The Volkswagen Golf Mk1 is the first generation of a small family car manufactured and marketed by Volkswagen. It was noteworthy for signalling Volkswagen's shift of its major car lines from rear-wheel drive and rear-mounted air-cooled engines to front-wheel drive with front-mounted, water-cooled engines that were (often) transversely-mounted.
Successor to Volkswagen's iconic Beetle, the first generation Golf debuted in Europe in May 1974 with styling by Giorgetto Giugiaro's ItalDesign.
Video Volkswagen Golf Mk1
History
Replacing the Beetle; early efforts
Volkswagen began producing prototypes of possible Beetle replacements as far back as the early 1950s, and may have received design proposals from Porsche earlier than that. All of the internal projects' names started with "EA", standing for "Entwicklungsauftrag" and meaning "Development assignment". This work began during the tenure of Heinz Nordhoff, who was Director General of Volkswagen from 1948 to 1968.
In 1952 the company built the EA41 in collaboration with Pininfarina. Essentially a rebodied Beetle, it never went into production.
The first EA47 prototype appeared in 1953; at least 11 more EA47 variations were built over the next three years.
By the mid- to late-1950s questions about the future of the Beetle began to be asked from outside the company. In 1957 an article with the title "Is the Volkswagen dated?" appeared in the West German magazine Stern. Two years later a similar headline was used in an article in Der Speigel weekly news.
In 1958 Porsche began a project numbered 728 for a revised Beetle. A few years later this became the Volkswagen EA53. This project continued for a number of years and produced several prototypes, with early ones having bodywork designed by Porsche and later ones styled by Ghia. The EA53 eventually led to the Type 3 model.
In 1957 another design study, the EA97, was started. This exercise was larger than the Beetle, but kept the usual rear-mounted powertrain. 200 instances of this design were built. Styling varied, depending on whether a particular car's bodywork was done by VW or by Ghia. Some cars looks echo the later Type 3 cars, although the EA97 was smaller. The last EA97 was built in 1960. The EA97 would provide the basis for the Brasília model from Volkswagen do Brasil.
The EA158 was a Beetle-successor project that started in 1962 with a unibody study by Pininfarina. As the project progressed the car grew in size and weight. Eventually it was rejected as a Beetle replacement, but served as the foundation of the subsequent 411 model.
In 1967 another set of prototypes for possible Beetle replacements appeared in the form of the EA235 and EA235a.
In 1968 the last internal prototype for a Beetle replacement built under Nordhoff's direction appeared. This car, designated EA276, was a small three-door hatchback with front-wheel drive using a front-mounted Volkswagen air-cooled engine. The EA276 program was cancelled after the death of Nordhoff, but did find new life as the inspiration for the Brazilian Gol.
During Nordhoff's time VW did broaden their product line with the launch of the VW 1500 in 1961, and the 411 in 1968. In 1964 the company acquired control of the Auto Union group from Daimler-Benz and with it the technologies of the constituent companies of DKW, Horch, Audi and Wanderer.
Corporate changes and later prototypes
Kurt Lotz succeeded Nordhoff as Director General of Volkswagen from 1968 to 1971. Work to broaden the product line and find a replacement for the Beetle accelerated. Under Lotz Volkswagen acquired control of NSU in 1969. NSU was subsequently merged into the Auto Union group. One outcome of this acquisition was that the K70 mid-sized front-wheel drive car that had been under development at NSU would reach the market, not as an NSU, but as the Volkswagen K70.
In 1968 another development project started named EA266. This project originated with Porsche, where it began as an internal project as early as 1966. This unusual design used a rear mid-engine, rear-wheel-drive layout with a water-cooled inline four cylinder engine laid over on its side and mounted longitudinally under the floor of the rear of the passenger compartment.
In 1969, one year after the start of work at Volkswagen on the EA266, another project named EA337 was commissioned. This project would draw on engines and front-wheel drive technology from the Audi division of Auto Union.
Difficult times
In the late 1960s and early 1970s Volkswagen started to face more serious challenges, although the company did continue to prosper for a time. In 1966 it built almost 1.5 million automobiles and reported net profits of DM300,000,000. By 1967 however domestic sales had fallen to 370,000 units from a high of 600,000 units in 1965. A government-backed economic stimulus package was able to produce a rebound in sales. Beetle exports to the United States went from 232,550 in 1963 to 423,008 in 1968.
Local competitors Ford and Opel had launched new small car models targeted directly at Volkswagen's traditional market. Volkswagen's share of the German domestic car market dropped from 45 percent in 1960 to 26 percent in 1972.
Profits fell from a high of DM330,000,000 in 1969 to DM12,000,000 in 1971, mainly due to slumping Beetle sales and R&D costs.
In 1971 the United States' government ended international convertibility of the US dollar to gold in what is termed the Nixon shock. One outcome of this was that the Deutsche Mark rose 40 percent against the US dollar in 1971. This, combined with a 10% import duty on cars entering the US, caused Beetle sales to plummet in what had become a critical market for Volkswagen. In 1973 the OPEC oil crisis hit, triggering a global recession. The German government responded with emergency measures banning private car use on certain days of the week and comprehensive speed limits.
In 1972 Opel's share of the German market rose to 20.4%, making them Germany's largest automobile manufacturer and overtaking Volkswagen in their domestic market.
In 1972 the Center for Auto Safety published "Small--on safety: the designed-in dangers of the Volkswagen", which examined the safety deficiencies of the Beetle just as Ralph Nader's earlier book "Unsafe at any speed" had done for the Chevrolet Corvair.
All of the foregoing combined to result in Volkswagen posting a DM807,000,000 loss in 1974. In the same year Volkswagen of America alone posted a DM200,000,000 loss.
Rudolf Leiding replaced Lotz as Director General of Volkswagen from 1971 to 1975. Commenting on the situation at Volkswagen as he found it, Leiding said: "The global situation for VW was more critical than we had once thought - to put it simply, we were dealing with the survival of a giant group, which employed more than 220,000 people worldwide ..."
Two weeks after assuming the directorship, Leiding stopped work on the Porsche-designed EA266 and ordered all but two of the 50 prototypes built to that point to be destroyed. Focus shifted to the EA337.
Maps Volkswagen Golf Mk1
Model history
In 1969 Lotz and Italian Volkswagen importer Gerhard R. Guempert visited the Turin Auto Show. After selecting their six favourite cars of the show, they discovered that four of the six were designed by Gioretto Giugiaro and his Italdesign studio.
Giugiaro was invited to Wolfsburg in January 1970 to work on development project EA337. The design brief provided by Volkswagen specified a C-segment car with a two-box body in three- and five-door versions. The client also provided Giugiaro with the basic dimensions and the powertrain options.
Giugiaro produced a design that reflected his signature "origami" or "folded-paper" style, emphasizing sharp corners and flat planes. Giugiaro would come to consider the Mk1 Golf the most important design of his career. Early prototypes included rectangular headlamps and wide tail-lamp assemblies. At least one pre-production car was modified with a sliding side door.
During development, candidates for the name of the new car included "Blizzard" and "Caribe", but these lost out to the final choice of "Golf". The origin of the name is variously attributed to the game of golf, the Gulf Stream current (German "Golfstrom") or the name of a horse.
The Golf Mk1 received VW model designation Type 17. The car entered production early in 1974. By this time Giugiaro's rectangular headlamps and wide tail-lamps had given way to round headlamps and much narrower rear lamps. On these earliest cars the lower horizontal bodyline running under the tail-lamps on the rear hatch was dropped down in the location of the rear license plate. This feature has been dubbed "Swallowtail" by some Golf enthusiasts. The surface between the raised sides on the bonnet on early cars also blended smoothly into the leading edge.
The Golf was not the first example of of Giugiaro's work for Volkswagen to reach production. His design for the first generation Passat was released in 1973, and the first generation Scirocco, a Giugiaro design prepared concurrently with the Golf, was released months ahead of the Golf.
The right-hand drive Golf went on sale in Britain in October 1974. For the 1975 sales year it was the 14th best selling car in Britain with more than 19,000 units sold. In 1981 the face-lifted Golf GTI was voted Car of the Year by What Car? magazine, ahead of all-new models like the Austin Metro and MK3 Ford Escort. In its final sales year of 1983 it sold more than 25,000 units and was Britain's 14th best selling car despite being almost 10 years old.
In the North American market from 1975 to 1984 the Mk1 Golf was sold as the Volkswagen Rabbit. In Mexico the company revived one of the early name options and sold the car as the Volkswagen Caribe.
Air conditioning became available as an option on the domestic market in August 1975. The ability to retrofit the system, together with installing a larger battery, was offered to owners of existing cars.
In December 1975 a minor styling revision deleted the Swallowtail line on the rear hatch, replacing it with a simple straight horizontal body-line. The bonnet also received a transverse line connecting the two raised sides across the front edge of the panel.
The Golf was introduced to Japan in 1975, and was imported by Yanase dealerships in Japan. Its exterior dimensions and engine displacement were in compliance with Japanese Government dimension regulations, which helped sales.
The Golf Mk1 was runner-up for European Car of the Year in 1975, losing to the Citroën CX.
The Golf Diesel appeared in late 1976 with performance very similar to that of the petrol-fueled 1100 cc model.
A minor exterior revision in December 1978 replaced the narrow front and rear bumpers with moulded units that wrapped around the sides of the car. Another minor facelift in 1980 saw the adoption of wider rear lamp clusters and a new dashboard with a more modern-looking instrument display featuring LED warning lights. US versions also received rectangular headlights. This was the last major update before the MK1 was replaced by the MK2 Golf in most markets in September 1983 and in the British market in March 1984.
The Golf was West Germany's best selling new car for much of its production life, and was among the most successful cars in the whole of Europe during its nine-year production run.
Technical Data
Mk1 Derivative models
Golf Diesel
A Golf powered by a normally aspirated diesel engine first appeared in September 1976. Equipping a compact car with a heavier, noisier and less powerful diesel engine was unusual in Germany at the time, with Peugeot among the few competitors offering a comparable model. The 1.5 litre Golf Diesel, which used fuel at the rate of 6.5 l/100 km (36.2 mpg-US), was one of the most fuel-efficient compact cars of the 1970s.
The diesel engine was derived from the existing EA827 Audi petrol engine. To withstand the higher stresses imposed by the diesel conversion, many engine components, including the cooling system, crankshaft, connecting rods, pistons and piston pins, cylinder head and timing belt, were reinforced or otherwise redesigned. Swirl chambers were added to the cylinder head. In the place previously occupied by the ignition distributor was a vacuum pump for the brake booster. The diesel injection pump was driven by the camshaft drive belt. The diesel engine was no larger than the 1.5-litre gasoline engine.
Early diesel engines had a displacement of 1.5 liters and developed 37 kW (49.6 hp), while later engines displaced 1.6 liters and developed 40 kW (53.6 hp). The noise, vibration, and harshness (NVH) characteristics of the early diesels were still unsatisfactory. When the turbocharged 70 hp diesel engine appeared the turbo not only boosted the power output but dampened engine noise as well.
Golf GTI
A sports-oriented variant of the Golf called the Golf GTI was introduced in March 1975 at the Frankfurt Motor Show.
The GTI was powered by 1588 cc and 1780 cc four-cylinder engines fed by Bosch K-Jetronic fuel injection, which helped them develop a respectable 110 & 115PS (80 kW) @ 6100 rpm and 140 N?m (103.3 lb?ft) of torque @ 5000 rpm. With a curb weight of just 810 kg (1,785.7 lb), the GTI could accelerate 0-60 mph in 9 seconds. Top speed was 180 km/h (111.8 mph).
The 1976 Volkswagen Golf GTI is closely associated with the "hot hatch" class of sporty small cars of the 1970s and early 1980s, but the Golf GTI was not the first hot hatch. Other cars with some of all of the characteristics of this class included the 1971 Autobianchi A112 Abarth and the 1967 Simca 1100 Ti. The GTI's competition included a number of small saloons, including the Ford Escort RS2000. When the Escort switched to front-wheel drive for the third generation model in 1980, Ford launched an XR3 model which was comparable to the Golf GTI in design and performance.
Volkswagen initially built the GTI only for the home market of West Germany, but launched it onto the British market in 1977 as special order only in left-hand drive form, with a factory right-hand drive version finally becoming available in July 1979 priced at £4705 as demand and competition increased. The standard Golf had been on sale in Britain in right-hand drive form since late 1974. The Rabbit GTI didn't arrive in the United States until the 1983 model year.
The Golf GTI was among the first "hot hatches" with mass market appeal, and many other manufacturers subsequently created special sports models of their regular volume-selling small hatchbacks. Within a few years of its launch, it faced competitors including the Fiat Ritmo, Ford Escort XR3/XR3i, Renault 5 GT Turbo and Vauxhall Astra/Opel Kadett GTE.
The GTI became available with right-hand drive in July 1979 priced at £4705 (compared to £3935 for the 1460cc 70 hp GLS and £4149 for the competitor Renault 5 Gordini), when more than 1,500 examples were sold. Although the subsequent recession saw new car sales fall considerably during 1980 and 1981, sales of the Golf GTI reached nearly 5,000 in 1981. This also came in spite of the arrival of a popular new British-built competitor - the Ford Escort XR3. By 1983, the GTI accounted for more than 25% of total Golf sales (some 7,000 cars). In 2004, Sports Car International declared the Golf Mk1 GTI to be the 3rd best car of the 1980s.
GTI variations
Following the upgrade to the 1.8 L engine, special editions of the GTI were sold under different names in several European countries. These models were distinguished externally by a quad-lamp front grille, tinted glass, factory sliding sunroof and Pirelli P 6Jx14 alloy wheels. The interior featured a leather-wrapped steering wheel, internal mirror adjusters and the MFA trip computer system.
The names of these editions, by country, were:
- GTI Campaign (England)
- GTI Pirelli (Germany)
- GTI Plus (France)
- GTI Trophy (Switzerland)
Two additional special editions of the GTI were available in France. One was called the Golf GTI Rabbit. This model was a GTI with some normally standard equipment deleted, making it less expensive than the regular GTI.
The other French special edition, which pre-dated the 1.8 L GTI and was also available in Switzerland, was the Golf GTI 16 S Oettinger. GTIs were shipped from Germany to the Oettinger factory where they received, among other modifications, a 16-valve double-over head cylinder head. The engine in the Oettinger conversion developed 101.4 kW (136 hp).
Golf GTD
Presented at the March 1982 Geneva Motor Show, the Golf GTD combined performance and economy. The car's appearance package and suspension were based on the Mk1 Golf GTI. The engine was a version of the 827 model diesel, with power boosted by the addition of a turbocharger system. To increase the performance of the 1.6-liter naturally aspirated diesel, the GTD was equipped with a Garrett turbocharger with a maximum boost of 0.7 bar (10.2 psi), which raised power output to 51 kW (68.4 hp) and a maximum torque of 130 N?m (95.9 lbf?ft) at 2600 rpm from the 40 kW (53.6 hp) and 98 N?m (72.3 lbf?ft) at 2300 rpm of the naturally aspirated engine. To make this power increase possible, more than 30 changes to the base engine were made, including increased oil circulation, a more efficient oil pump and reinforced or higher quality components. Due to the increased thermal load on the pistons, they were cooled from below by means of oil jets, and the engine was equipped with an oil-to-water heat exchanger on the flange of the oil filter element.
The turbo engine weighed about 8.5 kg (18.7 lb) more than the naturally aspirated engine, and once all the accessories were factored in weight grew by 18 kg (39.7 lb). Average fuel consumption of less than 6 l/100 km (39.2 mpg-US) was possible.
Golf Cabriolet
The convertible version, named the Golf Cabriolet (or Typ 155) in Europe and Canada ("Rabbit Convertible" in America originally and renamed in 1985 to "Cabriolet"), was sold from 1980 to 1993. It had a reinforced body, transverse roll bar, and a high level of trim, and kept the pre-1980 style of rear lamp clusters. The Mk1 Cabriolet is of unibody construction built entirely at the factory of Karmann, from stamping to final assembly; Volkswagen supplied the engine, suspension, interior, etc. for Karmann to install. The vinyl or cloth tops were heavily insulated and manually - or beginning in 1991, electrically - operated, with a heated glass rear window.
The body of the Cabriolet did not change through the entire production run except for a larger fuel tank. The space saver wheel was fitted from the outset in 1978, when pre-production models were built, unlike the saloon which adopted this in 1984. In an attempt by Volkswagen to keep the car's styling current, all Cabriolets from 1988 on were fitted with a "Clipper" kit out of the factory, featuring smooth body-coloured bumpers, wheelarch extensions, and side skirts.
Prior to the 1984 model year the highest standard specification was the GLI, essentially a GTI but sporting a different moniker. It was only in late 1983 with the introduction of the 1984 model that an officially badged GTI version of the cabriolet finally became available.
There were a few special editions of the Cabriolet including the Etienne Aigner, Carat, CC, Wolfsburg, and Best Seller editions. One of them was produced in Italy using Golf II Country engine and transmission by ACM, called "Golf Country Cabrio" and sold as "Biagini Passo".
Rabbit Pickup/VW Caddy
A Golf-derived utility model with a pickup-truck style rear bed was developed for the American market. This Mk1 variant was called the Rabbit Pickup in the US, and entered production in 1978 at the Westmoreland plant. An almost identical version for Europe called the VW Caddy went into production in 1983 at the Tvornica Automobila Sarajevo (TAS) plant in Vogo??a near Sarajevo, Yugoslavia. Approximately 200,000 units were produced at this location until the factory was destroyed in 1992 during the Bosnian War.
Jetta
In August 1979 a sedan version of the Golf called the Jetta was introduced. Essentially a Golf Mk1 with a trunk grafted on, this three-box body style was offered in two- and four-door versions and was targeted at more conservative buyers. In North America the Jetta was a sales success, but sales numbers in Europe lagged behind expectations.
Regional variations
Volkswagen CitiGolf (South Africa, 1984-2009)
From 1984 to 2009, Volkswagen of South Africa manufactured two variants of the Mk1 Golf, the five-door Citi Golf and the Volkswagen Caddy pickup. Earlier, the original Golf Mk1 had been manufactured with petrol or diesel engines.
On 22 September 2006 in order to celebrate the continued success of the Mk1 based Citi Golf in South Africa, Volkswagen SA announced the limited edition Citi R which is powered by a 90 kW (120 hp/123 PS) 1.8L fuel injected engine with a five-speed manual transmission as well as a GTI trademark red outlined front grill.
The 2007 VW South Africa Citi Golf range starts with a standard Citi Golf, in either 1.4 or 1.6 litre fuel injected models. Many variants of the standard version are/were available with different extras packages, which included the Citi Rhythm, Citi.com and so on. The range topper is the CitiRox, also available in 1.4i and 1.6i, made as sportier versions of the standard Citi to replace the previous sports version, Velociti and Citi Life. The later Citi Golfs produced feature modern features, such as a new dashboard adapted from a ?koda Fabia, and minor body "facelifts" such as revised tail-light clusters.
The 2009 VW South Africa Citi Golf range consisted of four new models:
- CitiRox 1.4i and 1.6i
- CitiSport 1.4i and 1.6i
- TenaCiti 1.4i
- CitiStorm 1.4i
Production of the Citi Golf ended on 2 November 2009 after 377,484 cars had been built. The final 1000 vehicles manufactured were a special edition Citi Mk1 with a 1.6i engine. The colors available for the Citi Mk1 were "Shadow Blue" and "Black Magic Pearl".
Volkswagen Rabbit/Golf (U.S.A./Canada)
In 1978, Volkswagen began producing the North American "Rabbit" version of the Mk1 Golf at its Westmoreland plant. Former Chevrolet engineer James McLernon was chosen to run the factory, which was built to lower the cost of the Rabbit in North America by producing it locally. Unfortunately, McLernon tried to "Americanize" the Golf/Rabbit (Volkswagen executive Werner Schmidt referred to the act as "Malibuing" the car) by softening the suspension and using cheaper materials for the interior. VW purists in America and company executives in Germany were displeased, and for the 1983 model year the Pennsylvania plant went back to using stiffer shocks and suspension with higher-quality interior trim. The plant also began producing the GTI for the North American market in the fall of 1982, for the 1983 model year. 'Rabbits' were built in Pennsylvania until 1984. The first Volkswagen Caddy pick-up, based on the Mk1 Golf, was also created at the Pennsylvania plant.
Canada continued to import the more desirable German made Rabbit until the 1981 model year when Volkswagen Canada began to import the US made version.
The original U.S.-spec Golf saw use in a taxi fleet. The Yellow Cab Company of Lexington, Kentucky, bought eleven Rabbits in the late seventies as part of an effort to save money on fuel, estimating an annual savings of $135,000 in gasoline costs.
By 1982 the gasoline powered Rabbit had a 1715 cc engine, an iteration used only in North America, which offered 74 hp (55 kW).
The Volkswagen Rabbit GTI, the North American version of the high-performance Golf GTI, debuted in Canada in 1979 and the United States for 1983. Assembled from parts made in Mexico, Canada, Germany and the U.S. in Volkswagen's Westmoreland assembly plant, it had the same Mk1 chassis, and the same A1 body type as the Mk1 Golf GTI that had been on sale in Europe since 1976, with a few exceptions. Key distinct features of the Rabbit GTI were its squared front end styling, and its alloy "snowflake" wheels. The interior came in red or blue felt and leatherette trim. The squared styling of the front end, particularly the wraparound direction indicator lights, gave it added safety and slight improvement in performance. Under the hood, the engine was a JH 1.8 litre four-cylinder gasoline engine that ran on unleaded fuel; in addition to being marginally larger than the regular engine it also had lightened pistons, bigger valves, a higher compression, and a free-flow exhaust as well as other minor improvements. The JH 1.8 litre was transversely mounted, and it would peak in stock condition at 90 hp (67 kW), delivered through a close-ratio five-speed manual transmission. For 1984 the Rabbit GTI was back, now with an updated engine offering 100 hp (75 kW). In total, 30,000 of these 1.8 litre Rabbit GTIs were built in Pennsylvania.
When the Rabbit GTI first appeared in Canada, it featured the 78 hp 1.5L (79) and 1.6L (80) K-Jetronic engine and wide ratio five-speed transmission. It was initially available in red, white, and black. These Canadian cars were German-built and were nearly identical in bodyshell and interior appearance to the 81 kW (110 PS; 109 hp) Golfs built in Europe. Unfortunately for enthusiasts, the entire driveline and running gear was identical to the other Canadian versions. Five-MPH bumpers were fitted as well as anti-intrusion bars within the doors. The towing eye integral to the front of the European car was deleted as the crashworthy bumper's shock absorbers had towing facilities as part of their design and the car had been crash-tested for Canada with the North American front apron. The car was very attractive but drove no better or worse than a Rabbit of the same era. Only with the arrival of the American GTI was a faster Golf available in Canada, and it was down 22 hp (16 kW) compared to the 1.8 litre Golf GTI Mk1. A small number of European specification GTIs made it to Canada under an agreement with the government that allowed foreign soldiers training at Canadian military facilities to bring their personal vehicles with them. As a result of this, VW made available (for many years) all unique European model parts required through VW of Canada. It was possible then, although expensive, to build a "real" GTI. Some enthusiasts did so based on the reputation of the European car.
Volkswagen Caribe (Mexico, 1977-1987)
In May 1977 the Mk1 Golf was launched in Mexico as Volkswagen Caribe. It came standard with a 4-speed manual transaxle and a 1.6 litre 66 HP carbureted engine. The car was an instant success. Initially, only the 5-door body was offered, but in 1978 the lineup expanded with the 3-door body. Two initial trim levels were offered: "Base" and "L", with the "GL" trim level added in 1979.
The 1980 Caribe lineup remained essentially unchanged except for a slightly restyled front grille with squared type headlamps.
In 1981 an improved Caribe was offered to the Mexican market, with looks matching the recently face-lifted North American-spec Mk1 Golf: the Volkswagen Rabbit. New features included revised bumpers, new taillights and a new front grille design. A diesel engine became an option that year.
In 1983, the Caribe range got an improved dashboard designed for the 1980 European Golf. Trim levels were also updated, with the previous "Base" entry-level rebadged as the "Caribe C", the "GL" level unchanged, and the mid-level "L" trim level being dropped.
In 1984, inspired by the worldwide success of the Mk1 Golf GTI, VW Mexico produced its own "hot" derivative: the Caribe GT. This souped-up version featured a 85 hp (63 kW) 1.8 litre engine with dual-carburetor injection system, rather than the electronic fuel injection of the GTIs.
Close to the end of the model production, VW Mexico offered, through 1986 and 1987, three special Caribe versions: "City", "Pro" and "Plus".
The "Caribe City" was primarily based on the entry-level Caribe "C". It was offered only in Pearl Gray or Turquoise Blue paintwork and featured a distinctive "City" badge.
The "Caribe Pro" was a somewhat downgraded version of the GTI-like Caribe GT. The "Pro" retained the sporty feel of the GT and was offered only in 3-door body, with two paint choices: Tornado Red or Black. "PRO" label graphics were attached to the lower doors and the hatch.
The "Caribe Plus" was the last special edition in the range. The "Plus" had GL level trim, and was offered only in Alpine White paintwork for the body colour and much of the trim, including the front grille and the bumpers (which were of the plastic-molded type sported by European Mk1 Golfs since 1980). The interior's upholstery and carpets were also Alpine White in this edition.
After 10 years of success, 1987 was the last production year for the Mexican Mk1 Golf-based Volkswagen Caribe series. The "Plus" special version could be considered the "Last Edition" Caribe, since it had a short production run before the discontinuation of the model lineup in March 1987, when the whole Caribe range was dropped in favor of the production and introduction in Mexico of the Golf MkII.
See also
- Volkswagen Group A platform
- VDub
References
External links
- Golf at Volkswagen International
- Volkswagen Golf at Curlie (based on DMOZ)
- Volkswagen Golf Mk1 on Facebook
Further reading
- Blunsden, John (1 February 1993). VW Golf and Derivatives Including Convertible, Jetta, Scirocco and Corrado: A Collectors Guide. Motorbooks International.
- Ruppert, James (1 December 1996). VW Golf: With Scirocco, Corrado and Karmann Convertible Derivatives. Crowood Press. ISBN 978-1852239961.
- Schreiber, Gerhard (1998). Eine Geschichte ohne Ende. A Never Ending Story. Una historia sin fin. Volkswagen de México.
- Glen, Simon (10 January 2004). Volkswagens of the World. Veloce Publishing. ISBN 978-1903706930.
- Clemens, Kevin (19 April 2006). Thirty Years of the Volkswagen Golf & Rabbit. Enthusiast Books. ISBN 978-1583881583.
- Copping, Richard (15 October 2006). VW Golf Five Generations of Fun. Veloce Publishing. ISBN 978-1845840204.
- Hayes, Russell (14 May 2014). The Volkswagen Golf Story: 40 Years of the Second People's Car. Behemoth Publications Ltd. ISBN 978-0992876906.
Source of article : Wikipedia
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