Q-car
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Q-car (Quiet Car) is a Metropolitan Police term for an unmarked police vehicle used for covert patrolling and operations. It is often crewed by plain-clothed officers. A Q-car is usually a high-powered saloon or estate vehicle, fitted with sirens and blue warning lights behind the front grille in order for it to also carry out response duties when necessary.
Over time, the term Q-car has evolved to mean any unobtrusively styled high-performance saloon or a performance-tuned model of a car that otherwise appears stock (a sleeper in American English). Ironically, in this usage of the term the police are the targets of the deception, as these modest-looking but powerful cars attract far less police attention than regular sports cars and other vehicles that "look fast."
The first reference to the term "Q-car" (earliest known reference) is in the February 1963 edition of Motor Sport magazine (published in the UK since 1924) when the editor, Billy Boddy said of the Lotus Cortina "..the modifications carried out by Lotus have turned it in to a "Q" car par excellence..". Another car generally considered to merit the description of "Q-car" is the Mercedes-Benz 300SEL 6.3 of 1968 (only two were manufactured in 1967; 1968 was the first full production year), a fairly standard S-Class luxury model fitted with a 6.3L V-8 engine, beginning a Mercedes tradition of offering powerful engines (often tweaked by AMG, Mercedes's tuning arm) for their standard luxury saloons. A more modern example of the Q-car, and one that can probably be found more easily than recent Mercedes supercars, would be the older (E39 and previous) BMW M5. A sporty, powerful mid-size saloon superficially indistinguishable from its tamer 5-Series brethren. A more affordable and even less visually remarkable "Q-car" car is the classic Saab 9000 2.3 turbo. Also, the MG ZT 4.6 V8 260 which looks very sedate like its brother the Rover 75 but has hidden performance.
Due to the expenses of high-powered engines and precision tuning, Q-cars are primarily part of the luxury or upscale market and as such are subject to an odd yet inescapable dilemma: namely, that buyers wishing to pay luxury prices often want their cars to reflect the amount of money that they have spent. Since the visible differences between a Q-car and its less potent siblings are slight, the owner fails to make the same impression that a more distinctively styled (yet perhaps less powerful) car of the same price would make. As such, the Q-car plays to a somewhat limited market of wealthy driving enthusiasts who wish for a practical high-performance car but care little for the attention (positive and negative) that a true purpose-designed sports car brings.
The word "Q-car" is derived from Q-ship or Q-boat, a term given to Royal Navy armed vessels that were designed to look like unarmed merchants in order to counter the U-boat threat. The "Q" originally referred to the first such ships being based in the British naval base at Queenstown, Ireland. In its non-police usage, the phrase may also have stemmed from or been reinforced by the fact that until recently vehicles registered in Great Britain had a letter on the licence plate which indicated the year of manufacture; for heavily modified or home built vehicles where a year of manufacture was not easily established, the letter Q (for "Questionable status"[citation needed]) was used.
