Does anyone remember the old VW's that had the early form of a manumatic transmission? My uncel has one, it is kind of wierd, no clutch but you still have to shift it... I think it has 3 gears and reverse. Just wondering if anyone remembers them of can explain the system in better detail to me.

 

Yep, I remember them. Now, it's usually a bad thing resale wise tho'. The semi-automatic sportomatic isn't that popular, but the chrome "automatic" badge off the read decklid is desirable for those sportomatic enthusiasts.

When you touched the shifter you grounded it, so the bug would go into "neutral". Shift gears, let go of the shifter and it'll be back in gear. Or at least that was how it was explained to me.

It's basically a very primitive form of tiptronic trans (or whatever BMW calls it). Porsche also had a 911 sportomatic (1970??), but alot of the old cars have been converted to a standard tranny.

 

Yeah, I'm a VW nut.. I've been working on them since I was 10. The MANUshift tranny in the ol dubs was a hydroically controlled tranny. The motor has its own hydro pump on it that maintains the pressure. There a pain in butt, and I hated um. We used to always swap out for a stock 4 speed manual tranny. It usually took us 4 hours to drop another tranny in it, put the new pedals in, and run the clutch cable. There commonly found on 69 + super beetles.

 

My Dad has some old VW sitting behind his house that he's kept since he was a kid. I think it's a 52 or so. It has a terrible blind spot in the rear. I think he's selling it for a couple hundred but I bet he could get more if he did a conversion to a bigger back window.

 

my uncle's neighbor has a beetle that he drags... it runs 10s N/A... crazy little orange beast.

 

Holy Crap! Is that smaller window an OVAL window? He could get some serious $$$ for that! DEF. Don't change it. I've got a 65, I wish it was a 50's model. I've got 50's style tail lights (hella snowflakes) that I paid over 200 bucks for, you can imagine what a 50's dub itself is worth.