screw up

When I first started driving I had a VW beetle,back in the day you could pick them up for a couple of hundred,fix the motor,they usually dropped a exhaust valve in #3.You'd drive them for a year,sell them and make good money.I owned 5 bugs and 1 Rabbit that I had bought new.It all ended when we bought a 1982 Quantum.Nice car when it was well,most of the time it was sick.It seemed like every week it was something.At 30k it had a complete new transaxle at 90 it needed another.At below 0 temps the gear lube in the diff would force it's way thru the dual seals and into the auto trans section, then the ring gear would start to self destruct and when the governor drive finally sheared off you were done.All other manufactures used auto trans fluid thru out their system.Air conditioning trouble,harmonic balancer fell off,damaging the crank,fuel injection trouble,front wheel bearings,you name it.I felt that I was the one doing the R&D for them.Never again will I give that company any of my money.Since then we have owned Chevy's, Ford's and Jeeps and never have had the troubles that that car subjected us to.But if you ask the wife what was her favorite car we had,it was that Damn VW!

A friend of mine had a VW diesel Rabbit when I was in high school. He used to put $8.00 worth of diesel in it and it would last him 2 weeks. He used to take the damn thing off-road, beat the F out of it. That was a tough little car. From what I have read VW isn't building a very reliable car these days.

79Tique- I tend to agree with you,I have owned several English cars and have now had my MGA for 25yrs,but how do you maintain sealed front wheel bearings? How do you get the injection system to work when the dealer can't?Who checks the harmonic damper on 30k routine maintainance?None of the dealers in this area are in business anymore that were around in VW's early years,why is that?I agree with boat dr over engineering, in Eric's case their trying to get more power by using turbo's and multi valves when a small v8 would do nicely.

I think every car company has some lemon cars. My Mother had a 1999 For Taurus that was a total chunck of crap. It blew a head gasket at 40k and the transmission need to be rebuilt at 90k Ford's only gave the car a 30k warrenty. My Dad had a 1990 Ford Aerostar AWD 4.0 V6 that blew it's head gaskets at 85k and that vehicle was built so that you can't get the heads out through the hood. The transmission and final drive had to be pulled and the motor dropped out the bottom. When the dealer had the vehicle running again the bill was almost $5000.00. WITH 85K ON THE THING!
I had a 1995 Chevy Turbo Diesel Truck that produced a little over $9000.00 in repairs before 100,000k (not impressed). I know that the 1.8 VWs have problems but they do have some great cars available today, but I no longer consider gas cars an option now that I have had had such long service and efficient milage from our diesels ( not just VWs) my Cummins diesel trucks (Dodge) have proven very good as well.

My point is that every car company has produced some crap motors, but at the same time can have others that are choice vehicles. Our TDI Volkswagens really do get around 50mpg, last for   about 300K and are powerful enough to pull a mountain pass at 90 if you like. I have no brand loyality when it comes to cars but the TDI's have been great for us. If I have trouble with one in the future I will shop for somthing els.

Also if you are looking for good mpg the best I know a small V8 to get is 25mpg. Escorts are dependable and get ok milage but they are gutless slow and if you wreck they don't do much to protect you. The VW cars have 8 air bags and crash pretty well, I have seen it as I'm a volunteer EMT on a local ambulance.

My all time fovorite vehicle for traveling, camping and pulling a boat was a 87 Ford econoline van with a 300 I6 in it. Fun to drive in a strange kind of way, lots of room for a bed and with the 300 it got around 20mpg on the highway. The 302 in my Ski Tique seems awsome! So I know Ford has made some great stuff and some crap just like every auto maker.

They did seem to put out a bit of sulfer carbon when they are cold or idle for a long time, like it would in city traffic, but now that all the diesel is 15ppm sulfer that seems to be gone.
It may be a conspiracy.