On Fri, 09 Mar 2018 10:42:07 -0500, wrote:

On Fri, 9 Mar 2018 06:01:24 -0600, Dean Hoffman
wrote:

VW is ending production of the second version of the Beetle.
https://www.roadandtrack.com/new-cars/a19155284/volkswagen-beetle-discontinued/
I remember my dad shaking his head at the first version of those
bugs passing us.
Forty horsepower is all they had if I remember correctly.

Close, 36. I had a dune buggy built from a 1958 pan that had 14" cut
out of the middle and welded back together. With the dune buggy body
on it you could go about 55-60 on the highway. If you hopped it up
with the 1600cc "squareback" engine it was more like 70.
Yes one guy could lift that engine but you needed something or someone
to hold it up when you were putting the bolts in. These things also
had the infamous carbon monoxide heater. No real heater fan but they
took some of the cooling air from the engine and routed it back into
the car. They did have threaded fittings on the manifold and cast
iron parts to mitigate the CO problem tho. The only problem was
sitting at a light when the wind was behind you.
Not as bad as the corvair, which redirected the heated air from the
cooling system into the car. At least the VW used fresh inlet air,
blownthrough heat exchangers on the exhaust, to heat the car. Getting
oil or exhaust fumes into a VW that wasn't rested to pieces was pretty
rare.

In a Corvair it was very common (as the pushrod tubes were very prone
to leaking oil all over the exhaust)