VW Love

The last classic Beetle has rolled off the assembly line in Mexico, 21,529,463 iterations after the first one.

My first car was not a bug (although it almost was); it was a Rabbit. A diesel, four-door, beige Rabbit that I named Fu-Fu The Killer Bunny. I had it for less than a year, during which time it was in the shop about half the time thanks to a cracked engine block, but when it was running it was a hell of a lot of fun -- small enough to dart into narrow gaps in traffic, light enough to be picked up and moved by two or three guys, and a sipper of gas -- $2 of diesel was enough to commute to-and-from school for a couple days.

Besides a common parent, the Beetle and the Rabbit shared an important trait: economy. You could buy either one for next to nothing (in car terms) and run it into the ground. Sure, they were prone to problems -- the electrical systems in VWs still suck -- but nothing overly expensive, since you could rely on parts from junkyards or just put up with the problems. Fu-Fu never had more than three doors working at a time, not including the hatchback, but I didn't care.

Fu-Fu cost $850 used. These days a "cheap" new car is nearly $10 Grand, and you probably wouldn't want a used car that cost as little as Fu-Fu did, unless you're a mechanic. It's a shame that transportation has become so expensive. The Beetle was one of the first economy cars, and it's a little bit of a sign of the times that its run is at an end.

Posted by Andrew Huff at July 30, 2003 02:58 PM