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My Background
As a boy, I realized the reliability and function of German engineering from my first car, ever , a red 1976 Volkswagen Rabbit. With over 157,000 Miles registered on the odometer, that motor just did not die regardless of the punishment it took through years and years of year-round stop and go NY city driving
.
This is a photo of me taken in my college years replacing a strut....................and a radiator...and the clutch...and the entire interior...and the carburettor...and the brakes... oy!
The Rabbit was a good design in the fact that its components had less moving
parts. No fancy spaghetti wiring in the engine bay, spark plugs and oil filter
were easily accessible and everything in the car was built with a function to
carry out with minimum maintenance.

My old Scirocco's interior
After years of using the Rabbit, I moved on to a black 1986 Volkswagen Scirocco which I later had repainted a dark green forest metallic. The Scirocco had the same reliable 1.8 Litre block as the Rabbit and the controls were just where you wanted them. Everything was within your grasp at a moments notice. The car was fitted with the teardrop alloy rims usually found on a 16 valve Scirocco that a special buddy of mine by the name of Andrew owned. The rim size as usual, further enhanced the Scirocco's handling. If anyone wants to know the difference between an eight valve motor versus a 16 valve, the difference basically is the primary has two valves per cylinder one input, one output and the latter has four valves per cylinder, two input valves and two output valves for each cylinder. (More output, hence more power) Moreover, the 16 valve engine tends to have a powerband when the engine is run at high RPM and can continue to accelerate even when a regular engine would run out of breath.
German engineering. What else would you depend on?