1964 Volkswagen Type 34

The Type 34 was VW's premium model. It cost about twice as much as a Beetle. Though never officially sold in the US, some dealers imported them and some G.I.s brought them back after their tours of Germany. This is the only one I've ever seen. Jay Leno covered the Type 34 a while back.

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1981 Volkswagen Rabbit convertible - with ski rack!

Ski rack on a convertible. Gotta love the west coast.

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1968 Volkswagen Beetle

Unlike the '59 we spotted in Georgetown, this Beetle has a speedometer and a gas gauge.

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1959 Volkswagen Type 1 Beetle - when there's no gas gauge

Early model Beetles had a lot of quirky features, none more strange than the "reserve fuel tap" to compensate for the fact that they did not have a gas gauge on the dashboard.

The regular fuel tank was 10.6 gallons, and the reserve tank was 1.3 gallons. From the owner's manual: "For vehicles with a fuel tap, the operating lever should be set at "Open". If the engine begins to "shutter" due to lack of fuel, just turn the lever right to "Reserve."

The owner of an old Beetle described what this meant in practical terms: "Of course, there was no way to check the gas level while you were driving, which meant that you could be straining down the freeway at 65 MPH one minute and windmilling down to zero the next when you ran the tank dry. So the VW designers gave the driver a little valve next to the foot pedals that you could work with your toe, which turned on a reserve fuel supply good for about 30 miles, which they figured was enough to get you to a gas station. So when the engine quit, the drill was to leave the engine in gear, cut into the slow lane, flip the valve with your foot and pump frantically on the gas pedal to restore the flow of gas. If everything worked, the engine started up again after about 5 seconds of terror; if unsuccessful, you cut onto the shoulder and coasted to a stop."

 

 

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1966 Volkswagen Beetle 1300

For those of you who don't live on the west coast, yes, as you suspected, there are still vintage Beetles everywhere out here.

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1965 Volkswagen Type 2 - '21 Window' Microbus

Let's take a look at the current prices of some of the most valuable collectible vehicles.

1967 Pontiac GTO: $29,900
1970 Chevy Chevelle SS 454 'LS6': $59,900
1963 Chevy Corvette split-window coupe: $68,500
1968 Dodge Charger R/T 426 Hemi: $149,500
1963 VW bus - 23-window Deluxe: $165,000

No, that's not a misprint. Here's another 23-window expected to go for $180,000 at auction. And here's another that auctioned for $198,000 after a protracted bidding war. So what is this unrestored 21-window bus worth? My guess would be around $45,000. Why these things are worth this much I cannot comprehend.

* Here's the Type 2 pickup I spotted.



    

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1981 Volkswagen Rabbit pickup truck

The Rabbit pickup is a vehicle I see from time to time in Seattle, though I haven't seen one in many years in other parts of the country. Most of those that remain appear to be the diesel-powered model (biodiesel is popular out here on the west coast), although this appears to be a gas-engine copy.

Built in the U.S., the economy-minded Rabbit pickup sold an impressive 37,392 copies in 1981, a year in which gasoline prices rose to an all-time high of $1.35/gallon, $3.51 in 2016 dollars. The Rabbit pickup's payload was a respectable 1,103 pounds. Unfortunately, VW's American plant closed in 1984. This resulted in all the tool and die equipment used to build American Rabbits being shipped to South Africa, where VW produced the original Mark I Golf-Rabbit as a pickup until 2007 and as a car until 2009.

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1963 Volkswagen Type 2 Transporter flatbed pickup

You might not associate political controversy with old Volkswagens, but there's a reason why there are many VW microbuses built between the 1970s and the 2000s on American roads, but the only air-cooled VW trucks you see date from the mid-60s or earlier.

From Wikipedia:

"Certain models of the Volkswagen Type 2 played a role in a historic episode during the early 1960s, known as the Chicken War. France and West Germany had placed tariffs on imports of U.S. chicken. Diplomacy failed, and in January 1964, two months after taking office, President Johnson imposed a 25% tax (almost ten times the average U.S. tariff) on potato starch, dextrin, brandy, and light trucks. Officially, the tax targeted items imported from Europe as approximating the value of lost American chicken sales to Europe.

In retrospect, audio tapes from the Johnson White House, revealed a quid pro quo unrelated to chicken. In January 1964, President Johnson attempted to convince United Auto Workers' president Walter Reuther not to initiate a strike just before the 1964 election, and to support the president's civil rights platform. Reuther, in turn, wanted Johnson to respond to Volkswagen's increased shipments to the United States.

The Chicken Tax directly curtailed importation of German-built Type 2s in configurations that qualified them as light trucks – that is, commercial vans (panel vans) and pickups. In 1964, U.S. imports of automobile trucks from West Germany declined to a value of $5.7 million – about one-third the value imported in the previous year."

The Chicken Tax is still around. Ford has been importing its Transit Connect vans from Turkey in passenger vehicle configuration to get around the tax, then ripping out the extra seats to put the vans into cargo configuration.

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1988 Volkswagen Fox

The Volkswagen Fox has the distinction of being the worst car I've ever driven. Now don't get me wrong, I'm a VW owner and I love my car.

But the Brazilian-built Volkswagen Gol, known is the US as the Fox, was not a great car. It was, after all, sold to compete with entry-level models like the Hyundai Excel. But I had a particular complaint against it: the pedals are so close together, it's almost impossible to step on only one of them. The Fox was never even available with an automatic transmission.

Other observations:
*You gotta love the blue pinstripes with a splash of hot pink, instantly dating this car to the 80s.
* This car is from Seattle all right: There's moss growing on it.

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