The Beetle is no more – IOTW Report

The Beetle is no more

Saturday, 15 September 2018, 1:45 BFH Uncategorized 32

Volkswagen is discontinuing its Beetle.

I love when the left claims Hitler wasn’t a leftist.

Volkswagen is a German automaker founded on 28 May 1937 by the German Labour Front under Adolf Hitler and headquartered in Wolfsburg. The People’s Car.

Certainly sounds collectivist and socialist to me.

ht/ the big owe

32 Comments on The Beetle is no more

  3. My still favorite little car was my red 1968 VW Beetle, my wife and I loved that car but we got rid of it after my son was born because it was too small. We should’ve kept it as a second car because a lot of our cars after that were real POS’s. It was one of the best Winter cars we ever had, it could get thru anything that Winter threw at us. And it was just plain fun to drive as well. My wife always wanted a Karmann Ghia convertible of which we never got, she loved those cars.

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  4. Environmental laws doomed the Bug. Once all the anti-pollution gear was added, the engine size had to be increased beyond 1600-1700 CC to support it, making it too large to be air-cooled. After that it was just a matter of time.

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  7. One of the greatest trips in my life was in a 65 Mexican (controls backward) bug going from Philadelphia to Indianapolis and back in January of 1979. We had breakdowns and problems with the gas tank (suction issues that would crumple the gas tank).

    The high lite was stopping at an attraction that had a “dancing Chicken” machine that would be inhumane by today’s standards.

    Shout out to you Dave, wheve ever you are, for the memories. Dave was a sociologist and I was a psychology intern and we had the world as our lab!!!!

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  8. Had a 65 Bug while on Guam in 74-76. By necessity, I became a really good VW mechanic. I could drop the starter motor, dis-assemble and clean the plate, re-assemble, and then re-install in under 15 min. I mean I HAD IT DOWN! LOL

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  9. The new beetles were front engine, front drive liquid cooled Mexican VW crap.
    They were as related to a real beetle as a NASCAR front engine rear drive 800 HP Toyota Camry is to the 4 cylinder front drive Camry on the street.

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  10. Vietvet – It’s not just that, but a water-cooled engine can maintain closer tolerances and not have all that parasitic fan power wasted on cooling. There are plenty of air-cooled engines far larger.
    BTW – The conventional air-cooled Bug and Transporter were still being made by VW in Puebla Mexico for Third-World consumption long after the water-cooled version replaced them.

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  12. First car for me – 1962 Bug convertible. Zero heat in cold weather. The best thing on working on it was that the dashboard had access from the tire/trunk compartment a cover that came off and everything in the dash was right in front of you. Not that it ever broke down. Pressurized windshield washer tank. Memories

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  14. My Dad had a late 50’s VW converted into a Dune Buggy.

    Fenders were all chopped, had Brush Bar in the front and a Cage

    around the engine…No Heat

    It still had the old turn signals that didn’t work…They were

    white arms and had gloved hands that came out of a slot in the

    center Pillar , each with a reflector on it. This was around 1977.

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  17. My family owned seven beetles and 1 camper from 1967 through 1992. There was also a Porsche in the mix.
    Even though the “peoples car” concept was developed under a socialist regime directive it thrived under capitalism!

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  18. My brother bought one that was parked in a field for $50. We built a new engine from scap parts and installed it right in the field. He drove it home and, after fixing body damage, brakes, etc., put another 70k miles on it before selling it for $400.

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  19. One of the more foolish things that I’ve ever done was in a Beetle. My friend would race against the clock descending down Lookout Mountain Golden, CO. I swear some of the corners where on two wheels.

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  20. A bandmate of mine had the VW bus that was great for hauling guitars, amps, and drums. I remember the front seats were roomy enough that we could switch driver/passenger positions easily while flying down the Thruway at highways speeds. Of course, I wouldn’t recommend that behavior now.

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  21. I had too much fun in my 1960 VW convertible including driving to Montana in the dead of winter and the heater didn’t work. Also upon high school graduation a friend and I traveled around the U.S. and Canada in a VW camper van. The mischief we got into would make a great movie.

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  22. When the laughing subsides, remember that, in the late 1990s, VW was considering pulling out of the American market totally. The ’98 New Beetle virtually saved VW America. Just FYI.

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  25. I had a red 67 in the mid 70’s, last year of the handlebar bumper I believe. Drove it around Minneapolis without brakes for a month then the clutch cable broke and drove it around for another month (very challenging to say the least) Virtually no heat, defroster was an ice scraper, what a piece of crap but looked cool and was fun to drive,

    side note; We would grab bugs and put them on the sidewalk from time to time.

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  28. I learned to drive in a 1976 red Beetle. My dad bought it new, and I bought it from him a couple years later when I moved out. Kept it until my daughter was born in 1981. Good car. Good times.

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  29. I have a ’73 Super. It took me some time to get it back to good running condition after the PO did the “necessary” stupid stuff to it. He put the 009 dizzy in it, and removed the cooling system (louvers and t-stat). And he had the carb totally screwed up. I put a manual choke in it, new jugs and pistons, new front bushings, and new struts. Oh yeah, and disc brakes on the front. And an oil filter system with an HP1 spin-on.

    I love that little car.

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  30. I thought I’d wait until the thread got farther down the iOTW list to post this news.

    It’s coming back in 2025 as a plug-in electric model. (maybe they’ll nickname it: Bug Zapper)

    You know they wouldn’t squash the popular little Bug. 🙂

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  31. I also had a 61 VW van, a camper van equipped with a factory installed sink, stove, side facing seats etc. that could be made into a bed that I bought for $750 in Beaverton, Or. in 1972 before I joined the Navy. I should’ve put it away instead of letting my brother have it and giving it to a friend who wrecked it while I was in the Navy. My youngest brother who is a mechanic tells me that aging baby boomers are now paying 75 to 100 K for that particular camper van, I could’ve made a fortune off of that darned thing now. We should’ve all kept our older cars in storage.

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  32. @TRF: I was only going by what some VW technicians (read: mechanics) have told me.
    Seemed to make sense, since the old beetles didn’t even have a fan, just the air flowing over the engine.

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