Welcome back to Shitbox Showdown! I’m writing this on Sunday evening from drizzly Portland, Oregon, after having spent the day installing new flooring in my basement, rather than from sunny southern California, basking in the afterglow of what I’m sure was an absolutely epic car show at Galpin. It’s all right. I’m not mad, just disappointed. But whatever. I have something they don’t have – a line on two cool little diesel-powered pickup trucks for sale. But before we get to those, let’s check the final tally from Friday’s bad ideas:
Unsurprisingly, the running and driving project won out over the incomplete basket case. That’s probably the right call. But I do hope that LaDawri finds its way to the right owner who will finish it up the way it always should have been.
Now then: For a while in the 1980s, not only did nearly every automaker offer a genuinely compact pickup truck, most of them offered them with the option of diesel power. This option didn’t find many takers; small trucks were generally pokey to begin with, and diesel engines, while they did wonders for fuel economy, didn’t exactly help in the horsepower department. But the buyers who did choose them really seemed to love them, and hung on to them forever, racking up the miles one long slow freeway on-ramp at a time. These days, it’s impossible to find a small diesel truck like these with fewer than 200,000 miles showing on the odometer, and I’ve seen some with a 3 or a 4 in the first digit. Slow and steady wins the race, they say. Let’s see which one of these is the winner.
1981 VW Rabbit Pickup – $4,750
Engine/drivetrain: 1.6-liter turbodiesel overhead cam inline 4, five-speed manual, FWD
Location: Vancouver, WA
Odometer reading: 281,000 miles
Runs/drives? Yep
Volkswagen’s entry to the small truck market was a unibody ute based on the first-generation Golf, sold here of course as the Rabbit. As such, this truck is front-wheel-drive –an uncommon layout for a truck. The only other small pickup driven by its front wheels at the time was Chrysler’s L-body-based Dodge Rampage and Plymouth Scamp. VW Rabbits offered the option of diesel power, so the pickup (also sometimes known as the Caddy) did as well. In fact, most of the pickups I’ve seen are diesels.
From the factory (VW’s Westmoreland plant in Pennsylvania, to avoid the “Chicken Tax”) this truck would have come with a 1.5-liter engine good for around 48 horsepower. It’s not quick. You could listen to the whole intro to “Blitzkrieg Bop” before reaching sixty miles per hour. Add a load in the bed, or a bit of an incline, and you’d probably make it through the first verse. This one has a bit more “hey ho, let’s go” under the hood from a later 1.6-liter turbodiesel, but I bet it’s still pretty leisurely.
The Achilles heel of this era of Volkswagens has always been rust, and this truck does have some. The seller claims there’s nothing “serious,” but those rocker panels look pretty ugly to me. A closer inspection is warranted, I think. The paint is still shiny, at least, though it’s missing the caps on the front bumper. Not a big deal – just take it off; these look pretty cool without bumpers.
Tiny and front-wheel-drive though it may be, this is a real pickup truck, with a payload capacity of 1,100 pounds. You can use it to do truck stuff, just like any Ranger or S-10, and you’ll get forty miles a gallon doing it. You just need to be patient.
1982 Chevrolet LUV – $3,500
Engine/drivetrain: 2.2-liter diesel overhead cam inline 4, five-speed manual, RWD
Location: La Pine, OR
Odometer reading: 245,000 miles
Runs/drives? Indeed
The LUV, of course, isn’t a Chevy at all. It’s a rebadged Isuzu truck, known in some markets as the Isuzu Faster. That moniker is even more ill-suited to this particular truck, powered by a naturally-aspirated 2.2-liter diesel making 58 horsepower. It’s faster than, say, a bulldozer, or maybe a 2CV, but that’s about it. The second-generation LUV lost the charming ’70s styling of the original, becoming boxier and smoother. It’s still a good-looking little truck, but I like the early one better, personally.
The LUV is a conventional body-on-frame design, with a longitudinal engine driving the rear wheels, like most other trucks. Four-wheel drive was available on the LUV, but not with a diesel, I don’t think. This one looks like a pretty basic truck, with a bench seat, rubber floors, and dog-dish hubcaps. The owner claims to be an old guy, and this feels like an old-guy truck, the sort of truck that has seen many fishing trips and hauled lots of mulch home from the local hardware store.
This truck runs and drives well, and has recently received new brakes and shocks, as well as a new water pump and alternator. The seller notes that it needs new tires, but they should be cheap. That’s sort of the beauty of a little truck like this; it’s cheap and easy to keep it on the road. And at 35ish miles per gallon, fueling it won’t cost you an arm and a leg either.
It also comes with a topper on the bed, which I’ve never particularly liked – I know it offers a dry place to carry things when it’s raining, but it also reduces rearward visbility drastically. The nice thing is that they’re usually either just clamped or bolted on, and an aluminum topper like this one is pretty lightweight, and easy for you and a buddy to take off and reinstall.
So there they are, two little diesel-powered trucks. They won’t get you anywhere very fast, but they will get you there. One is a traditional rear-drive truck, and the other is a front-driven ute based on a hatchback. Which one is more your speed?
(Image credits: Craigslist sellers)
A kid in our neighborhood had a Rabbit diesel truck like this. I would see him coming out of the nearby high school everyday. I loved seeing that thing, it was so small! Alas, a large VW SUV tried to make a left turn in his path and the little V-dub was crumbled badly. The kid is fine, but I don’t think the little truck will survive.
To quote my old man, neither of these would pull a greased string out of a duck’s butt.
“Those other trucks couldn’t tow a salmon upstream”
Brought to you by the legendary Ferd F-teenthousand video.
It’s old, gold and ready to roll. That Rabbit shreds harder then Eddie Van Halen trying to get to laid. Put some respect on that wipe. That CY or whatever they swapped in probably makes 58 horsepower! Yeah you’re getting beaten off the line by scooters. But you drive this to be seen, and they’ll see you doing about 10 under in the left lane.
> That Rabbit shreds harder then Eddie Van Halen trying to get to laid.
More like Mick Mars on bad heroin
The seller of the rusty Rabbit heard somewhere that small trucks = $$$ and set their price accordingly. I’ll go with the much more realistically priced LUV.
A rusty VW unibody trucklette? Madness!
It must be LUV, LUV, LUV.
This comment was one step beyond.
I voted VW because even though I have a general rule of “Don’t mess with old German crap,” a Rabbit pickup is one of the few exceptions to that rule I’d consider. They’re charming and cute, for some reason I find the clattery little diesels endearing, and most importantly…
They have MASSIVE amounts of empty space UNDER the bed! The only thing under there is the gas tank, just move that aside and there is so much room to get creative.
Specifically, since it has leaf springs and a beam axle out back, I’d replace it with a solid axle from a more conventional RWD truck and install an electric motor just ahead of it, with the gas tank on one side and a battery pack on the other. Then I’d make it an engineering project to develop my own motor controller to sync the electric motor with the diesel up front, and voila, hybrid diesel-electric AWD mini truck!
Then I get double the horsepower, double the torque, same reliability (if the EV part breaks down, it still has the stock diesel, nothing is changed from stock, and when the diesel does VW things I got an electric backup motor!), and I could switch back and forth between the two if I want.
Dream pickup truck right there. Like a Maverick but better and cuter and more charming. I could even run it on veggie oil if I want and be completely carbon neutral in significantly more flexible ways than a pure EV, with better range. It’d be so much fun 🙂
Head over to RichRebuilds on Youtube. He’s has a VW just like this one that he swapped an electric drive in the front and is now installing a turbo Suzuki Hayabusa engine in the rear. It’s epic!
Yep I’ve been following that build! It’s pretty much the exact reverse of what I’m imagining given that the gas engine is in the back and electric is in the front rendering the bed useless, but I still find it amusing that someone else thought of building a hybrid VW Caddy as well. Theirs is gonna rip for sure.
I think VW was more luvly this time. Those are kinda fun to drive, it has a turbo and it even has a lovely brown interior!
I voted veedub as I have a fond memory of the nearly identical one my Dad had. It was the very first vehicle I wrecked.
I was playing follow-the-leader through the alleys, and blasted out onto a street without looking. I nailed a Nissan pickup right behind the driver side rear wheel. I spun them 180 degrees. Minimal damage to the Caddy I was driving, and a big dent in the bed on their truck.
Also, they were out celebrating their anniversary, and the big box of China dishes in the bed that had been a gift, well, it did not survive.
I was convinced Dad was gonna kill me. Obviously, he did not, but I did have to cough up the money I had saved to go on a marching band trip to fix our vehicle. I learned a valuable lesson from that.
> It was the very first vehicle I wrecked.
I don’t follow? Your dad had a VW and you wrecked some poor sob’s Nissan in your Cadillac.
A VW pickups is also known as a Caddy.
Really? That’s wild.
Even with the rust the Rabbit has a much larger cult following. once the charm of driving super slow wears off, I feel like that could be flipped the fastest. might even make some additional money in say California.
I would kind of like to have the LUV to try out the fry grease conversion though. I feel like the topper and possibly more Agro motor would make that easier to make happen.
I like both. For voting purposes, I’ll take the LUV. It is a very nice truck. It would look great with the truck cap removed (it doesn’t fit the lines of the truck and is just plain ugly) and smaller mirrors. Other than that, I would give it a good cleaning and drive it as is. This could be a cool classic truck for very little money.
I genuinely want to buy it. Why does it have to be 3,000 miles away??? I never see trucks like this for sale here in Florida.
The under powered Rabbit diesel description brought back memories. My friend had a Rabbit, and one day 5 of us took it on a ski trip. We got to the major hill on the highway(nothing major) and were in the middle lane. Well this poor overloaded rabbit slows, downshifts are no help. The next thing we know we have a fully loaded school bus coming up both sides of us, so we all roll the windows down and get the air paddles going. Kids on the bus laughing their asses off as we slow to 50 and they go “speeding” past us.
Luv all the way on this one.
Man do I miss bench seats!
I would normally go for the Rabbit, since I’ve always wanted one of those. But not that particular one, I refuse to buy another rusty car. Maybeeee if it’s only the rockers…but when is it ever “only” the rocket panels with rust?
How can you not pick the cleaner, cheaper LUV? I want it.
The Luv is in better condition and cheaper.
Have driven versions of both of these. Great for around the farm at slow speeds, but absolutely abysmal experience out on a road. I vote luv because it would be easier to engine swap
A few years ago I was doing a road project and we were working in front to a trucking terminal. The yard manager had one of these VW Trucks. It was a diesel, I think ’82. It was the guy’s daily and he was the original owner. The thing had something like 585k on the clock and was still kickin. (not sure if it had a rebuild). You could always tell when he left work every day because you could hear the little thing clattering v-e-r-y slowly out of the yard and up the road every day at 3:30.
Bonus: It was purple with silver/purple ghost flames.
I ignored price, or rather am too out of it on Monday morning to have noticed either, I went VW because they are more quirky, and stand out. That LUV is the most bland, anonymous truck anyone has ever made. Like seriously, scroll back up, look at that grill. If there wasn’t the LUV badge on the fender there would be absolutely nothing identifying a brand, it looks like one of those video game cars the makers didn’t want to pay licensing fees for. I hate bland cars more than anything else, and that is the very definition of bland.
That LUV looks so clean!
I’m going to go with the LUV. Nearly $5k for the rusty VW is a big nope. I prefer the look of the older LUV as well.
That LUV is sexy. Look at that front end; look at that bumper! So clean.
That front wheel drive unibody with shit-hammered rocker panels can go kick rocks! I haven’t seen a LUV that clean since I was a little kid. AND it’s $1250 cheaper!?! This is a lead-pipe-cinch. Only the VW fan-bois are going to pick that one.
LUV is cheaper and less rusty. And look at those hubcaps! Look at that interior! LUV to see it.
Tough call. The LUV seems to be in better condition, the VW has much better aftermarket support. Or at least more visible (what is there for old Isuzu pickups?)
I think you could listen to the entire guitar solo from UFO’s “Rock Bottom” before either of these got to 60.