You suddenly find yourself, lost in the market of choices for automobiles. You need a Drifto Magic Carpet Whip pretty much as soon as now. Where do you go? All your Option 2 heros cars are played out, filled with hip-young-YOLO kids and you can't get a brake on a nice granny getter import for the sake of your existence!
So what do you want?
-Mad Sick Torque, your going to swap the engine anyways.
-Rear Driven Wheelies.
-Tons of aftermarket support, chilling on the shelf at Pep boys.
-Guys with backyards full of the darn things.
-Sturdy bump drifto protection.
-People giving them away.
-Has a solid drifting history.
Chu-forty won't do this time, your bro's all smashed up their single cams. The cressidas are all bought up by your Mexican neighbours, the rx7's are sitting behind the house of some ex-military reject engineer, and the miata's are filled with weak wristed semi-successful middle managements.
It's funny, you've ridden around in the solution for years, hell you've even paid them money, and they've also taken money from you whether you liked it or not. You've been drunk in the front, and drunk in the back, and no matter who's driving, you have communication issues with them. Hell every night you've gone streeting, they've been in volved in some way! Best of all, they look good in black....
Panthers live among us everyday. Crown Victoria!?!? But why Quinn why?!
You want to get out onto the track, enjoy a full day of driving, with little worry for maintenance or wear. The confidence you'll be able to fix it if it does break, and for cheap, and most importantly, quickly.
Long long ago, in Amurrica new cars only came out every 5-10 years. Why was this? It wasn't that people didn't want a new flashy model every 5 minutes, they've always wanted that. No, it was the speed of design. It was very difficult to design the entire car by hand, test and record these tests and reapply the changes in a speedy manner. The cars were sold for a high volume, low profit margin, so the design budget wasn't as high, the design turnover was low.
How did this affect cars back then? Flaws were often well fished out, although the initial look of the car was decided, little kinks and tweaks were ironed out over the course of the car. Many were sold, and the aftermarket support was large. Along came computer aided design. Since it's introduction the difficulty and cost structure has changed, model production runs are shorter and shorter due to the differently efficient design cycle, and voila, we have a new model every 2 years.
Cars now are more refined quicker, but long term problems are not monitored well, nor is there incentive too when you move up to a new model, and no longer support the previous generation. High profit, low volume production takes over, reliability over time suffers, but flashiness and overall profit increases.
Dinosaurs are often cars that for some reason surpass these market trends. The Crown Vic is a Dinosaur. With the need of pure reliable function, the crown victoria, the most recent Panther platform has been in production since 1992 all the way up until 2012! They've been making and selling the Crown Victoria for nearly 20 years in North America, something you've only heard rumors about other cars in other continents.
What makes it desirable for drifting? It's core purpose! A reliable, powerful, RWD car for heavy driving abuse. The sheer reason the crown vic has been around is it's pure success over the Chevy Caprice. Capturing two of the most important car markets in North America. The Taxi-Cab and the Police car. Two jobs solely reliant on a 'bulletproof' vehicle. In either case, there is no fucking time to be wasted on a downed vehicle, it costs lives and money.
246hp, RWD 4 door luxury sedan designed to keep up with anything else on the road, carry guns and people as fast and as safe as possible on public roads for as cheap as possible and as reliable as possible. Look your going to be swapping your car to V8 anyways. It's the thing to do. You know you want 4 doors, and you know you want to look good, even on 16's.
Why is this the car to buy? A few reasons: 1. Police don't buy shit. They have no tolerance for junk, it needs to be ready now, affordable, unbreakable and available in mass quantity. It has to be fast to chase down all other vehicles on the road, AND be able to be smashed, bent back out and smashed again. Who keeps the prices in check? Taxi cabs. They make money on small transactions, little fares here and there to get people where they need to go. The car must be hella cheap to buy, and maintain, take a million miles, and parts must be available now.
Imagine being a parts manufacturer! The part must be unbreakable, available in the hundreds of thousands, practically free, and provide perfect performance, and it must be ready to pickup in ten minutes. Every parts counter in every small town in America has a whole entire Crown Victoria in parts, spread out in the back, multiple times over for the, hundreds, if not thousands of taxis and police cars operating in their area. All times of the day and night you need to get them.
How do they achieve this? Simpleton plain V8. Fuel injection, tuned for low end torque and a high top speed. Over built everything. Not a single bolt skipped over or missed. People daily beat the hundreds of thousands of these cars to absolute death ever moment of everyday. The trans, the axle, the brakes, steering, everything is beefed up well over that of any other normal car.
Why do they take hits so well? They are the last Body on Frame car I know of. A separate frame than the body that mounts on top of it. Little of the structure of the car is affected in bumps and scraps. Thousands of yellow and black and white sedans rubbing around through the streets of chicago, new york and LA. Grinding themselves into poles, people, and parked cars. The panels fold, but the frame doesn't. Drive it home, bang it out.
4.6L and 5L V8's. The very same ones used in Ford performance vehicles since forever. There's ungodly amounts of power items for these cars sitting in your uncles shed. Floating around for peanuts in flea markets and craigslist. Order online, or just walk into the parts store closest to your house and buy horsepower for reasonable prices, conveniently. Hell, chat to the guy behind the counter, he probably owns 4 of the same V8's in his cars.
Why is now the time to buy? They have finally stopped making them. Police and Taxi companies are practically giving the things away during their transitions to other cars, however, it may not last. They've tried so hard in the past to switch to other cars. But nothing is as tough. Want to know how bad they like them? They tried to stop making them many years ago. Switched to other cars, hated them, and had Ford actually start the production lines back up to get them back!!!
Sadly, they lack the fuel efficiency. Fuel prices have a huge affect on service vehicles. So they are yours for the taking. Movie companies have known this for years. And they are the reason that the after market parts will continue. Nearly every movie made in North America features a few hundred of them. Racing Schools have been using them for years.
But Quinn, I'll never own a car that hasn't competed in D1GP! I am Core to the Bone!
Sadly, your wrong, in the early 2000's, an American Ryan Hampton, a driving instructor, actually competed in a few events in a Mercury Marudar, basically a police performance package sold directly to the public in a luxurious, and very black car.
Though it's hard to find pictures, there is Ryan out on Irwindale, hanging with a reliably modded example.
You know what the best part about buying a Crown Victoria as a Drift car? Besides being able to get parts for cheap for them anywhere, having a a torquey V8, being able to withstands the torture of a young drifting idiot. Besides the fact that when you get pulled over you can chat shop with the cop? Or that your mom will approve? Even past the fact you can lay two adult across the back seat, and it's extra stain resistant? Beyond the factory dash mount, shot gun holders?
The cops them selves have to learn to, AND will teach you to, Drift Crown Vics.
And for giggles, no crown vics in this one, but some Caprices:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rLdHNkoYO0o]
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