As evidenced by the law-enforcement community’s loyalty to the Ford Crown Victoria, dynamic prowess is not a high priority for police cruisers. Neither is interior space. In fact, the Crown Victoria’s success suggests that the only things police departments look for in their cruisers are a V-8 and rear-wheel drive.

Nevertheless, in the new Chevrolet Caprice PPV (Police Patrol Vehicle), the cops are getting much more than just any old rear-drive, V-8 sedan. Basically, they’re getting a stretched Pontiac G8, with all that car’s attendant strengths. And then some. The front struts were stiffened, as was every component in the rear suspension. Talking to the Caprice’s chassis engineers, you’d think they’d been developing a track package for the defunct G8. They say they focused mostly on strengthening transient response. Their new cruiser feels planted but will happily wag its tail when properly coaxed.

Officers transitioning into this car from a Crown Victoria are in for a surprise the first time they spin the bow tie’s steering wheel. What is this? Effort? Feedback? Revelation? A car this planted and responsive seems like overkill for patrolling broad, flat highways, but officers and troopers in twisty locales will be praying for pursuits.

Two Engines, One Price

Chevy will offer two engines in the Caprice PPV, a 3.6-liter V-6 and a 6.0-liter V-8. The six makes 301 hp and 265 lb-ft of torque; the eight ups the count to 355 and 384, respectively. The last V-8 G8 we tested needed 5.2 seconds to get to 60 mph and 13.8 to rip through the quarter-mile. Figure on the 2012 Caprice needing a couple extra 10ths, thanks to a few additional pounds. The V-6 car should need an extra second to hit the same marks. Departments hoping to put on drifting exhibitions with their cruisers will have to opt for the V-6 car, as the V-8’s stability-control system can’t be fully disabled to keep the cops in the more-powerful cars from getting in over their heads.

Interestingly, the Caprice’s price with either engine will be the same $31,495—before contract and bid pricing enter the picture to lower it, anyway. Considering that the bulk of GM’s development costs for pushrod V-8s was amortized sometime in, oh, say, the early ’70s and that the V-6 is a modern—and recently developed—dual-overhead-cam aluminum piece with direct injection and variable valve timing, that actually makes some sense. It also leaves each department to choose more freely whether it wants the higher performance of the V-8 or the better fuel economy of the six. With the eight, the Caprice is rated at 15 mpg in the city and 24 on the highway. The V-6 car hasn’t been tested by the EPA yet, but figure on its bettering those numbers by a couple mpg in each category. (Should probably go with the sixes, fellas, fuel costs and whatnot. And the higher the speed in a pursuit, the greater the danger to the public.)

Both engines will be paired with six-speed automatics. Like the civilian G8, the transmission has a sport mode that holds gears longer and downshifts under braking, but we take issue with the name for that function. Shouldn’t it be “pursuit”? Or if two Ps on the shifter surround are going to be too confusing, maybe “chase”? As opposed to other police cars, which have their shifters relocated to the column—somewhat clumsily in the case of the last Dodge Charger police car we drove—the Caprice’s shifter remains on the center console, albeit offset to the driver’s side. This is done to make room for computers, but we drove a car with the computer mounted on a pedestal that lifted it above the shifter, which seemed fine. The PPV will also be offered in a “detective package” set up for stealthier duty. In this car, the shifter remains where we remember it from the G8 and even retains its manual-shift gate. (We’d be impressed to see the in-car footage of an officer banging off manual shifts during a pursuit.)

An Important Fundamental Difference

With other police cars, there’s a long list of what’s been changed from the civilian version. But with the Caprice, the mere existence of the car is unique to the police market. In the U.S., there simply is no civilian version. Of course, our late G8 lives on in Australia as a Holden—and in the Middle East as a Chevy—and the differences between this car and those follow the usual police-duty script: upgraded suspension components, cooling system, and brake calipers, rotors, and pads. In the police market, the testing performed by the Michigan State Police and the California Highway Patrol is referenced by departments and posts throughout the country. Chevrolet says the Caprice’s braking performance was the best ever recorded in California’s testing. There’s also a second battery to power the myriad auxiliary systems in a police car, with an isolator between it and the primary battery to make sure the car always starts even after sitting on location with lights, computers, and cameras sucking juice.

The biggest difference between this car and that formerly known as the G8 is its size. Stretched 3.7 inches between the wheels—overall length is up 8.1—the Caprice has a startling amount of space inside. We’d be happy to sit in the back seat for overnight stakeouts, the 43.1 inches of legroom nearly equaling that of a long-wheelbase BMW 7-series. That volume shrinks significantly with the perp partition fitted, the most devastating loss being the total abolition of toeroom. But we’re not too upset by the discomforts forced on those who find themselves behind the glass in a cop car. Neither is Chevrolet, apparently, as the PPV only has curtain airbags in the front seat. Pipe down, ACLU. That’s because, with the partition blocking off the front and rear seats, the regular full-length curtain can’t deploy. Based on the number of times we’ve seen baddies on TV and in the movies bonk their heads getting into the back seat—we can only assume this is an accurate depiction—an external curtain airbag might be more useful anyway.

Now that the Ford Crown Victoria is dead (long live the queen!) and replaced by the Taurus, the rear-wheel-drive V-8 cop-car market is left exclusively to the Dodge Charger police car and the Caprice. We’ve heard a lot of cops gripe about not having enough space inside the Charger. We can’t see that complaint being very common in the Caprice, and there is no dynamic reason the Chevy shouldn’t be the go-to pick of police officers everywhere. The law-enforcement community is about to get a very effective tool.

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