Thursday, July 19, 2012

Junkyard Find: 1973 Volkswagen Super Beetle

I see many air-cooled Beetles in self-service wrecking yards these days. In fact, I have always seen many VW Type 1s in self-service wrecking yards, going back to my first junkyard adventures in early-80s Oakland. Like any car freak who came of age in that era, I've owned some old Beetles, and I can say from experience that there was nothing super about the Super Beetle. In fact, it's possible that this '73 is the Super Beetle that I sold in 1983.
I got my bright yellow Super Beetle for free after one of my mom's coworkers got it stuck between a couple of concrete traffic barriers while driving drunk in Berkeley, tearing off the front fenders and losing her driver's license in the process. I'd always assumed that the McPherson strut front suspension on the Super Beetle would transform the handling from scary to just bad, but in fact there wasn't much improvement over the old torsion-bar setup (other than increased cargo space under the hood). I put junkyard fenders on it and drove it a bit, but ended up selling it for $250 to a couple of drunken sailors from the USS Coral Sea.
This car used to be yellow, too, but since my Super Beetle ended up shot full of holes and on fire in an irrigation ditch near Benicia (according to the cops who found it and called me to come deal with "my" car, the Drunken Sailors not having bothered to register the car in their names) I'm guessing this is a different yellow '73.
This one has all the standard bolt-on upgrades that readers of Hot VWs Magazine, circa 1982, would have installed 30 years back: nerf bars, crankshaft degree wheel, Bosch 009 distributor, and so on.
It's impressive that so many of these cars have hung on for 30 to 50 years before getting scrapped, and I'll need to start shooting more of them in junkyards. The air-cooled Beetle was built for 65 years, which makes it the all-time production-run champion… but the Hindustan Motors Ambassador will pass it in 2020 (unless you count the 1948 Morris Oxford instead of the '54 as the same car as the Amby, in which case it will pass the Beetle next year).

24 - 1973 VW Super Beetle Down On The Junkyard - Pictures courtesy of Murilee Martin 01 - 1973 VW Super Beetle Down On The Junkyard - Pictures courtesy of Murilee Martin 02 - 1973 VW Super Beetle Down On The Junkyard - Pictures courtesy of Murilee Martin 03 - 1973 VW Super Beetle Down On The Junkyard - Pictures courtesy of Murilee Martin 04 - 1973 VW Super Beetle Down On The Junkyard - Pictures courtesy of Murilee Martin 05 - 1973 VW Super Beetle Down On The Junkyard - Pictures courtesy of Murilee Martin 06 - 1973 VW Super Beetle Down On The Junkyard - Pictures courtesy of Murilee Martin 07 - 1973 VW Super Beetle Down On The Junkyard - Pictures courtesy of Murilee Martin 08 - 1973 VW Super Beetle Down On The Junkyard - Pictures courtesy of Murilee Martin 09 - 1973 VW Super Beetle Down On The Junkyard - Pictures courtesy of Murilee Martin 10 - 1973 VW Super Beetle Down On The Junkyard - Pictures courtesy of Murilee Martin 11 - 1973 VW Super Beetle Down On The Junkyard - Pictures courtesy of Murilee Martin 12 - 1973 VW Super Beetle Down On The Junkyard - Pictures courtesy of Murilee Martin 13 - 1973 VW Super Beetle Down On The Junkyard - Pictures courtesy of Murilee Martin 14 - 1973 VW Super Beetle Down On The Junkyard - Pictures courtesy of Murilee Martin 15 - 1973 VW Super Beetle Down On The Junkyard - Pictures courtesy of Murilee Martin 16 - 1973 VW Super Beetle Down On The Junkyard - Pictures courtesy of Murilee Martin 17 - 1973 VW Super Beetle Down On The Junkyard - Pictures courtesy of Murilee Martin 18 - 1973 VW Super Beetle Down On The Junkyard - Pictures courtesy of Murilee Martin 19 - 1973 VW Super Beetle Down On The Junkyard - Pictures courtesy of Murilee Martin 20 - 1973 VW Super Beetle Down On The Junkyard - Pictures courtesy of Murilee Martin 21 - 1973 VW Super Beetle Down On The Junkyard - Pictures courtesy of Murilee Martin 22 - 1973 VW Super Beetle Down On The Junkyard - Pictures courtesy of Murilee Martin 23 - 1973 VW Super Beetle Down On The Junkyard - Pictures courtesy of Murilee Martin

from The Truth About Cars http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com




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1 comment:

  1. UnknownJuly 20, 2012 at 12:45 AM

    Chevy nerf bars Nerf Bars – Stainless Steel. These great looking Stainless Steel Nerf Bars/Side Step Bars are made of a highly polished heavy-duty 304 stainless steel junkyard so i can easily drive it

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