A brief history of "The Bug"

[Ben Framed]

From the 1930's to the early 2000's

https://youtube.com/shorts/qnrAenUjH1o?si=STkLEO4r5HOh74N4

[Terri Yaki]

Volkswagen def: Peoples' car

First car I owned, 1969 beetle, bought for $700 in 1974 and a fantastic experience. It is the reason that most of my tools are metric. They had many design features that should have been implemented in other vehicles, starting with the way the distributor drive was designed. Parts fit across several model years and evolved over time. Back in the '70s, I never thought I'd see the day when they would be scarce on the road because there were so many of them.

[BeeMaster2]

I bought a VW while we lived in Bermuda. Paid $150 for it but there were no floor boards. I traded an old Reliant for having the floor welded back in. I had a friend give it a new paint job so that it would pass the license beauty inspection. That just cost me for the can of paint. Total cost was less than $200.
Jim Altmiller

[animal]

Had a couple of 'em. My favorite was bought for 200 and had a really tired motor and an ELVIS LIVES! sticker on the motor hatch. Later (bought from an insurance company in Starkville MS) a porsche for scrap that had been pretty much rolled up in a ball for another 200. Spent a day with a torch cutting the car off the motor and transaxle which was somehow pristine inside of the wad. It wasn't hard with a little creativity to install in the '67 bug ...

pulled the spare tire out and put two 50lb sandbags in it's place to keep the front wheels on the ground when you popped the clutch around town. It was squirrely above 120 .. finally slung a rod through the top of the case a couple years later doing somewhere around 150 , painted the road with oil, and caught on fire ... It was a great sleeper while it lasted.  

Original motor got rebuilt, the powertrain back in, used for a couple of years, and later sold for 250. Had also touched up the motor hatch with a rattle can, and left the sticker on. My wife (girlfriend at the time) hated that car. Ran out of gas three times in it with her, but no joy any of those times

[gww]

When we would drive anywhere, I had a sore arm cause we would beat each other to death, so there were a lot of them on the road.  Not a Beatle but my uncle had one of the fiberglass bodies that sit on a Beatle chassis that we played on the farm with.

[Michael Bush]

I never owned a beetle but I drove a lot of them.  I had a girlfriend who had one and I drove that a lot and I ended up with a borrowed one for several months.  I always thought the reserve tank was nice.  Hard to find the battery the first time.  Back in the 60's I heard this joke:  A lady in a VW sees another lady with a VW with the front open.  She stops to help and the first lady says, My engine is gone!  The second lady says, that's ok I have a spare in my trunk.

[Terri Yaki]

Mine had a gas gauge. It also had 12V electrical system, doors that locked and a heater that probably worked a little when it was new.

[animal]

Went down a logging road with the 67 (stock motor) It was wet Mississippi red clay gumbo (I didn't know it until it was too late) UH OH ! ... BETTER NOT STOP ! moment ... It seemed to dance right through the muck while I thought I was gonna be walking out, but suddenly there was a grassy spot on the side of the road and pulled onto it. Got out and there were 2 ditches made by the tires and a perfectly flat graded area between them. Walked around the front and mud was packed onto and into the bumper and about midway up the headlights and completely covering the hood handle. Back bumper was full of mud too. Looked around, no options looked good, so I drove back through to get out...no problem getting out, but the rest of the day cleaning out mud.

It amazed me how well it did. I'm guessing the body pan was the reason, but still.

[Ben Framed]

They made good dune buggies like gww described (fiberglass body). One of the fellows used it deer hunting with dogs. It was a good cut off vehicle.  I had a friend that had a yellow one with flared fenders and wide back mud-tires. It was awesome off road and fun on it.

[Michael Bush]

I admit, the worst thing about them (from a Nebraskan point of view) was the defroster followed by the heater.  In an ice storm you couldn't keep the window clear and it was never toasty warm.

[BeeMaster2]

If memory serves me correctly, the heater on the old bugs was air deflected from the air cooled engine fins as compared to most cars use the radiator hot water which has a thermostat to keep the water at a minimum of 170 to 210 degrees for maximum engine efficiency. In cold weather the heat off of an air cooled engine never gets very warm.
Jim Altmiller

[Michael Bush]

Actually the heater was a double wall on the exhaust manifold and air was blown through that space.

[Terri Yaki]

Actually the heater was a double wall on the exhaust manifold and air was blown through that space.

This is correct. The exhaust went through a heat exchanger, which was wrapped in a sheet metal shroud, that the engine cooling air was sent through. Those shrouds didn't hold together for long and once they weren't tight any more, they didn't make enough pressure to get the heat into the car. And that was compounded by the fact that there wasn't much air pressure coming off the engine to start with. I used to keep ice scrapers handy to keep the windshield clear on the inside.

[Salvo]

Hi Folks,

Saaadd.

First they went Hybrid. The they went all Electric. Now Vegan.

Sal

[Ben Framed]

Hahaha! Good one Sal.

What was the expected fuel mileage on the bugs?

[animal]

I don't remember the beetle having an exhaust manifold per se. I could very well be wrong, 40 year old memories and all... plus I also had a '67 squareback and a '72 type 3 (dual carb big motor that was made for the German market) and I may be mixing VW memories ... but I seem to remember the muffler assembly on the bug bolting directly to the cylinder heads in the back (with 2 small heat exchangers on it located between the heads and muffler itself) , the muffler also having 2 more ports that went to the main heat exchangers that were bolted to the front cylinders. I guess that the pipes/exchangers might be called manifold pipes, but I think of them more as header pipes .. and not "manifolded" until the muffler itself.

The cooling fan of the engine pushed the air first through the small heat exchangers(not much to them), then the long ones and on to the ducting of the car. The heater was "turned on" by opening an air gate leading into the passenger compartment.
The engine also had a thermostat. It was a wierd little bellows thingie on the underside that opened flaps as it warmed up to increase airflow across the engine. If those flaps were stuck open, forget about heat.   

[animal]

btw
I highly recommend this book... and i do mean HIGHLY ... I think it was written by a flower child stoner.
A friend had a copy and loaned it to me well after I had no more VW stuff. It is hilarious. I laughed all the way through it ... plus you can really use it to work on one ! It's a very good manual but HIGHly unconventional as manuals go   
For instance, the wiring diagram is labeled "The Spaghetti System" 

[Michael Bush]

I seem to remember somewhere in the mid 30s MPG.

[Ben Framed]

I seem to remember somewhere in the mid 30s MPG.

That is awesome even for today?s standards in my opinion considering they were computer free and ran off of a simple carburetor fuel system.  Considering animals post, can we take it these cars were dependable, economical, and easy to maintain?

[Terri Yaki]

I don't remember the beetle having an exhaust manifold per se. I could very well be wrong, 40 year old memories and all... plus I also had a '67 squareback and a '72 type 3 (dual carb big motor that was made for the German market) and I may be mixing VW memories ... but I seem to remember the muffler assembly on the bug bolting directly to the cylinder heads in the back (with 2 small heat exchangers on it located between the heads and muffler itself) , the muffler also having 2 more ports that went to the main heat exchangers that were bolted to the front cylinders. I guess that the pipes/exchangers might be called manifold pipes, but I think of them more as header pipes .. and not "manifolded" until the muffler itself.

The cooling fan of the engine pushed the air first through the small heat exchangers(not much to them), then the long ones and on to the ducting of the car. The heater was "turned on" by opening an air gate leading into the passenger compartment.
The engine also had a thermostat. It was a wierd little bellows thingie on the underside that opened flaps as it warmed up to increase airflow across the engine. If those flaps were stuck open, forget about heat.

Now that you spell it out, I remember all of that. Man, you have a good memory.

I really don't remember MPG but I was thinking more like 25.

And I had that book at one time, might even still have it somewhere.

I rebuilt one with bigger pistons and had a lockerplate put into the transaxle. It did donuts and awesome burnouts. It was pretty entertaining.

[animal]

I remember 30s on the highway and low 20s in town.
Dependable? Pretty much, if they were maintained. I used to say if you changed the oil every 3000 and adjusted the valves every other oil change, the motor would run forever. A lot of them got gunked up from bad oil or not changing it enough. Quaker State was the worst of oils and cheap, so a lot of motors got nastied up by it and people were used to longer oil change intervals. The bug didn't have an oil filter, just a strainer under the round plate that had the drain plug in it. People hardly ever cleaned it either. .. or cleaned and re-oiled the air filter

[gww]

Sounds like my 1951 ford 9n tractor.

[Michael Bush]

>I remember 30s on the highway and low 20s in town.

As you say, it was definitely lower in town.  As to maintenance, I never had a water pump issue or a radiator issue.  :)  It had a simplicity to it.  All kinds of aftermarket things were available like a crank start etc.

[Ben Framed]

With their air cooled motor; What was a good highway cruising speed? Could they cruise at 70 MPH and still run economically and efficiently?

[Michael Bush]

>Could they cruise at 70 MPH and still run economically and efficiently?

The ones I drove were not very powerful.  I often fell below 55mph on hills.  I don't remember every cruising at 70mph. :)

[BeeMaster2]

When I had my Bug down in Bermuda, I never got to drive it over 30 mph. The speed limit was 20 mph. It was a good thing that the island was only 20 miles long. I think that was where they got the speed limit from. 😊
Jim Altmiller

[animal]

With their air cooled motor; What was a good highway cruising speed? Could they cruise at 70 MPH and still run economically and efficiently?

Dunno about economically or efficiently, but not comfortably. It's not the air cooled part that's the problem. Displacement and not being designed to output a lot of power is. After a fresh rebuild that was mostly stock 1500cc(90 cubic inches or so), I pushed my '67 to a little under 100 and it did not like it at all . It handled 70 ok. The earlier 6volt models had smaller engines and weren't as fast. At 70 it started to feel light and having a crosswind hit you if you were doing above 80 would really get your attention. Long steep hills were also a killer for the poor little motors.
In 1985, with the hotrod motor, I  got a ticket in Artesia MS on Hwy 45 for 97 mph. HP was being nice and told me he was writing it for that because if he wrote it above 100, he would have to take me to jail. Went to court in Columbus, it was taking forever and they broke for lunch before my case came up. I asked some official if there was any way I could get another court date because I had a test in a vector mechanics class in about 2 hours in Starkville, and they said the judge would have to ok it.... so .. I chased him down in the parking lot and caught up to him, as luck would have it, right next to my car. Quickly ran through the details to him, told him my speedometer was broken but now replaced, had a junkyard receipt for a speedo, the old speedo and a cordless drill in my hand and said something like "Besides, I don't think this thing was doing 97."(and kicked it's bumper) That got his attention and he said "In THIS car ?" I said "yes sir" while trying my best to will a halo into existence above my head. He said, "give me that" and snatched the ticket out of my hand and studied it over, looking back and forth between it and the car. Then he said "Go take your test and don't worry about this ticket, it's dismissed."
I never lied to him