VW is aware of cute. Whether or not it is cute-cute, a la the Beetle, New Beetle and Kharman Ghia, or ugly-cute (see: Factor), VW has been there and executed that. However even when the division of labor between enjoyable and performance has been fairly clear (say, Beetle vs. 2-Door Golf), there has not often been as stark a distinction has the one which developed in Volkswagen’s van lineup. When in comparison with the likes of the unique Kind II, among the firm’s passenger vans have the charisma of chilly gravy.
With the ID. Buzz and its gasoline equal trending again towards sunshine-and-rainbows, we would wish to take a step and keep in mind a number of of VW’s homelier homes-on-wheels. Whereas we may plumb the depths of the corporate’s European industrial again catalog in quest of the boring and displeasing, we would somewhat persist with the vans you may really see on the highway right here within the States. And whereas they might not be profitable any magnificence contests, most of those people-movers have their virtues — and their very own cult followings.
Transporter T3 Vanagon
Admittedly, the T2 Transporter was a tricky act to comply with. The T3 (identified right here in America because the Vanagon) adopted a extra angular, trendy physique fashion however retained just about all the pieces else that made the unique Transporter distinctive, together with the rear engine placement. The above is a U.S.-spec Syncro (AWD) mannequin, which was a bit longer and received a beefier set of brakes.
The Westfalia camper conversion stays common with the #vanlife crowd, which grew in the course of the pandemic, seemingly sparing fairly a number of Vanagons from sharing the destiny of the 1986 Wolfsburg Version proven above proper. It might not have been as a lot of as looker because the mannequin it changed, but it surely actually will get the job executed.
Transporter T4 Eurovan
Not a van. Not a minivan. Simply … Euro. If earlier Transporter variants had been bizarre, the Eurovan was someway made weirder by Volkswagen’s try to current a extra standard, trendy cargo automobile. Gone was the under-floor, rear-mounted, air-cooled engine; the brand new water-cooled mills resided up entrance. When it was first launched, it was concurrently too small to compete with the everyday American cargo vans of the early Nineteen Nineties and too massive to be thought of by these searching for American minivans. VW yanked it from its U.S. lineup for half a decade earlier than reintroducing it with the coveted VR6 engine, but it surely remained a distinct segment different to a phase slowly being cannibalized by the rising recognition of SUVs.
Routan
Nope, not a Transporter! Not even a VW. The Routan was in reality a Chrysler from prime to backside — albeit with out Chrysler’s killer Stow ‘n Go seating system. Whereas Volkswagen did have some flexibility in ultimate particulars of the Routan’s inside, this American-built minivan was badge engineering within the purest sense. If VW’s executives believed being extra American would preserve its minivan immune from the crossover revolution of the 2000s, the Routan disabused them of that notion. America hasn’t seen a Volkswagen van since. Till now, after all.
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