[Vwdiesel] top speed 82 Rabbit 1.6 NA

[Mark Laplante]

I am sure this has come up before -- I looked through the archives for 2003 and didn't find anything recent other than a snail-like Rabbit and some discussions of top speeds with a turbo.

I just put on some new tires (175/70/13) and now I can go over 65 mph without vibration. I top out at 72 mph indicated on level ground. The only smoke I ever see is a little bit of white smoke at startup. No black smoke visible in the rearview at full throttle. Letting off the throttle a hair didn't seem to cause an immediate slow down -- maybe I am just wasting fuel holding it to the floor? I get somewhere in the mid to upper 40s for mileage. Transmission is 4-speed manual (3+E) -- don't know the code.

Should I be able to get much faster than 72 mph on flatland? (On short downhills I can get to 75 mph). I plan to get out my handheld GPS to see if it differs much from the speedo (after converting knots to mph).

Test runs conducted with driver's window all the way down. Top speed did not seem to be affected by adding an adult and child passengers.

Funny thing is I still have trouble with SUVs and cell-phone occupied drivers not accelerating fast enough for me.

Thanks,

Mark