Here's a Minifact™ to tide us all over until I drop the next MEGAFACT™, probably sometime tomorrow:
In the mid to late 1990s, the California Highway Patrol hosted a bid for their next police cruiser. The traditional favourite at the time, the Ford Crown Victoria, had recently launched the second generation for 1997. But the platform's age was showing, and departments were afraid that Ford wouldn't continue production after the second gen (and they were right - it was discontinued for fleet sales in 2011 after no significant refreshes since the 1997 redesign). During this bid, a surprise entrant had come along - Volvo, offering their new S70 sedan with a custom tailored police package.
Despite being the only foreign entrant in the competition, officers loved the S70's unexpected performance. You see, the police package on most cars is actually a bit of a myth. The P71 Crown Victoria (with P71 denoting the police variant) didn't actually have more power than one you'd find as a rental, or the one your grandpa stuck into the garage wall. The mechanical upgrades were more to do with longevity, including a beefed up cooling system to handle long, consecutive hours of idling. But the police package on the Volvo upgraded a few things over the standard S70. For starters, the optional 236 horsepower turbocharged 5 cylinder engine reserved for the high-end models became standard, and the brakes and suspension were unique to the S70 police package. Volvo knew that in order to win over the CHP, they'd need to impress.
One such story to come out of this trial involved the S70 being pitted against the competition in a braking run. The cars were to perform emergency braking runs from 60 MPH to zero. After a few trials, the Ford and Chevrolet teams had pulled their cars into the paddock to replace the brakes when they noticed the Volvo lining up for another run. The Americans flagged down the Volvo, trying to explain that they needed to replace their brakes as well, or they'd take a hit on performance due to brake fade. The Swedish delegation simply looked back and said "no we don't." And lo and behold, the S70 performed the entire braking trial without needing to replace its brakes.
The CHP didn't take the Volvo after all for two reasons. First, Volvo ended up discontinuing the S70, and the CHP wasn't interested in the comparable V70, because they didn't want "soccer mom cars" like the Ford Explorers they'd end up in anyway. But even if Volvo had kept the S70 in production, the CHP was facing immense pressure to buy American, and a Swedish designed car built in Belgium simply wouldn't get approval.
Side note: The Taurus and Explorer police interceptors in use today are actually descendants of the Volvo 70 series, thanks to some weird dealings with Ford and Volvo.
-1
Never mind.
