Yesterday, I took my 83 Westfalia out for a spin. This is the last of the air cooled, and weighs 4000+ lbs. It's totally stock, and supposedly has 67 hp.

This thing totally keeps up with modern traffic. Road tests of the day said it would do 88mph, which for VWs would also be top cruising speed. I don't do that though. We've driven this thing cross country and it has about the same highway manners as an interstate semi, ie cruise at 75mph on the flats, 3rd gear and 45 mph on big hills. It's actually pretty aerodynamic for a big brick, and it has good winding road manners. In the day you could get it as a microbus, or crew cab pickup, amoung other variants.

I've often thought the planet needs a 100 hp limit - 100 hp in a Lotus 7 or Yamaha r6 is plenty of performance. My GPZ900R has 115 hp, and road tests had it doing high 10s quarters.

Instead we're destroying the planet with 700hp monstrosities and monster SUVs and Pickups.

Feel free to heap abuse, but you know I'm right

 

Hahaha You're just asking for abuse! I will meet you in the middle. I think 400hp is perfect for "Fun" without going straight to jail.

PS your 83 Westfalia is probably just terrible for the environment lol...83 is before my time but did catalytic converters exist back then? What is your ideal "Green" family hauler for 2-3 adults and 4 kids?

... and your wrong...as always

 

most vehicles after '75 had cats. This one even has an O2 sensor

Cars without cats are stinky POSs. Just follow a harley sometime.

I was brought up as a catholic. Families in our Parrish with 13 kids all drove 13 window VW microbusses

 

yes. 700hp needed.

as 997turbocab said, I bet old westfalias and the like are far worse for the environment than a 992 turbo s.

 

I used to have to "drive clean" this vehicle. It blew about the same numbers are more modern cars and well under spec for the year. Catalyic converters are miracle devices.

 

I only have 612 hp and feel that another 78 would make the car more enjoyable, so yes I could use a small tune.

 

Can’t disagree with this sentiment. Increasingly leaning towards cars that are lighter with moderate power.

 

Honestly I always felt that 500 was the sweet spot for power/fun. Now with all the driving aids I don’t see why not 700.

 

yes, slow also fun in right cars too
remember it advertised that 996 Turbo/GT2 were first sports cars to have cleaner air exiting the tailpipes vs the air going in the intake in major cities

 

If you believe that what comes out of the tailpipe of any car is air, I've got news for you. It's a toxic asphyxiatiant.

 

Yes

 

I do not believe an '83 Westfalia can keep up with pedestrians let alone traffic ;-)

Our '98 Defender 110 certainly couldn't...

 

I think the first 911 to have cats was the 78SC, later in the SC series they had the Lambda computer and the first O2 sensor.
Previous to this in the middies ( I believe 75-77 ) they had what they called in the day " Thermal reactors" where they just wanted to get the exhaust hot enough to burn off any contaminants and of course damage the magnesium case they were bolted too. I will let historians argue if they were considered catalytic converters, as i'm not sure what type of substrate they had if any.

 

I prefer vehicles with airbags when transporting all the children

 

These were a total disaster, and I believe have now all disappeared. I wonder if they did this at the time because of the ungounded hatred of car enthusiasts for catalytic converters. I remember idiots of my acquaintance drilling catalytic converters out for the "extra" horsepower