Is it just me or is VW desecrating the beetle?

[elhigh]

Originally Posted by Frank Lee

The last one got a Corvair engine swap- no more downshifting for hills!

I bet that shocked the heck out of a rev-happy drag racer or two.

If you can find someone here in the states who was bringing them in, VW of Mexico was making the old aircooled up to 2003. Still 1600cc, EFI that had benefitted from eons of advancement, 50hp and 35mpg all day long. No more peashooter exhaust, though. Too bad. That's my favorite part, the happy chirp of the exhaust. Ah well.

[dcb]

Ive rebuilt enough cars to know good engineering when I see it. Aint nobody that works on more machines than me in a 10 mile radius. I've heard enough humor to know it. Mean isn't funny where I come from.

[TheDon]

Originally Posted by tasdrouille

Just put the wheel on with the holes aligned and put the bolts in. How hard can that be? My 99 has bolts too.

wheel bolts rock.. Mercedes does that as well

[azlar]

My '72 Squareback ran great for many years (except for the time I forgot to put the rotor back in the dist after a tuneup). My better half loved the car.

Then I sold it to a buddy of mine. Blew up within a month. He wasn't happy... Obviously not and air-cooled guy.

To drive the original Beetle, you had to wrench on it. A given, but not a biggie since you could pull the engine for a sparkplug change in the morning, with basic handtools. The New one's are for chicks. Cute, reliable, and have a flower vase on the dash.

With proper habits, both get great MPG. I've only been reading the board for a short time, but thought the goal was to promote efficiency, rather than bash certain car models.

Lar

[dremd]

Well; I try and see things on the positive side. VW is selling a small SUV with the Bug rather than a large SUV.

The Bug is their new advertising campaign; it will be used to sell everything.

Just found out that one of their big advertising guys lives about 5 miles from my camp.

[Volones]

Originally Posted by elhigh

You're a funny guy. I've got a '45 Farmall whose wheels mount with studs, and the offside wheel has a 165lb counterweight built into it. What I wouldn't give for stud mounting at that point... Thank God those tires can take a lot of abuse.

Just my two bits.

My '51 Allis WD uses bolts, and a bunch of 'em. Although I don't have your counterweight, I did discover that my tires (only one now) are fluid-filled. Taking them off to patch a hole is one really messy job! I look forward to having the restoration done and brand new DRY tires mounted (less so the work of mounting them )

Vol

[orange4boy]

I totally rebuilt a VW beetle from the ground up when I was 18. Simple, well engineered vehicles. Fantastic in the snow, great for off roading, great gas mileage for their time.

They were designed to be inexpensive so they had some ingenious solutions to save costs. You did have to know how to wrench on them and they had some weak areas but most of those problems were easily remedied. Great for tinkerers. VW beetles were ahead of their time competing against 16 foot long land yachts. They sold like hot cakes to a public sick of crappy fuel economy and truck like handling.

I found that there were a lot of people simply prejudiced against them who didn't know what they were talking about and just parroted other peoples misinformation. Just like today with electric cars.

I never had to pull the engine to change a spark plug but I could pull the engine in less than an hour with only a small hydraulic jack.

I'm with DCB. I miss my VW.

[Frank Lee]

Americans LOVE truck-like handling!

[orange4boy]

Should we revise the old saying to, "Strong, like bull. Dumb, like truck"?

(mini vans exempted, of course)