1972 Volkswagen 411 Variant

Hello again! Here's my first post featuring a car from Wilbert's U-Pull-It in Williamson, NY. Back early in October, I took a roadtrip up to Niagara Falls to see sights and friends. On my return trip, I made a pit stop at WilbertW's to window shop, and eventually grab myself a souvenir. But that's for another time, for now, let's get to a car I didn't know existed, but became quite smitten with- the little VW 411.



Coming upon this odd little compact, I immediately took a liking to it. It's just the right size, and the rear-mounted, air cooled VW engine gives it a smooth, grille-less front end that only enhances it's quirkiness. The rear engine also gave this car a very early "frunk" (as much as I hate that word, I think it's my personal "moist"). Ironically, in it's time in the junkyard, it seems to be slowly accumulating engine parts.



Swinging to the back, we can see a hearty assortment of vents, both for cooling the engine and for the car's "flow-through ventilation". The vents in the rear pillars certainly help give it a unique look, and offset the pretty pedestrian looking tail lights. Also visible is the shadowed scar of the car's long gone "VW 411" badging, leaving eons ago in the pockets of a badge collector. However, thanks to decades worth of paint fade and dirt accumulating everywhere but under the badge, it's outline is still clear as day. The 411 was only on sale for four years, but America received it for even less- only two years from 1971 to 1972, when it was replaced with the slightly revised 412. That itself only lasted two more years, puttering out by 1974 to be supplanted by the first generation Passat (or Dasher, for American markets. Hey look, this is Christmas themed!).
I think this technically was a 411 Variant, denoting it as a 3 door estate and not the 4-door fastback sedan. The lack of any scarring for that badge is a little bit confounding, but we're basically doing automotive archaeology here, there's bound to be some best guess dot connecting.



Rounding us out is a quick interior photo. While the dash appears to have been plucked apart by a horde of angry vultures, the period dark blue interior is surprisingly intact, and a welcome sight, personally- not a color you see much anymore. Doesn't look like a very roomy front seat though, which is probably down to the car's era and overall size, even if it was roomier than VW's previous offerings.

This marks only the first of my finds from this yard- but it is a personal favorite. Until next time.




This article was written and published December 14th, 2022. All statements were researched to the best of my ability, but mistakes may have been made. Don't take it as gospel. At the very least, because I didn't mention religion in the slightest! Would be a weird place to find gospel.