[Vwdiesel] best car ever made -- rating by Dan MacArthur

[LBaird119 at aol.com]

> The USA models are no labor of love. ---shitty material shitty fitting  
> shitty paint
> shitty headliners.   And I am only comparing what I got.  I saw a film from 
> Germany
> and they completely submerged the body in a tank of paint. That means 
> painted inside and out. ----Do the do that in America ?   --I wonder.  
> 

  Gee, almost sounds like USA bashing.  ;-)  Having done a repaint on both 
an 80 and an 81 I can safely say that neither car was "dip" painted.  
Maybe some rust proofing but not the paint nor primer. My 81 had 
a pip of rust at the bottom of every paint chip.  Jake's 81 had a pip of 
primer.  Much better there.  The headliners suck but that had nothing 
to do with the factory.  That would be head of design.  Yup, bad design.
There's always the option of doing like Jake did.  Visit the wrecking 
yard on a warm day and find yourself a good, used, early headliner.

  Do I preffer an 80?  Yup again.  Then, I own one but the headliner is 
a big point.  I like the grille better but it's the horizontal lines one on 
mine.  Jake couldn't believe how much better mine handled than his.  
Mine was stock and his was slightly modified at that point.  I tend 
to like the chrome bumpers with lights in them over the wrap around 
fender lights.  83 actually has some advantages over the 81.  Dome 
light and "bolt through" vent windows rather than the "glue on" ones.

  AFIK the 80 and 81 have the same brakes.  Some Rabbits up to 
81 have the ATE brakes, which are a two piston design.  Smaller 
pads but I like them better. Mostly for the ease of changing pads 
and the dual piston rather than one and a slide arrangement.  Heavy 
Mercedes' stop on about the same size pad so I guess size doesn't 
matter.  ;-)

  I also tend to like the 6 bolt flange over the spring clip one.  Yeah, 
I usually break a stud but it's still not that bad plus the flow design of
the manifold and downpipe is so much better over the 81.  It's so good 
that all the "kids" out there looking for a better stock manifold arrangement 

go to the pre 81 setup.
     Loren