Crown Vic Taxis

[michaelluscher]

Beat me to the post

My dad had more than a few, the '96 CVPI that he did car service with was a steadfast member of the family
With those rubber floors we'd scrub with Mistolin, and the ticket light
And those vinyl rear seats with the PAINFUL METAL BUCKLES
Never comfortable, no matter the weather
And the 4 button radio, all he ever listened to was CBS on 880
Screw an 820s and 5 qts of insert random oil here, and they'd run

TLC only gives you 10-11 years of use on a vehicle, the last being 2010/2011 models means times up for business use
After about ~150k, they all develop the same whine on takeoff (4R70 or the Diff?), and the sound of the right rear door slamming shut is committed to memory
I could hear it coming to pick someone up from a block away

I'd love to buy him a Marauder one day, or maybe just a clean LX Sport/GM LS Ultimate

I found an old picture, when some degenerate smashed it one Halloween
It's successor, a 2013 Pentastar 300 COULD NEVER
Dad's a GM man, but even he admits Ford lost money on that car
He put 150k+ on it, never touched the transmission, never cut/replaced the front rotors

I don't know when these were taken, all I know is it's pre 2006
2001 maybe?

 

[Fordiesel69]

The dash and little bit of the front bumper gives it away as a 92 thru 95. 96 had a different dash.

 

[PandaBear]

People say the Crown Vic got poor gas mileage, but IMHO it was decent for the size of car and what it could do. In fact, in my experience many current generation SUVs and larger vehicles do no better if they aren't hybrids. I kept track of my mileage for many years on my Crown Vic and a Grand Marquis, and on long trips we averaged a consistent 26mpg. One February we piled four of us into the Crown Vic for a last-minute vacation to Florida and back. The trunk was completely full, four people in the car, average speed on I95 was probably 75-80mph, but when we hit northern Florida we were hitting 90+ keeping up with traffic. Still 26mpg for that trip of about 1200 miles.

It is, the problem really is today the manufacturing cost is relatively low compare to the fuel cost (so it is probably easier to sell the old car and upgrade to something more efficient), and for a car that size in hybrid they can probably do 36-40mpg today as a hybrid.

Most people would be happy if their taxi is a Camry Hybrid today and its mpg if you believe Toyota is 52mpg. Not sure about gas in NYC but around here is $4-4.3/gal for 87.

 

[brianl703]

a car that size in hybrid they can probably do 36-40mpg today as a hybrid

The 1st gen Chevy Volt weighs about as much as a Ford Crown Victoria, and gets about 40MPG operating as a hybrid.

So it might be right that a hybrid Ford Crown Victoria could get 40MPG (if the hybrid components don't add too much additional weight).

 

[Paco Pena]

I like the Crown Vic but almost every cab driver I've met LOVED the Prius.

Paco