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Volkswagen Transporter (Rear Engined).
The Volkswagen Transporter is a car of legend. Born of Volkswagen Beetle mechanical parts, the boxy deliver van became the VW Combi, the flower people's palace on wheels, travelling through Europe, California, and more adventurously India and Morocco; in fact some of them still do. Aging hippies turn misty eyed at the thought. From 1955 to 1976 Volkswagen Transporters were also assembled from kits at Clayton in Victoria, Australia. (The factory was subsequently acquired by Nissan.) The panel fit was not as good as on imported Transporters but the locals went just as well. Volkswagen reports that 77,800 Transporters were registered in Australia.
Volkswagen's air-cooled flat-4 engines have a tremendous reputation for rattling on forever, although oil leaks can be a chronic problem and siezed valves are not unknown. The rear engined layout put the weight over the rear wheels and gave good traction, but it made the engine susceptible to damage from dust drawn into the air intake on dirt roads. Raised air intakes improved matters. Volkswagen's final 1982 incarnation of the rear engined Transporter
had a water-cooled engine which
cured occasional problems with sticking-valves,
allowed closer tolerances for reduced emissions
and lowered noise levels.
It also introduced the - URL:/4WD.html From VW:
Tom Niksch writes: To make confusion complete: In the mid to late 1970's there were first 4WD Transporter prototypes built, based on the Type II, T2 with the 70 HP air cooled 2.0l Boxer. Steyr-Puch was not involved until the Type II T3 4WD (later named "syncro") was developed and manufactured in the mid 1980's A few additions on the (T3) syncro production figures: (source SDP Graz/Austria)
Thanks to Tom Niksch and to Peter Farrer for information. Go to the Syncro-16, front-engined and VW pages |
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