In recounting the years of mobility, something always drew me towards the ugly duckling of cars, the Volkswagon. It has been termed by its detractors as "Hitler's Revenge" but was designed by Ferdinand Porsche under instruction by the "Fuhrer" to produce a peoples car, and that is exactly what happened.The initial car was produced at Wolfsburg Germany in 1938 but with the advent of the second world war the factory was used to produce war type vehicles and it wasn't till 1946 that the humble beetle started to appear in any great number. For the full story, please visit the following site address. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen
I used to ask the question. "Who in their right mind would buy one of those?"
- A car with an engine in the tail end behind its gearbox.
- A petrol tank over you legs and feet.
- A car whose motor was different being a flat 1200cc horizontally opposed four cylinder air cooled arrangement. They only went into motorcycles.
- Strange torsion bar suspension and swing axle at the rear, and spring leaf torsion bar beam at the front. But it all worked and was simple.
Well the answer was simple. They were reasonably cheap even in Australia, they were reliable and if something went wrong, easy to fix. A good mechanic could drop a motor out of one in less than half an hour, put it on a work bench or stand then proceed to do what ever was necessary if the repairs couldn't be done in engine bay.
Now to my involvement. I bought the first of them a 1956 model which I kept for a period of twelve months as a second car, then traded it in with a '64 XM Falcon on another car. A few years later I was able to acquire two written off wrecks. One was severely damaged at the front, and the second looked like a bulldozer had hit it in the rear. When I arrived home with the first one My wife looked at in horror, but said nothing. A few hours later I arrived home with the second and this time I was told my pedigree.
Three months later and a lot of work, day and night, we ended up with a beautiful beetle. What was originally a 1200cc motor had grown in capacity to 1750cc by using an aftermarket Empi big bore kit, a mild camshaft, "Holley Bug Spray" inlet manifold and carburettor, and tuned length extractor exhaust system. It went really well but the engine seemed to want to do more than the miserable 3800RPM's. There was definitely something wrong.
After talking to a number of people, not to mention reading heaps of American VW magazines, I discovered the the cam in the VW distributor had one lobe out of whack with the other three. It was designed to create bounce of the distributor points arm when it rotated at a certain rev range. Now Mr Bosch made and sold a replacement distributor known as the "Bosch 090" that eliminated that problem and allowed the motor to rev its heart out. This then produced another problem, and one that could be very costly. The crank shaft was not counterweight designed. If you could to fit one of those, 7500RPM's wasn't an unusual top limit. Over rev the engine and it would explode into the best load of shrapnel in town. Old Ferdinand Porsche knew what he was doing. Here was one big difference between VW and Porsche engines and there were others as well.
Suffice to say I heeded the advise from the magazines and took fine care not to take the motor over 5000RPM's.
Then the arguments started as to who was going to drive the beetle Joan or I. If that wasn't bad enough the kids argued as to who was going to ride in the space behind the b
ack seat sitting over the engine. The VW of today is now an upmarket make; and sadly is no longer a working man's family car. The VW of today is now an upmarket make; and sadly is no longer a working man's family car.
By this time a new interest reared it head and it was time to move on. The VW was sold sadly, but there was money to be made from the sale that funded the next venture. Dune Buggies . . . . . . . . . . . But that is another story.
Now look at VW today, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nd5WGLWNllA
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