VOLKSWAGEN BEETLE 1.6 Luna 3dr (2005)

Iconic, Stylish and impractical.

I had always liked the iconic retro design of the beetle and when the chance of buying one came up I grabbed it with both hands. It was 2 years old and had done 18,000 miles and I knew “he” had been well looked after. I was so excited about getting this car and I was really happy with it for a short while.

This car does have a lot of positives but that will depend heavily on the driver. As I am only just over 5ft I found the driving position quite uncomfortable at times, I had to have the seat as close to the steering wheel as it would go and the seat as high as that would go which meant my legs were squashed under the steering wheel column, this wasn’t too bad on a short journey but on a longer journey it was horrible and I did get cramp a couple of times, and trying to drive with cramp was rather difficult. Carrying passengers is another problem, the head room in the back is really limited and there was no chance of my 6ft boyfriend fitting in, even with my smaller girlfriends in the back there is still a problem, I had to give prior warning when going over any bumps so they could duck down or their heads would smack the roof of the car.

The leg room in the back was also very poor and you could only ever fit 2 in the back. The boot was another let down with this car, in a word it was useless, I never used it I just used to use the back seat and if there was people sat in the back I put the bags on their knees.

The Beetle is all about style and personality rather than performance. I found the 1.6 litre engine rather sluggish and slow and it was quite difficult to overtake. Roundabouts were a nightmare as the cars handling was also poor. City driving was difficult, even though it’s a small car it was quite difficult to park and manoeuvre as the wheel arches stick out I also found the visibility out of the back window quite poor.

In terms of running costs it was disappointing all over again. It seemed to drink the petrol like I would drink wine, I went from spending £25 a week in fuel with my previous car to about £40 a week with the beetle. It was also expensive to tax costing about £180 for the year and the insurance was expensive too.

The car does have reliability on its side, in the 2 years I owned it I didn’t have a single problem with it, saying that the car was only 2 years old when I bought it so I wouldn’t have expected it to have any problems. I also enjoyed the being part of the Beetle club, other Beetle drivers would flash and wave when driving past which I liked. Unfortunately for this car when you take away its looks you aren’t left with much which is why I had to sell it on in the end.