The unmistakable shapes of classic VeeDubs. It doesn’t matter whether they were designed and built for transporting people, goods, or both. They’ve all become cult vehicles, with an immense fanbase all over the globe.
I just picked out a few from the ones that were present at the event I recently visited. Anything was welcome there, from microcars to heavy trucks (definitely my kind of show).
1964 Transporter T1.
A three-tone 1975 Transporter T2. Or more precisely, a T2b, the post-August 1972 series.
1978 Transporter T2b Westfalia.
1985 Transporter T3, the only water-cooled Volkswagen of the collection, powered by the 1.9 liter boxer.
1973 Beetle convertible, parked next to a you-know-what-it-is (and speaking of an unmistakable shape).
1969 Beetle. And look what’s arriving in the background…
…this 1972 411 LE Variant. With Bosch D-Jetronic fuel injection, its 1.7 liter engine is good for 80 DIN-hp. An air-cooled beast!
Auf Wiedersehen and happy motoring!
Beautiful images as always Johannes. As you say, every one an icon. My dad owned a T1 transporter in the early 60s, as he started his young family. One of his most memorable vehicles.
The timing of your post is very ironic, in that I was planning a bicycling daytrip in a couple weeks at one of my favourite nearby spots. And I noticed last night, Google Maps captured a couple vintage VW buses at the lock station where I usually park, and start my rides.
This lovely boating lock location in Eastern Ontario, Canada could easily be a scene in The Netherlands. Especially if you rotate it 360 degrees, with all the water.
https://www.google.ca/maps/@44.7025826,-76.2956161,3a,75y,123.67h,82.74t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sNOrymVmp0-y2FGn06I7gcQ!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?hl=en
Nice! A T2 and T3 side by side, no Beetle inbetween.
Cool show, wonder where it was held??
https://www.mijlpaal-hernen.nl/
Nice, I see a couple of old VW vans in regular use lately the traffic here is just traffic mostly from Japan and heavy trucks so yeah I notice old Volkswagens on the motorways and the Curbivore in me notes details and two of them I see at least weekly and thats only in Auckland at my loading destination it gets worse with VW and Commer campers being regular sightings,
We have no restrictions on using classic vehicles here, the only problem being if you are involved in a crash your rare classic becomes a worthless write off someone in Christchurch had their 60s Buick taken out by a police car recently BOF construction V late unitary not much of a contest.
I’m always impressed at how immaculate cars are at your car shows. But then the Dutch were always known for being very tidy and neat. 🙂
The 411 Variant is my favorite today. It’s had its rims widened.
I noticed the rims too. The 411/412 may be a flawed car in a few respects but this example speaks to me.
How peculiar!
My comment was going to be “Are 411s as awkward as they look in photos? I’ve never seen a real one, and so much seems so NQR on paper. Like the rear lights, which appear to have slid off their mounts and melted down to their current too-low position resting on the bumper.”
Just goes to show, as if needed, that one man’s meat is quite off, sorry, is another man’s brussel sprout, sorry, poison.
Not sure what “NQR” means.
There’s a world of difference between the wagon and the sedans, which very much are awkward. Not so the wagons, which I have always found somewhat fascinating and a bit compelling. I’d take one, just for the uniqueness of it being the end of the road for that concept. And I like the idea of having both a front trunk and rear cargo area, like EVs now with their frunks.
The wagons are cool; the sedans are terminally dorky.
NQR= not quite right.
The last two pics, of the 411, provided some missing-link clarity that allowed me to finally solve this old mystery of those small lights on the fenders, above-behind the front wheels. They show white light to the front and red to the rear, and they are indeed front/rear position lights; Americans would call them “parking/tail” lights, even though the red part isn’t on the tail of the car—that’s okeh; the Brits talk about front and rear “side lights” even when they aren’t mounted on the sides of the car as these are.
In markets where repeaters were required, the same lamp in the same place with an all-amber lens was used.
Such a micro item, yet so intriguing. The Germans call them Begrenzungslichter, on the article’s VW 411 the klar/rot (clear/red) combination, evidently.
https://www.csp-shop.de/elektrik/beleuchtung/begrenzungslichter/
…or Standlichter, or Stadtlichter, or Parkierungslichter. Like a lot of deities, these have many names. 🙂
(the linked site misnames the ’68-’69 and ’70-’79 items; those aren’t Begrenzungslichter at all—they’re Seitenmarkierungslichter in the case of the ’70-’79 items; the ’68-6’9 ones are SeitenmarkierungsrĂĽckstrahler)
“Micro item” still stands, but “so intriguing” turns out to be an understatement (Untertreibung).
I have exactly zero doubt there is a German word for thing that seemed intriguing at first, but now seems even more intriguing in light of additional information discovered after the first impression.
Strutenwitzelknätschelöße.
…bitte?
That’s the German word. Very ancient, lost on Google, sadly.
Nailed it! It was still being used by old-timers in my early years in Austria, but it was fading fast.
How does it translate, literally?
It’s one of those incredibly complex and deep German words that expresses concepts almost impossible to literally translate. English is so facile and basic; there just aren’t the right words available. At least not to me.
My Dad’s US Spec ’68 Renault R10 had them, though I never knew what they were for. His previous ’59 Beetle didn’t have them or any other import he owned. Thanks for the info; I always wondered what they were for. It must have also had the US Spec reflectors newly mandated in ’68, I just remember lots of things fixed to the side of the car…they didn’t delete all the European spec items when they shipped it to US (but I suppose that’s better than leaving a hole in the fender where the item was removed)
My ’00 Golf has fender mounted lights, but they flash with the turn signals, not sure why they included them on US spec models, but they’re present. A bit of a pain, the plastic mount clips deteriorate in the hot sun and I come out finding them sprung from the fenders hanging by their electric leads…I’ve replaced the sockets multiple times (I’ve owned the car since new) and it keeps happening. Maybe just should plug the hole in the fender but that too might just get dislodged.
I’ve not owned an aircooled VW, unlike my Father, but when I worked for Hertz in the 70’s one of my fellow transporters owned a 411 (not sure which year). He was an older guy back then, probably around my age now, who took a liking to me (I tend to get along with people quite a bit older than I…though not many of them left) and advised me to not plan to make the job my career. I was midway through undergraduate studies and I assured him much as I enjoyed the job I planned to do other things once I got out of school.
This was in Vermont…wonder if the gas heater worked well there? How many mpg did it reduce from the range of the 411 (a factor in the 70’s in particular since you sometimes had a hard time finding gasoline with spot shortages). Guess I should have asked him but maybe he wouldn’t have known.
Nice shots, and another example of the CC effect – I saw an early Sixties Bug putting past our building in Toronto the other day. With the snow and salt gone, I expect people will be dusting off their old Bugs, Karmann Ghias and Westfalia campers for another season.
DS please. Just has to be, and there’re too many in the Netherlands, proportionally.
The gray ’69 Bug is not a ’69, it’s a ’71 or a ’72. The flat windshield and crescent shaped vents behind the quarter windows give it away. It might have some ’69 parts on it. It’s a hodge-podge of many different years, not that there’s anything wrong with that.