dune buggies and hotVWs

I just can't believe that the holiday season is already here, and the new year is just around the corner. As I write this column, it's the first week of November. I've just returned from the SEMA Show in Las Vegas, and daylight saving time is about to end in California. By the time you receive this copy of the magazine, we will already be in the midst of the holiday season. Are you ready for 2024? There are only a few weeks remaining in this year. The year 2023 was another unforgettable year in Dune Buggies and hotVWs magazine's history. Once again, we started seeing international friends here in the States following the pandemic. I also travelled more extensively this year, covering events in other States and overseas, including…

Gotta Go Bigger Hi Jon, I own a 1968 Bay window passenger Bus and am looking for more power with comfortable highway cruising capability. My Bay is completely stock now, using a 1600cc single-port engine and a stock gearbox. What would you do to satisfy my desire for more horsepower and to reliably cruise around 75-80 mph? Thank you! Thomas Simpson Ventura, CA Thomas, a pretty popular engine for a Bus is the 1776cc. That's stock stroke with a 90.5mm piston. If you run this with a mild cam (like an Engle W-100) and a dual Solex/Kadron kit you could net about 75 to 80 horsepower. That's a big improvement over your single port, and the engine can be pretty reliable. If you truly are wanting that 75-80 MPH cruising…

In late July, I was speaking to the new owner of hotVWs Magazine, Tom Kinney, about Volkswagen events, and he asked if I had ever been to the Shaka VW meet. As you may already know, Tom was born and raised in Hawaii. I replied “no”. I've been to the Hawaiian Islands but never to that show. Tom said, “Oh, you gotta go!” So, I called up my longtime friend Rich Kimball who didn't need any urging to go to the Islands, and the planning began. The Shaka meeting is on Labor Day weekend and is held at Ala Moana Park, right next to the beach in Honolulu. When we arrived, Tom hooked us up with the president of the VW Club of Hawaii, Todd Matsumoto, who very kindly loaned…

Do you think all books about VWs are already written? I don't think so. Even 20 years ago, people said that already, when I wrote my first book. The concept behind it occurred to me by accident. I had seen the spinoff from VolksWorld magazine, named “Keeping your legend alive”. It was a thicker magazine filled with the how-to-stories published in VolksWorld. I offered the idea to my publishing house – I was second editor at VW Speed magazine back then – but they refused. Several months later, I got a call from the publishing house, asking me if I could do a book incorporating the DIY articles we had published in our mag. I told them that we hadn't enough stories to fill a book plus we would need…

As the car show season winds down in the Midwest, one of the last blasts is the Greater Toledo Volkswagen Club's annual Bugfest, always held on the third Sunday in September. Now in its 32nd successful year, this is always a delightful show! One of the hallmarks of a good event is an excellent location. Two years ago, organizers made a great transition, to beautiful Oak Shade Grove Park, home of the German American Festival Society. The GAF Society began in 1966, to bring together all those of German and Swiss heritage. Their festival in August of that year was the first large-scale ethnic event in Toledo, and became a standard for all other heritage groups. They found Oak Shade Grove three years later, and the park has since grown…

As many of you know, I'm a bit of a barn find hunter. I have shared many of my finds with the hotVWs readers and even more on social media and YouTube, and as a result of that, people often contact me when they see something interesting. Truly, some of my best leads have come from random tips from strangers, and while I have at times felt like that gives me an unfair advantage over most folks out there that share the same passion, I'm certainly not angry about it. I am immensely thankful for the opportunities that come to me this way. I like to think that it's a karmic payback for all those years of just being a decent human and treating people right. Sharing the finds with…