My ’71 Super Beetle – You Always Remember Your First Time

My first car was a baby blue ‘71 Super Beetle, in 1987. It was payment of a debt; after a bunch of us students helped my high school math teacher put an addition on his house. He helped me work on it some too.

It was basic transportation during college, to get back and forth to home and my grandparents’ for food and laundry, and it was fine for that. It was beat, and it was weird. It had the Automatic Stick Shift, which is a very cool idea that had some issues in practice. ASS ran off the vacuum system, and in an older car rubber hoses aren’t always in great shape, so I was always chasing down leaks. When it worked, it worked fine. No clutch pedal; grab the stick and wait a second for the system to notice, and then move to the appropriate gear.

Other lines had issues too; the washer fluid ran off air pressure from the spare tire, so you had to keep it full for everything to work (and had to have a useful spare). Once I forgot to put a screwdriver in my toolbox in the “frunk” –we never called it that back then– and it bounced around and pierced the washer fluid line, leading to blue moisture up front. Another time, while on the far side of town, I pushed the brake pedal and it went all the way to the floor. Got it home by driving slowly, downshifting often, and occasionally dragging my foot out the door like Fred Flintstone. Got it to a shop where they replaced the bad line, then whenever they tested it, the rest of the lines blew out one by one. A major expense for a broke student, but the shop worked with me (and is still around and community-oriented 40 years later).

The Beetle was a good car. Bigger inside than you’d think, plenty of headroom and legroom. More heat got to the driver than in the Bus I had a few years later. Overheated in hot weather if in traffic; it was an old aircooled car, after all, and without a little motion, it was not happy. I started learning how to fix things, change oil, etc., and I still have a few parts as souvenirs. I learned of all the sources, and relative quality of Germany, Spain, Brazil, spares and more. I learned to carry spare parts. I liked that I could get a little stool and sit right behind the engine and work.

The wipers went out on a road trip; I found I could reach out the side window and move them back and forth on the flat windshield fairly easily, which got me to where I could look at the issue. Turned out to be a washer clip holding the wiper to the motor. Easy fix.

Harder to fix was the rot. Small patches I could take care of. But the underside was rusting away. I took it to a cheap shop and they welded things together to get me by. It was clunky looking and heavy, but sturdy.

Behind my uncle’s limo- he had a side gig in his spare time from being a firefighter.

 

On the road it was… slow but steady. Susceptible to crosswinds, whether from a semi or just wind. Once, atop an overpass in northwestern Ohio in the winter, the wind pushed me from one lane into another before I could correct by turning the wheel hard over. Luckily, no one was beside me.

You’ve heard they float? They do. Part of the time, I worked mornings, driving to work at 5 am in the dark. At one point my route went under a railroad overpass, and one morning rain from earlier had filled up the depression. I didn’t see it till too late, hit it at 35mph, and plowed right across with the wheels off the road, thankfully having enough momentum to get to the other side. Didn’t even have any wet spots inside, and just drove on to work.

When I got another car for a trip across the country, I sold it to another student for $100. He asked, “Why so cheap?” and was suspicious. I had gotten it essentially for free, not put a huge amount of money into it, and didn’t need it anymore. I told him everything that was wrong with it and what had been repaired. I hope it served him well.

 

Related CC reading:

Curbside Classic: 1966 VW 1300 – The Best Beetle Of Them All; Or At Least The Sportiest

Curbside Classic Driving Review: 1969 VW Beetle – Still A Viable Driver?

Curbside Classic: 1946 Volkswagen 1100 (Type 11): The Beetle Crawls Out Of The Rubble