The lure of The Aircooled engine

Anyone who knows me will know my love of all things air cooled.  I'm not talking about al fresco dining here but the amazing concept of motor engines cooled not by water, but by air.

Since I bought my first VW Beetle in 1988 I have been hooked - old aircooled cars are not the most luxurious of cars, but they have charm to compensate.  Heating is either on, or off and usually tainted with the aroma of exhaust fumes, petrol and oil.  You'll always know where an aircooled car has been parked by the little spots of oil it marks its territory with (or more often the case with badly repaired engines a pool of oil).

They are however notoriously reliable, efficient and plenty powerful when built and maintained correctly.

Porsche famously went on to develop the aircooled engines, developing firstly a four cam, twin distributer model for the Carrera versions of the 356, and then the crowning glory of the 6 cylinder Porsche 911 engine which remained in production until the last of the 993's.

There were of course other manufacturers who built aircooled cars, the most prevalent being the Chevrolet Corvair, but nobody got it quite as right as Porsche.

Today there are hundreds of clubs, websites, forums and shows which cater for the aircooled lover, collector or hobbyist.  My favourites are Volkszone, DDK and The Samba.

I currently own three aircooled VW's and still regret the day I sold my beautiful Porsche 356.  I yearn to own an early 911 which are rapidly going up in price but are the epitome of aircooled ownership.

Mark Paine
Meyado
Singapore