This Police Caprice Is Loving Retirement as a Sleeper Hot Rod

In 1976, I was 12 years old and really into cars. My friend Tim and I would ride our bicycles all over suburban Boston to scour car dealerships for their point-of-purchase brochures. That summer, Chevrolet unveiled “The New Chevrolet,” a completely redesigned full-sized B-Body Caprice and Impala. I still recall seeing an ad and being so mesmerized by the new design. That feeling stuck with me, simmering on a low flame within my subconscious into adulthood.

I’ve been in music my whole career, and early on I got into the world of high-end audiophile music systems and exotic cars. Eventually I opened a car audio/security shop in Fairfield, Connecticut, called Audio Coupe. One day around town, I happened to see two unmarked 1988 9C1 police-package Caprices being prepped for decommission and auction. One of them, this car, had been primarily used to give out parking tickets at the local train station and had clearly been well maintained, so I decided to buy it. My wife likes to remind me that I went to register the car a few days after our daughter was born in early June, 1996. I paid $2800 for the car.

Even with 90,000 miles on it and worn police-issue Firestone tires, the Caprice lay flat through turns, much more adeptly than you might expect for a sizable sedan. Mind you, this is no BMW M5—but I was surprised how well it performed overall and how reliable the Quadrajet carburetor was.

The police-issue bucket seats over rubber floors were an odd look but I liked it, so I just replaced the flooring with fresh rubber, refreshed other worn parts, and had the seats reconstructed.

The stock 350 small-block was low horsepower/high torque, and the final drive was 3:08, so the car was fun off the line, had a silly top speed, and barely made it up steep hills. The first two things I fixed were the exhaust system and the balky, always-hunting 700R4 automatic with overdrive. For the former, I had a custom dual stainless 2.25-inch system made up, and the latter was replaced with a high-performance 700R4 with manual lockup. I’m a cruiser, not a racer, and it has been marvelous for years.

I chose the best body shop around—they were all hot rod guys—and had the car carefully massaged and sprayed with a slightly modified version of the factory color and many layers of lovingly sanded clear coat. I used factory-new Chevy parts to replace all of the rubber gaskets and chrome trim, the bumpers, and the mirrors, and I ditched all of the glue-on trim, the hood ornament, the AM/FM antenna, and the spotlight in order to get the cleanest possible look.

Regardless of the tortuous task of keeping up with revolving EPA regulations during the 1970s and ’80s, GM most certainly should be ashamed of itself for the mess under the hood that it turned loose on customers throughout the era. When addressing the engine bay, I asked my builder to clean house and start fresh. I wanted something utilitarian and sensible.

I chose a turnkey small-block from Chevy called the Fast Burn 385, which is the venerable ZZ4 with upgraded aluminum heads, a Holley 750 and a serpentine belt system. We put the motor on a dyno and it gave me back just under 400 hp, perfect for my recreational cruising and the occasional charity car show here in my new hometown of St. Petersburg, Florida.

We ditched the ugly fan shroud and installed electric fans, chucked the ugly plastic bottles for the washer fluid and coolant overflow and replaced those with stainless containers tucked out of the way. I then added an aircraft-grade aluminum fresh air intake system reminiscent of the old Ram Air concept, with a snorkel under the bumper on the driver’s side.

The 700R4 transmission has been flawless, spinning my custom-made driveshaft and U-joints back to a Moser Engineering Ford 9-inch limited-slip 3.73:1 rear end. The car sits on Bilstein shocks and new springs, slightly lowered from the factory stance, with new Hotchkiss suspension and sway bars front and rear. The brakes are Wilwood vented discs front and rear. I was super careful in hunting for wheels, seeking to upgrade performance but maintain a retro visual appearance. The offset American Racing 18-inch Rally rims did the trick beautifully, letting me spin down the highway on fat Michelin tires.

Inside, I added a Dakota Digital instrument cluster that gives me an integrated tachometer, and of course I built a music system that sounds great but is not visible in any way. I replaced the 1988 windshield with glass from a 1977 model so I could get the AM/FM antenna in the window and lose the fender-mounted mast.

I have had the Caprice for 27 years now. It has that traditional muscle car rumble at just the right volume, and people seem to appreciate it more as I drive by or pull into a cruise night. They also like to share stories of the four-door family hauler their parents had when they were kids. Some people are puzzled as to why I chose this car, and I totally get that. Building a Caprice is an irrational thing to do—certainly not with the potent resale value of a Corvette or Camaro. But it is my counter-culture hot rod, and that’s perfectly fine with me.

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