wing mirrors as optional extras.
Stuff that was pretty much standard on any other car.
Ford decided they couldn’t compete and designed and knocked out the Cortina.
Two films came out involving these cars.
Ford supplied Carry on Cabbie with as many cars as they wanted.
BMC / Leyland refused to supply Mini’s for the Italian Job so they had to buy them at full cost.
Noel Coward wasn’t joking when he moaned about the cost of cars in the film.
Ford also supplied all the cars for free for the Sweeney and Proffesionals after Leyland offered to sell them to the t.v. company.
The proviso being the bad guys all drove Leyland / Jaguar models and the good guys all drove Ford’s
The po-lice have ■■■■ for brains, what do you expect…!?
Soldier z:
GasGas:
I worked in the motor trade in the late 1970s. I seem to remember long waiting lists for Rovers & Jags, because on paper they seemed very good value for money for what they were.
And yes they were cheap: because each one that rolled off the line was subsidised by the British taxpayer, most of whom could not afford to buy a new luxury car.
.
Ford privately purchased a Mini and stripped it down.
Then they stood round trying to figure how Leyland could knock them out so cheap.
It was eventually worked out Leyland was losing £30 per car or there abouts a figure Leyland later adnitted and agreed to.
They claimed they made the £30 back across the full Leyland range by offering seat belts,radios and left hand wing mirrors as optional extras.
Stuff that was pretty much standard on any other car.
Ford decided they couldn’t compete and designed and knocked out the Cortina.
Two films came out involving these cars.
Ford supplied Carry on Cabbie with as many cars as they wanted.
BMC / Leyland refused to supply Mini’s for the Italian Job so they had to buy them at full cost.
Noel Coward wasn’t joking when he moaned about the cost of cars in the film.
Ford also supplied all the cars for free for the Sweeney and Proffesionals after Leyland offered to sell them to the t.v. company.
The proviso being the bad guys all drove Leyland / Jaguar models and the good guys all drove Ford’s
The bit they forgot was that in real life the bad guys weren’t using old 1960’s S type Jags at that time.They’d already checked out the performance figures of an XJ6 with a manual box in it let alone XJ12 or a BMW 3.0 Si compared to everything else available at the time remembering that being criminals their transport needs were free too because they generally nicked what they needed for a blag not bought it. 
youtube.com/watch?v=ZaArlarm … 6C1608001C
The main Ford they used being the Transit van especially if it was also fitted with the same 3 litre V6 as the Granada had. 
