[jjbrouwer]

The last original VW Beetle rolls off the assembly line.

[RedBloodedAmerican]

My first car I owned was a '62. Then had a 63, a 69, 74 and 82 (last 3 were Westfalia vans/campers). Sad to see the beetle go. They were fun to see on the road.

[RedBloodedAmerican]

FYI

[doodad]

I owned a 66 and a 67. My first two cars. Amazingly durable POS cars. I loved and hated those cars. Couldn't find the right spring for the throttle on the 66 so I carried a pack of thick rubber bands and when the pedal went dead pulled over and applied a new throttle "band." Hmm...thicker is sportier, but I have traffic so maybe one of the thinner ones. Oh and no heat. My friend called it the rolling refridgerator.

[mewzilla]

Sniff...My younger brother had a powder blue Bug. He tried to teach me how to drive standard in it. Those were the days :)

[smith288]

Where do you find a '03 classic bug? I had no clue they were still manufacturing those ugly as hell things. (flame suit on)

[Libertina]

My first car! I had a 65. Saw it advertised by a banker who liked to work on his cars - sports cars. LOL He asked $600 but for some reason - kindness I believe - sold it to me for $400. :) It drove back and forth across the Washington state for years and was easy to fix. About the only time I had a problem was when I hadn't completely switched over from emergency gas tank to regular tank, ( a cool feature) and it wouldn't start. After I figured it out & turned the switch completely over, off my little car went again. The nice thing about a bug is that if they won't run, you can pick them up and carry them ;) After I finiseded usin the car, I gave it to my brother who painted it red, added aperiscope looking gadget. He gave it rather more of a rough drive, rolling it over numerous times. LOL

[Ed Straker]

My dad fought the Germans in WWII, but he wouldn't drive anything but a Volkswagen. It's what I learned to drive in. Brother-in-law wrecked the red one, so Dad got a blue one, and the brother wrecked that one. Of course, they each lasted about 15 years beforehand...

[rockprof]

My first car was a green 71 super beetle. My most vivid memory of it was how cold it was to ride in the winter because the damn heater never worked. I also almost floated away once trying to drive it over a flooded road. I did learn to drive stick with that car though.

[Range Rover]

Heap scorn on me if you like or be envious...

I still have my last bug - a red 1971 Karmann bodied ragtop with 35k miles from new. My only gripe is that it's that dreaded "Autostick" tranny. Auto clutch. It won't do over 70 on a flat road and it's slow going up hills. After owning a '59, a '63 rollback and a '74 "Sunbug" with a non-leaking sunroof (all of which gave MANY miles of trustworthy service - even floated the '74 across a pond on a bet), the '71 is a pampered family treasure that will see nothing but sunny days and moonlit nights plus the occasional drive-in for the rest of its life.

I get offers every time it's out - some so generous that I wonder if I'm not crazy for keeping it but some things you just can't replace when they've gone.

I don't see where all the heat problems came from. The design was brutally simple - flow air over the exhaust pipe. Sure, the heater boxes rusted if you were up north but they were so easy to fix. All of mine had enough heat to melt a pair of PF Flyers if left in the rear footwell.

The biggest problem with the classic bugs was the floorboards....rust city. Can't tell how many times I heard the "I was just bopping along and suddenly the drivers seat was scraping the pavement" story. With the rest of the car that solid, going totally weak on the floorboard construction made no sense apart from planned obsolesence.

I lost the throttle cable once - snapped just aft of the pedal. Drove it two miles just artfully rowing the stickshift with the motor idling. Some guy in a powder blue bug pulled alongside and yelled "Broken Cable"? We had it rigged with a bent coat hanger in 5 minutes. Drove it that way for a year.

A saying used by Harley fans applied to bugs as well - "If I have to explain, you wouldn't understand".

[FlyVet]

One of my cousins had a Beetle back in the 70's. He was nuts. The sheriff in his town had a beetle painted in sheriff dept colors, that he used for visiting kids in schools, etc. So, my cousin got a brush and some paint, painted the front and back of his black, fenders and doors white, with big black stars on the doors, just like the sheriff. Drove it around. Didn't take long for him to get in trouble with the sheriff...heee heee. Troublemakers, those cousins of mine. His older brother but a bottle of Mr. Bubble in the city park's water fountain. That one made the papers too. Heee heee.

[CWOJackson]

I think people are missing a little known fact concerning the bug. The Germans obviously stole the design from the Japanese. Or were Germans just exceedingly short in those days?

I tried getting into one in 68. It was harder to get off then a pair of too small saddle boots.