Ask your child to draw a picture of a police car. Do you get back a car with a flashing light on the roof? Then say that this drawing makes you very sad and that he hasn’t been paying attention. Feel free to follow us for more parenting tips. Because you will see less and less police cars with flashing lights. The next batch of Audi A6 from the police will no longer have flashing lights on the roof.
In any case, the flashing lights on roofs have been dwindling for some time. Just look at the photo of a police car from ten years ago below. But even the slimmer light bar that the Audi A6 of the police has on the roof so far causes problems. At high speeds, the light bar catches a lot of wind and that causes noise inside. And driving fast is exactly what the rapid intervention vehicles (SIV) are intended for.
An older police car with the old stripes | Photo: © Police Base Team Leiden South
That is why the police have been testing different flashing lights for the Audi A6s since 2021. The blue lamps are now behind the windows – both front and rear. You can also recognize them by the double lighting in the bumper. Because the lamps no longer cause air resistance, the Audi should in theory accelerate a bit faster than before. At least during intermediate sprints at higher speed.
The test has now been completed and if an Audi A6 from the police needs to be replaced, the successor will be one without a flashing light. On average, such a SIV lasts about 160,000 kilometers before it is allowed to retire. In their police career, the station wagons wear out almost 30 sets of tires, because the rubber lasts 5,000 to 6,000 kilometers.
Previous generation A6 with the old light bar | Photo: © TopGear
It is not the first vehicle to have the flashing lights behind the windows. Also the ID. Buzz ambulance no longer got a light bar. In the case of the ambulance, it is not because of the noise at high speeds (that thing only reaches 145 km/h), but because of the range. The extra air resistance is not good for the range of such an EV.
Without flashing light, the SIV is called 2.0
The police call this Audi A6 without flashing lights on the roof the SIV 2.0 – and that is a bit confusing. Because since this year, the police also drive a SIV Light, which is a less fast version of the Audi A6 with a 2.0 TDI. The lighter version has 204 hp and can be driven by agents without special driving training.
The new SIV Light with less power and without V6 | Photo: © Police Assen
Funnily enough, the SIV Light has such a loose flashing light on the roof. The top speed of this less fast version is 241 km/h. That is only 9 km/h lower than the full-fat SIVs with 286 hp. The 0-100 time of the fast is 5.5 seconds and the Light takes 7.8 seconds. Incidentally, they are still diesels in all cases.
Photos gallery: Jeffrey van Buuren Photography
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