VW Bugs

[northern 85]

Picked up a 67 last fall. Very fun car to drive!!

[special-K]

'67 was a great year!

[Boog]

My wife's first car was a beige '67 vw she bought in '71 for $650. Someone had waxed it and let it sit in the sun and baked the wax on before wiping it off. Her dad used Janitor in a drum and a couple other products to get it off. We buffed it up and it was like new again.

[Rich84]

I went to Mexico last year. From Cancun to Playa Del Carmin I must have saw 20.

[special-K]

VWs in Mexico had better heaters

[1976gmc20]

Originally Posted by FleetsidePaul

I wrecked my 74 Bug going way to fast on a curve. (I was going downhill) My then girlfriend lived at the top of the hill and we had just had a fight. (what else is new) So I took off mad, was driving too fast and lost control and the car spun out and I hit a parked Oldsmobile backwards. I ended up in the passenger seat but I didn't get hurt either. And I drove it home. In fact I drove it around for a while all smashed up. It was my only car and it still ran. But I did get pulled over by the cops because it was such a mess. But they were cool about it and I didn't even get a ticket.

I sold it to my buddy and he fixed it all up and put a hitch on it. Hooked up a little trailer and drove it all over the country. And he weighed at least about 300 lbs. His nickname was "Heavy".

That was a tough little car.

My soon to be wife's bug was all squished over like a parallelogram. You had to be careful not to hit your head on the driver side going over a bump. The glass mostly flew out, and I took out the surviving back window and took off the doors which were jammed shut. I also pried out the jammed sun roof and a couple times we hauled our canoe on top by reaching up through the open sun roof and holding onto the thwarts.

We never dared taking it 40 miles to town to see what cops would say, but we had a blast with it driving on jeep trails the rest of the summer and fall until I robbed the engine out of it for the new one. Folks from Denver in their fancy Blazers and Ramchargers sure gave us some surprised looks. I never did but thought about telling them that "it was just fine before we came up this road."


Oh yeah, and when I swapped the engine into the replacement bug, I forgot to plug in the generator wire before we drove to town. It kept dying on us at stoplights, so when the light (there were only two in town) turned green I would jump out and push it and then jump back in and stick it in gear and let out the clutch and putt-putt away we would go.

[SCHRUMGMC]

As I’ve said before, here’s my 74 bug

Grandfather purchased it in my town 20 years ago and we have taken it everywhere across the states and to the yellow stone national park and the list goes on


Love the Volkswagen

[1976gmc20]

The later bugs (1970s) had better turn signals. I couldn't keep bulbs working in the old style that was just the reflector dish cut and bent to sort of hold a bulb.

[67C10Step]

Saw a nice, patina bug this week. It was parked at a local shop in either Quitman or Rose Bud. Both teaming metropolis' of a few hundred folks.

My fondest and best VW bug story comes from about 1985. Buddy of mine had a bug (forget the year model) but it had a baja kit on it. Front rounded, motor hanging out the back with pipe shooting almost straight up, big knobby tires. We've all seen at least a dozen like it. Well, in my hometown the favorite hangout was a convenience store/arcade (remember those?). There was this hill that all the 4x4 guys used to like to climb but most had to go up the backside due to a short radius ditch at the bottom of the steepest part. There were probably a half dozen of these guys in their jacked up trucks sitting up there and my buddy sees them. He got the "hold on" look on his face and down in that ditch we went hell bent for leather. When we topped the hill all four wheels of that bug came off the ground and we landed right in the middle of all those trucks. My buddy does about 2 1/2 donuts just to stir up the dust and off we went down the backside of the hill. I hurt for a half hour laughing at the looks on those guys faces.

[special-K]

My first car, although I didn't own it or have a drivers license, was a '58 bug. Friends of my folk gave it to them. My dad had the bus with a stroker engine so we could go up mountains faster than walking. He sold the Bus w/o engine to a friend of my older sister and put the stroker in that Bug. But he never put it on the road. He had bought a '62 Land Rover 109 to replace the Bus. We lived on a farm way back off the road up and over a hill and through some woods. I drove it a little farther than that, but never got caught. His friend had a Bug that someone busted the glass out of and he let them take the glass out of the '58 and the guy took the bumpers, too. This was in '68 and baja racing got big enough that I knew about it back East. I asked my dad if I could chop the fenders and put the old Bus wheels and tires on. He actually had a pair of Gates Commandos on the bus before he sold it. So I had me a field Bug! It didn't take long before I rolled it squirreling around. Then I rolled it again and then again. It was getting pretty rough looking. I never had a go cart or mini bike and kids just didn't have dirt bikes back then. I had a blast with that thing, riding my sisters or a friend in it and rolling it over trying to get it to land back on all fours. No one ever got hurt that I can recall (not much). Probably some bumps, cuts, and bruises but nothing serious. It sure was great growing up in the pre-safety era

[1976gmc20]

A dune buggy is really the only good use for a VW Bug.

They do pretty good in the mountains too, except when they power out on a steep hill at 13K feet ASL Need a lower gear.

[special-K]

Buses with reduction gears were great for that, and ground clearance. My 'Baja Bus' went about everywhere. Never got it stuck. I also never left mine stock. That Bus was pretty peppy too.

[joedoh]

I had a 64 with an 1835 sand rail motor in it, stinger and all. loved that car, had to run new brake lines through the tunnel after they rusted through again. had a 67 with a 50hp 66 engiine recently, freeway flyer isnt a joke it was flying all over the road at 65mph.

edit: I forgot when I was 16 my best friend bought one from a neighbor for 50 bucks. we lacked tools so we beat the fenders off with hammers and welded the headlights to the hood with a 12v battery. in rural western PA it made it to all the in-the-woods parties that the cops couldnt bust because their cars would get stuck and we would see them walking in with flashlights and just leave. he killed it, how else when you are 16, going to visit a girl, lost a valve cover and ran it out of oil. new oil didnt cure it and so he did the rod knocking-est powerslide/donut in his moms side yard, loop after banging loop till it quit!

[4u2nv]

Not a bug but this VW is just way to cool

[Steeveedee]

Originally Posted by 4u2nv

Not a bug but this VW is just way to cool

That's gotta be 'shopped, but it's still a pretty cool picture.

[special-K]

I think it's real. I'm not a fan of cartoon cars. I started out on VWs and was hot on them when it wasn't popular around here to hot rod them. People were happy thinking of them as slugs. The little 36-50 hp horizontal 4 has huge potential hidden in it. You can quadruple the factory power with ease. Look what does it take to go from 250hp to 1,000 in a V8. Nothing a HS kid could afford on his own. Those engines were adapted for about anything that moves. All this said, and now that they are so popular again the values have put them to where if I was spending that kind of money I'd be looking at something else. They are neat little cars that have become over way overpriced. and I used to get excited about finding an accessory. My '56 had some neat rare ones I had found. But what I see now are unrealisticly over accessorized clown cars. These folks are too young to know you never saw that back in the day. They don't represent their era well at all. I still like 'em clean

[4u2nv]

Originally Posted by Steeveedee

That's gotta be 'shopped, but it's still a pretty cool picture.

No it's the real deal , watched it on My classic car more than once .
Forget the owners name but he some other cool stuff also

[special-K]

Originally Posted by 4u2nv

Forget the owners name but he some other cool stuff also

Mickey Mouse?

[GOPAPA]

Originally Posted by CG

Im not talking about the newest generation of bugs, Im talking about the eleventy billion bugs that came before them. What the heck happened to them?
They made a serious amount of bugs and I almost never see them anymore.


I had a 66 that I built my first engine ever. Did it on some cardboard in the living room. Had another 66 and a 57. Nothing ever came of the 57, typical me lol. I also had a pretty cool 60's dune buggy, again I never did anything with it and the original owner from whom I purchased it called me and asked if he could buy it back. No problem, off to its new old home.

As I stated Mark,, I never wanted a Voltswagon .And one time a engineer at the power plant wanted to hire me to repair his roof and house where a tree fell on it and the car for payment ,,he would give me a I think 1967 bug.. I turned him down ,,and now wonder if that would of changed my mind about them ,,by owning one...but I got to say ..this little car right here catches my eye ..

[HO455]

I see them running around town all the time. Bugs, square backs, fast backs, vans. There is a fast back daily driver just up the street from me. I guy I work with drives his Karman Ghia every day in the summer including regular trips to Marysville.

[Steeveedee]

Originally Posted by special-K

Mickey Mouse?

I laughed 'til I cried. So true. To each his own, though. They probably smell my oil burning truck coming. Just joking, it's at about a quart every 1k miles and is going to get refreshed soon. A lot of it is through the valve guides, though.

[CG]

I love that van, I also saw it on my classic cars. But I love show rods in general and that's what category I would put that van in. Course it runs and drives, and probably most of the show rods were just that ... show only, not running. Still love em!

[special-K]

Originally Posted by Steeveedee

I laughed 'til I cried. So true. To each his own, though. They probably smell my oil burning truck coming. Just joking, it's at about a quart every 1k miles and is going to get refreshed soon. A lot of it is through the valve guides, though.

I wanted to say Donald Duck, which is my personal go-to cartoon character name, but Mickey Mouse is the most popular iconic cartoon character, Now if I thought a lot of us were familiar with R. Crumb comics I might have pulled one of those names out. They look straight out of Zap comics!

[Steeveedee]

Originally Posted by special-K

I wanted to say Donald Duck, which is my personal go-to cartoon character name, but Mickey Mouse is the most popular iconic cartoon character, Now if I thought a lot of us were familiar with R. Crumb comics I might have pulled one of those names out. They look straight out of Zap comics!

Oh, man. Zap Comix. I grew up on those! Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers, Wonder Warthog, The Checkered Demon. "It's a nice day for sumthin!"

I remember the episode where WW was trying to win a race for some kid riding a "Slo-Ped" against all the "Fastasssumbeechees". He pedaled that thing like crazy, hoping that he'd buy a "Hog", only to have the kid sell out with the prize money and buy a "Fastasssumbeechee".

[special-K]

Remember the album cover for Janis Joplin & Big Brother and the Holding Company's Cheap Thrills album? I recall Shuman the Human and Angelfood McSpade. Can't forget the snoid, "Hello, I'm a snoid, I live in a..."