Enthusiasm for the VW Derby - the 110% reasonable car
Traumatic experiences accumulate in automotive life, which sometimes even date back to adolescence. A VW derby is definitely part of it. A VW – what? The derby is now forgotten, perhaps rightly so. In my memory it was the notchback version of the VW Polo.
A look at Wikipedia confirms the memory.
And immediately refreshes the events of that time. The Volkswagen Derby, which first appeared in showrooms in 1977, was never particularly popular in Germany. Unlike in southern Europe, where small limousines always found their buyers, here only a few seniors drove off to the Derby.
The traumatic experiences begin with a fire. My first car bursts into flames. I need a replacement.
The sky blue VW Derby
After my Mini fell victim to the flames and I had to listen to reproaches as to what else I could have expected from this English car, I used my grandfather to make the next purchase. He was just as crazy about cars as I was, but with a more rational view of things.
I knew about the rational - and it should have been a warning to me.
The path led to various local car dealerships whose owners grandpa was acquainted with in one way or another. We found what we were looking for pretty quickly at a dealer with different cars.
In the used car lot, right next to an Opel Diplomat, was a sky-blue VW Derby. Coming from first owner, neatly groomed and with a new-car-like interior. A Derby L, with 40 hp, and a very special gear knob that does not correspond to the series. It was transparent, with embedded flowers, which were also blue and corresponded to the paintwork.
My grandfather was delighted.
The sky blue derby would be a good offer.
I didn't see it that way. The Diplomat V8, gold colored with a black vinyl roof, was my car of choice. The price was the same and why take less car per DM when you could have a Heavy Metal V8?
The fronts quickly hardened. The Diplomat was a bit too wild for my grandfather, who used to drive vehicles with in-line six-cylinder engines at most. Too American, and he had had traumatic experiences with Americans. Which he never took off.
On the other hand, I saw myself driving around with the V8, not skimping on the Derby. When you're young, very young, do you want to drive a derby?
Certainly not.
We broke off and changed dealerships.
Enthusiasm for the VW Derby?
In fact, it was difficult even for VW to get anyone excited about the Derby. The design was kept simple, the appeal, if there was one, was not even revealed to the copywriters from Volkswagen.
So the teaching of pure reason had to help. Since Immanuel Kant (Link) was no longer available in 1980, the Paul Frère group tried. Born in France, he was the nation's car uncle, an institution. He explained to the German audience in a boringly serious tone on ZDF Telemotor (YouTube video) how a vehicle works.
For the Derby advertising, however, Frère could only work with reason.
The construction is modern, which is noticeable in the driving behavior and driving comfort. 15,4 seconds from zero to 100 make the Derby one of the liveliest small cars, it can brake ten times and it's pretty quiet inside, says Mr. Frère, who is now running out of arguments and enthusiasm.
In reality, the Derby was a pretty loveless product, the kind that comes about when two companies only care half-heartedly.
In fact, the Derby is actually an Audi 50 that has been beefed up to VW level to keep it at a distance from the Audi. And since even the Audi is not an equipment miracle, but a thin sheet product with wood foil as premium proof in the interior, this applies even more to the Derby. The glued-on trunk didn't make the construction any better either, and the fact that the Derby could have transported many sacks of potatoes and other agricultural products in it is only of interest to buyers in the deepest southern Europe.
The Derby is now one of the forgotten VW models and if you spot one on the street, it's pure nostalgia. But the enthusiasm is still missing.
- Sequel follows -
If you mention the Audi 50 as the origin of the Derby/Polo, you should also say that its roots do not lie in Ingolstadt, but in Neckarsulm. This was actually supposed to be an NSU K50, the successor to the Prinz.
Another “victim” of the Audi-NSU merger alongside the K70 and the Ro80, which survived after some back and forth because there was a gap in the VW model range below the Golf, which VW also wanted to fill because of the small car trend.
My brother had a silver Derby in the early 80s that always had problems with the ignition. So new candles, plugs, cables and distributors. The engine purred like a kitten again. Full of joy we drove the car, which was parked in an underground car park between two pillars, outside. At least that's what we wanted and managed about 2m until the Derby got stuck on the pillar with the driver's door open, the door bent and the glass splintered. Unforgettable this noise and our faces. Luckily there was already Kiesow in Norderstedt, where we could get a used complete door.
And after graduation, the three of us toured Europe with the derby in olive green for three weeks. Unforgettable. And then the army.
It's good that this division exists. The VW Derby brings back buried memories. In England they call this type of vehicle quite aptly "aunty car".
And so was he.
I remember the Derby quite well, my aunt had one in the 80's, it was horrid olive green. But that was the only one I actually “knew”. I just found it terribly stuffy, dull and superfluous – it was just the trunk glued to the Polo, which was actually an Audi 50.
Which in turn I found great and exciting, as I was allowed to go on holiday alone to the south of France for the first time as a 16-year-old with him (and my boyfriend and another couple, camping gear and a huge gas bottle - so why do you need an extra trunk?).
Incidentally, I found the Golf counterpart, the Jetta, just as superfluous, boring and stuffy. As far as I can remember, there was more of that than of the Derby.
But if you had known that there were transparent gear knobs with flowers inside (which Tom still remembers 40 years later!!), then of course you would have grabbed it... 😉
Does anyone actually remember the golf balls as gear knobs (is that the correct plural?) in golf? They were in high demand at the time and probably belonged to an expensive special equipment. So coveted that a person close to me recently 'confessed' that they had unscrewed one from a new car at the dealership and taken it with them ... ;-(
These are traumatic childhood memories – you can never get rid of them. A gear knob with flowers. As a result, I only bought a car with my grandfather once, I made all the other mistakes on my own.
Golf ball - sure. Golf 3 GTI 16V with such a gear knob. I remember that. Still, I could never understand the fuss.
That's funny. My first trip without parents (also 16 years old) took place as a passenger in a 60 hp Scirocco already mentioned.
What you have to leave the little Derby with is an amazingly large trunk. Otherwise, their trip with four gas bottles would not have been possible and Wikipedia says that 8 crates of drinks would have fit in. That surprises me, you can't see him from the outside.
It seems to me that in the mid-1970s, Volkswagen built the cars that the nation has been wanting from VW since the mid-1950s. For example, finally a trunk for camping south of the Alps 😉
A real and large trunk, instead of air-cooled rear engines ...
What "the nation" (the VW disciple) forgets (hundreds of thousands of Teutons sink to their knees out of sheer gratitude), there have been modern and functional cars from other countries for many years. Back then, VW really did the trick, despite a number of omissions and a certain technical backwardness, to always generate itself as somehow modern and contemporary.
I think the division of Germany has a significant role to play here. In a domestic German comparison, VW was able to score points for many years. This appealed to many customers and distracted them from competitors. But this is where I finally get bogged down. And yet I am convinced that the idea has a valid core somewhere.
The trip took place in an Audi 50!! As I said, with 2 tents, 4 sleeping bags, some crockery, canned ravioli, etc., some of them on the roof rack. But I was the only one under 1,80 m and my rural friend had borrowed a huge red propane gas bottle (!) from the village blacksmith for the camping stove (!) which was a bomb on my suitcase (!! - I was just inexperienced in traveling and camping ) was enthroned in the trunk - and also had to go back with me.
Nonetheless, four of us stayed in the Audi 50 on the way there, but on the way back we were fed up and bought a pension.
On the other hand, how luxurious were the next two summer holidays that I enjoyed when I was 17 and 18 with the same friend and the same Audi 50 in Yugoslavia and on the Côte d'Azur, albeit only as a couple and without a gas bottle and suitcase, but with folding chairs and a table . Ah, what a luxury! 🙂
I can see it all vividly in front of me, thank you for this trip in two senses
And...I also see a parallelism: the day before yesterday we arrived in Ju...Croatia south of Split on the beach. The 9-3 OG loaded with two sun loungers, a folding table, a parasol, an insulating box and luggage for 14 days. Without folding the rear seat backs.
And to come back to the Derby: even as a child I found it ugly and impractical. Glued trunk hits it. But even the Corsa A was available in this version. Just as ugly.
Yes, that's right, my other aunt had a VW Variant—a smelly, rumbling, rear-engined behemoth. In contrast, my mother's R4 was much more practical. In it, for example, we often transported 2 standing (and bleating ;-)) sheep. The virtually non-existent loading sill made it possible. The Polo and Golf, on the other hand, still had a high loading sill up until the 90s (after that I had nothing to do with VW).
Funny again. I also transported a sheep once. A Dorfalki had pushed himself uninvited as a construction worker and absolutely could not be scared away.
What does he want? A bottle of liquor! Doesn't go in the bag. what else do you want 'N sheep.
How much does a sheep cost and where can you find one? 50 marks three villages further. handshake and go. Unforgettable the bleating in the Volvo station wagon. The sheep commented on every bump...
Was it the rigid axle or the condition of the dirt road? Only the sheep knows that...
I had completely forgotten the Derby existed...
I sat in there at least once. But it didn't occur to me until long after I read it. A fellow student had one of the 1st generation with chrome and a slim bumper - in canary yellow it even looked a little cheeky and sporty. The fellow student is a man of conviction and the Derby is already 13 or 14 years old and has allegedly run 400.000 km. I was impressed, but not infected...
I have always studied VW disciples with a certain distance and was fascinated by their fascination. A fascination for cars that didn't trigger anything in me emotionally. A derby? A lowered and spoiled Golf I with wide tires and diesel? A Scirocco with 60 hp? A loud T3 with air cooling (!) of a rear engine in the slipstream? And the same more. All their owners always explained their cars to me with sparkling eyes and smiled expectantly at me as a passenger. That was really fascinating, but also always embarrassed me latently...
Back then it wasn't vintage cars whose simple-minded charm I was supposed to succumb to, braked on the rear axle only with the drum. No, the proud owner expectation was that I should find these cars, “young” used, cool and share my enthusiasm. I'm afraid I've never managed to fake it convincingly...
I feel the same way. I still can't understand this VW bellwether enthusiasm!
It reassures me that I'm not the only one here with a VW Derby past. Mine was burgundy metallic with tan cloth seats. Not a bad combo but that doesn't save it either.
After that came a black Polo and then a black 900 Turbo 16S :-))
That's a really steep career!
A sky blue VW Derby with a gear knob with flowers. This is simply delicious, my condolences, Tom!