Retro is cool these days. Just look at the success of MINI
and Fiat with the 500, and of course the Land Rover Defender, but that’s hardly
retro, it just hasn’t changed!
So it’s no surprise that Volkswagen got in on the act with
their Beetle. As someone who once helped a school friend strip an air-cooled
flat four on a kitchen table using a Haynes manual, I have a fondness for
Beetles.
This was a split rear screen job and it was old even then.
We were both still at school at the time and he had acquired this
1950-something Beetle for the price of a school lunch. It was a non-runner. The
1100cc (or thereabouts) engine was tiny and a doddle to work on. From memory,
it was held in the chassis with four bolts, so it was easily dropped, and
carried in to the kitchen.
Thinking back, he must have been a spoiled child. His Mum
didn’t bat an eyelid and they ate their meals off trays till we got it finished.
So when a bright red Beetle turned up at the door the other
day, it conjured up images of oily fingers eating pie and chips out of
newspaper whilst scanning the next pages of the stripdown and rebuild.
Of course the modern water-cooled FWD Beetle is nothing like
its predecessor. These VW twins separated by generations share about as much in
common as Arnold Schwarzenegger and Danny de Vito.

The nostalgia continued inside with a painted metal
dashboard and door frames. And I know the original Beetle had a huge spindly bakelite
steering wheel, while the new one has a leather rim and painted centre, but
somehow it just seemed right for the car.
It’s also a bit quicker than the original 25 hp job. With
160 bhp from its 1.4 litre water cooled, vertical four-in-line, this is a whole
lot more fun to drive. And it handles. Maybe there's something to be said for modern after all.
No comments:
Post a Comment