Junkyard Gem: 1970 Volkswagen Beetle Convertible
The primary new Volkswagen Beetles went on sale in the United States in 1949, cable-operated brakes and all, and People may purchase brand-new air-cooled Beetles right here till the very last 1979 convertibles drove off the showroom flooring. Volkswagen of America’s best period for Beetle sales was 1968-1970, with properly over 350,000 models offered every year, and as we speak’s Junkyard Gem is a once-cheerful Type 1 Convertible from the time of that VW high-water mark, present in a Nevada self-service car graveyard final fall.
At first look, I assumed this was a Sawzall roadster, with its roof sliced off utilizing a reciprocating noticed and/or slicing torch in some back yard. In actual fact, it’s one of many 11,432 real factory-built 1970 Beetle convertibles offered in america.
These vehicles are a lot in demand by fanatics, and good ones can fetch real money. This one, nevertheless, spent many years sitting outside within the Nevada excessive desert with no high, and it could want a firehose of money sprayed onto it to even method good.
The inside has an interesting assortment of animal feces, not less than within the areas the place the flooring weren’t utterly dissolved by rust.
The physique itself isn’t so rusty, however air-cooled Volkswagens get nasty floorpan rust even in dry areas.
The unique Bendix Sapphire XI radio continues to be within the sprint. 1970 was a great year for pop music that sounded pretty good on a single-speaker AM radio.
These aftermarket slotted magazine wheels have been the recent Beetle ticket within the Seventies. Word the utterly decayed rubber.
The engine within the 1970 Beetle was an air-cooled boxer-four displacing slightly below 1.6 liters and generating 65 horsepower. The horrible “Automatic Stick Shift” transmission was now not out there within the U.S.-market Beetle for 1970, so the one transmission you could possibly get on your VW convertible that 12 months was a good old four-on-the-floor manual.
This may occasionally or is probably not this automotive’s unique engine (air-cooled VW engines are likely to get swapped as steadily as some individuals change their socks), however all these years sitting outside with no carburetor have seized it good and strong. When one in every of these engines can nonetheless be turned by hand within the junkyard, it tends to get bought immediately.
Sharp-eyed readers might have seen that this automotive has a generator as a substitute of the newfangled (and much simpler) alternator that almost all producers started utilizing practically a decade earlier. A minimum of VW was utilizing 12-volt electrical techniques by 1970, as a result of 6-volt automotive life is depressing.
We’ll by no means know if this automotive had 75,596 miles or 375,596 miles on the finish.
The MSRP for this automotive was $2,249, or about $17,800 in 2023 {dollars} (the common Beetle sedan was a mere $1,839, or $14,555 after inflation). You’d suppose there’d be no manner for anybody else to promote a less expensive convertible, however Fiat was promoting new 850 Spiders for $2,168 in 1970 ($17,159 now). People may additionally purchase a shiny new MG Midget or its Austin Sprite twin for 30 bucks (237 bucks as we speak) greater than a Beetle Convertible that 12 months.
As I often do, I introduced an outdated movie digital camera with me on this junkyard expedition (on this case, a 1950s Pho-Tak Foldex 30) and snapped a photograph of this automotive with the Sierras within the background.
Come benefit from the open street.
How lengthy will that 1600 engine final?
Hashtags: #Junkyard #Gem #Volkswagen #Beetle #Convertible
Keep Tuned with worldtechpower.com for extra Business news.