1965 Volkswagen Samba

With 23-windows and a ragtop roof, a restored Samba can command $100,000 or more in today's market. As the second picture shows, the microbus was and still is available in a whole bunch of different configurations.

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Auf Wiedersehen: 1979 Volkswagen Beetle Convertible

1977 was the last year for the Beetle coupe in the US. Why? From a New York Times article from August of that year: "In the United States, It has become a victim of international economics, American safety and emissions requirements and just plain changing times.

When the dollar decreased in value relative to the mark, the beetle became more expensive to United States consumers and therefore less competitive. At the same time, according to spokesman for Volkswagen of America, the cost of meeting American emissions and safety standards helped to make the bug uneconomical.

Finally, Japanese auto makers put severe competitive pressure on VW by bringing out more stylish, up‐to‐date small cars for the American market. For this and other reasons, VW changed its product."

The convertible received a reprieve of two years before it disappeared as well. With no convertibles built in the US after 1976, and the demise of the Beetle as well as the MG and the Triumph, by 1981 American convertible buyers were limited to a handful of German and Italian cars.

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1958 Volkswagen Karmann Ghia, 1973 Volkswagen 181 Thing

It was not a coincidence that these VWs were parked together; turns out it was a family picnic of VW fans. The Karmann Ghia was built virtually unchanged from 1955 to 1974. I think this is the oldest one I've seen. The 181, known as "The Thing" in the US, was only sold in the US in 1973-4 before safety regulations killed it here.

 

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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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Welcome to Budget Germany: 1971 Prosche 914, 1965 Volkswagen Type 1 Beetle

I have never featured a Porsche on this blog before. There's a reason for that: I think vintage Porsches are junk. And I drove enough of them in my valet parking days to know. Consider the famous Porsche 911. When Road & Track reviewed it in the 1960s, they found the car's handling so poor it was dangerous to drive. So Porsche fixed this... by dropping two 40-lb. steel weights into the front bumper. Even after a couple of generations of improvements, the 911 was still known for dangerous over-steer, stalling when cold, and (from drivetribe.com), "the early 4-speed manual transmission had exceptionally tall gears, making the driver be careful with shifting gears". What the heck does that even mean? I also drove Porsche 944's made in the '80s, and was shocked at the poor build quality. This is a premium-price supercar?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And yet the old 911 and 944 really are supercars compared to the lowly Porsche 914. From jalopnik.com, "The problem (with the 914) was that the engine they went with was the air-cooled 1.7-liter, 80-horsepower flat four from the Volkswagen Type 4 sedan. This was in no way a performance engine, and it showed. Even in the 914's lightweight body, 0-to-60 mph came at a lofty 13 seconds, giving the driver plenty of time to wonder if his or her purchase was really good idea.

But perhaps the 914's biggest problem was one of perception. With all of its VW components, many enthusiasts refused to accept it as a "real Porsche." It also suffered from a poor shift linkage, somewhat awkward styling and cut-rate quality that reflected its low-cost, parts bin origins. The car was not well received by the motoring press at the time."

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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1973 Volkswagen Beetle convertible

 Summer's almost gone.

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1970 EMPI Imp / Volkswagen dune buggy

When I was a kid, I was fascinated by dune buggies because, to me, they were so mysterious. Being from Iowa, I had never seen one except on TV.

* The EMPI Imp and the Meyers Manx are considered the most desirable classic dune buggies. Now you know.
* I really have no idea how old this is. The body looks new - it may be a replacement for a fiberglass body paired with an air-cooled VW engine 50 years ago.
* Street legal? In Washington state, you can license pretty much anything once it's 30 years old.

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Time Travel Photos: '85 Mercedes 380SL, '64 Ford Galaxie 500 XL, '73 Volkswagen Westphalia Camper

Used my time machine to visit a beautiful spring day in the 80s.

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1982 Volkswagen Rabbit

It took 30 years for Volkswagen the rethink its basic car. Up to the mid 70s, it was all Beetles and variations on the Beetle. The Golf ("Gulf" in German), called the Rabbit in the US, was one of the first small front-wheel drive cars you could buy.
* In the 80s these were made in Pennsylvania.
* I understand that in the 70s, if you wanted a Rabbit you had to order it at the dealership and take whatever color of car showed up.
* General Motors responded to the front-wheel drive small car challenge by cynically warming-over one of its German models, creating the rear-drive Chevy Chevette; a car with mechanics mostly out of the dark ages. In the 80s GM didn't even try and sold imports to small-car buyers.

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1970 Volkswagen Karmann-Ghia

I always really liked these and I'm sure they're fun to own. On the other hand, I don't know anything about air-cooled engines, and these cars are really not very safe.

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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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