New member from VA

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Welcome new members, please make your first post in this section. Say hello & tell us a little bit about you and your car. We're happy to see you here!
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L99Fast_enough
Posts: 2
Joined: Sat Apr 24, 2021 6:48 am

New member from VA

Post by L99Fast_enough »

Hi everyone.

I’m seriously in the hunt for a new Caprice after my ’95 is costing more to own than I can justify. While I’m in a position of needing a new car, I’m not in a position to be dumping money I don’t have right now so I’m hoping you guys could offer some advice.

Through a friend of a friend type thing I’ve been offered a nice looking black 2014 PPV that a dealer has just bought at auction but not yet detailed or listed. They suggested it’ll probably list for $9100-9400 and they’ll hold it for me for a couple days but I’m concerned about the idle hours. It’s only a V-6 so I don’t think the DOD problem is an issue but with 105k miles, it’s got 8460hrs, 5710 of them idling. To me that seems like a high ratio and overall total number. It already looks clean inside, it never had a push bar or spotlight, and there’s only a small antenna so I don’t know if that gives any further insight into how it was used or not.

Also the Carfax is kind of light on service info so I’m guessing all the work was done in-house at whatever agency owned it and they just don’t report. Is that a possibility with police cars? It looks like it was in service for almost exactly five years and possibly sat for about two. It’s entirely possible though that it was in service longer and sat much less if all the service just wasn’t reported.

Anyone want to help a prospective PPV owner out? Are those idle hours a concern if I'm looking for a reliable car? They are my biggest concern before I'd go the next step and have it independently inspected.

Thanks  
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elc32955
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Re: New member from VA

Post by elc32955 »

Welcome to the system!

I've always tried to buy from the auctions directly to avoid paying the dealer markup, you figure they want to make at least a 100% profit if possible. Buy it for $4K from the auction, sale price of $9K, pay $500 or so to clean up the car & get it ready for sale, gives them wiggle room to go down to $8K in "negotiation". Yeah, negotiation. Heh. Sometimes it can be difficult but consider the auction route, dealer's will only go so high on cars because they want to turn profit. To give you an idea, I just picked up a 2015 V6 for $4,700 (plus the additional expense to get it home to Florida, about $300 or so - and taxes, about $425 back home). If you want a V6, check out the North Carolina auctions - there's a post on the "for sale" page I made about them. I see you are from Virginia, if you see a white V6 chances are it came from the NC auction. That's a pic of when I picked my car up.
IMG-20210415-WA0005.jpg
IMG-20210415-WA0005.jpg (385.76 KiB) Viewed 3450 times
If you are in question on maintenance history, pull public records on the agency that owned the car. Request to look at the maintenance history, in most states you can access those records. A lot of the time if you ask the fleet manager nicely they'll cooperate with you. Only way to be sure on what was done to the car. Mostly. Although I have known collision repairs to be done "off the books" at a few agencies to protect the driver (aka the cop) that was at fault. Never sees a document, but that fender or door gets repainted and/or replaced.

Whatever the route you go, good luck. PM me and let me know which dealer has the car... like to keep track of how much those are getting marked up.

Thanks
Eric
System Manager and your tour guide for the day. 2015 Caprice w/LFX, former NC DPS staff car. Partial hybrid G8/SS/Camaro SS interior mods, SS MyLink radio upgrade, 2016 Camaro V6 rims, GMPP Malibu chrome exhaust tips, otherwise bone stock for now.
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elc32955
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Re: New member from VA

Post by elc32955 »

One other thing... a quick search revealed another alternative for you. In VA.

https://www.autotrader.com/cars-for-sal ... pe=listing

From Autotrader. Good luck.

Eric
System Manager and your tour guide for the day. 2015 Caprice w/LFX, former NC DPS staff car. Partial hybrid G8/SS/Camaro SS interior mods, SS MyLink radio upgrade, 2016 Camaro V6 rims, GMPP Malibu chrome exhaust tips, otherwise bone stock for now.
L99Fast_enough
Posts: 2
Joined: Sat Apr 24, 2021 6:48 am

Re: New member from VA

Post by L99Fast_enough »

Thanks for the reply.

I'm not brave enough to try directly from an auction myself yet but I probably would consider it in the future, especially if someday I want more Caprices or another newer one once 2016-17s show up more often. For now I've got to stick with one and with the relative safety (I know) of a dealer. I did stumble on the NC auctions though and see that there looks like there could be a decent supply of them semi-locally for a little while.

That link you sent from Autotrader has been an intriguing one due to it being close and so cheap. I just don't think I can consider that car since it has all those extra bolt holes/rivets(?) wrapping all over the front and rear bumpers. I couldn't figure out what they were when it first listed but they might be leftover rail hardware from the car possibly being a PIT trainer. If so, that car probably has some extra wear all over in the frame and suspension and those permanent leftover holes would be too much to overlook cosmetically.

Do you have an opinion on the idle hours of the black car I mentioned above? The car I'm interested in has 8460hrs, 5710 of them idling at 105k miles. For a car that will supposedly go for $9100-9400, is that too much?
CrashTestDummy
Posts: 2300
Joined: Sat Feb 07, 2015 2:31 pm
Location: Pearland, Texas

Re: New member from VA

Post by CrashTestDummy »

The white car holes in the front and rear covers are probably brush guard/push guard mounts. Most PIT training cars I've seen (we have autocross events at the Houston Police Academy) are pretty beat up down the sides, too from 'missed PITs', but the door panels and such look pretty good on that car. The only concerning thing I see on that car is the loose mounting of the front cover on the driver's side. Holden used a weird T-bolt configuration for those, so either they missed the fitting of that t-bolt into the bottom of the front fender, or the socket for the T-bolt in the fender has been pulled down. Either is a possibility, but if that T-bolt is missing entirely, you'll be trying to come up with another solution, as I don't know if that part is available new anymore.

Our 2012 had slots in the front bumper cover for a crash bar that was removed before we got the car I installed some LED driving lights there, and it looks pretty nice, so there are solutions for those holes.
Gene Beaird,
Pearland, Texas
2012 Caprice 9C1
1992 B4C 1LE Camaro
2018 Tahoe PPV (her car)
1995 DGGM Impala SS
1985 Firebird - 310 LS1 C Prepared autocross car.
1980 Bluebird Wanderlodge
And some others
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Pursuit
Administration Staff
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Re: New member from VA

Post by Pursuit »

FYI,
The T bolt is "Outer Reinforced Retainer Nut - GM (92138829)" I had to order one for my car. When I put the fog lights and splitter on, I noticed that there was one that was missing, never installed.

Maurice
Maurice Sheil

mhsheil@gmail.com

2011 Caprice Phantom Black 9C3
2012 Impala 9C1
1995 9C1 Caprice
1996 GMC Sierra C1500
1996 Chevrolet K2500 Extended Cab, long box, 454, 91,000 rust free miles
1974 SJ Grand Prix 455 well optioned with factory moon roof
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elc32955
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Joined: Thu Nov 29, 2012 10:32 am
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Re: New member from VA

Post by elc32955 »

There's an even cheaper 2014 with a V6 that one of the dealers buying from the NC auction is selling on CL right now... just under $5K

2014 Caprice, VIN/6G3NS5U34EL980133, 123K miles, 3.6 transport car. Rubber mat, vinyl rear seat.

https://fayetteville.craigslist.org/cto ... 02438.html

Eric
System Manager and your tour guide for the day. 2015 Caprice w/LFX, former NC DPS staff car. Partial hybrid G8/SS/Camaro SS interior mods, SS MyLink radio upgrade, 2016 Camaro V6 rims, GMPP Malibu chrome exhaust tips, otherwise bone stock for now.
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