Customer Reviews

VW Beetle & Karmann Ghia 1954 through 1979 All Models (Hayne's Repair Manual)

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This is a great book for the Do-it your self, back yard, VW mechanic. Information is easy to find and easy to use. This book has full wiring diagrams. They were color coded at one time, but the black and white version is still quite useful. I find this book has much more info than the Chilton repair guide. If I had to choose one manual for my VW, this would be the one.

The 1998 edition (purple cover with hand drawn Bug) was a much better manual. This 2006 edition (dark blue cover with photo of a blue Bug) has had all VW copyrighted material removed. This includes dozens of VW exploded views, wiring diagrams, and photographs. All that remains are some photos that were taken by "Larry's Foreign Car Repair" (see the acknowledgements behind the title page). The acknowledgement actually used to thank Volkswagen of America, Inc. until this edition. Presumably Haynes no longer wanted to pay the royalty or license fees to VW so they stripped the manual. One example of the destruction is Chapter 4, Fuel and Exhaust Systems, which used to be 20 pages and is now 12 pages. Another example: the wiring diagrams are now simplified line drawings instead of the much more detailed VW versions. You can still get useful information from this manual and you can still get the VW content by buying the awesome official VW service manuals, e.g. 1952-57: Workshop Manual: Volkswagen Types 11, 14, and 15 : 1952-1957. But if you want this manual then get the older version if you can, it is much better than the new one.

I own 12 different Repair/Workshop/service manuals that cover My 1968 1500 Beetle and the 1600 engine. This is the manual I read most, when I find a problem. Its well written, has many photographs, diagrams and exploded view diagrams which show You how things go back together after You have pulled them apart. I can't think of any subjects that are missing or not well recorded. I would recommend this manual to anyone owning a Volkswagen Beetle, in any country, LHD or Right Hand Drive.
This manual won't let You down... its great...

Trying to cram too much information to cover many model years can only result in mistakes. Just check out the tune-up maintenance sections. The paragraphs for manual timing and timing light adjustments are mixed together in a very confusing manner. There was no proof reading obviously.

What's worse, when adjusting the valves, you must turn the crank counter-clockwise 180 degrees to get each cylinder to TDC in 1,2,3,4 order. However, this manual states clockwise 180, so the result will be values that are incorrectly gapped.

The do-it-yourselfer should not use this manual as the final word, but rather check many sources on the internet for verification first.

I recently purchased my first Beetle, a 1961 model year. I intend performing a ground-up restoration. I just received my copy of this book and have read it cover to cover. This is a very honest book and offers easy step by step guides in servicing the vehicle and carrying out all mechanical repairs. What it doesn't cover in sufficient detail is any sort of body / interior restoration, but then it doesn't claim to do so. A great book and I'm looking forward to getting my hands dirty.

This book covers VW Bug repairs from the 60s to the 70s. If you own a VW Bug from that period you will find a great deal of relevant information on how to fix your Bug yourself. Complete with easy explanations and clear photographs showing you every step, this is a gem of a book for do-it-your selfers.
There are other books available, some excellent, some confusing and not very good. But the Haynes VW Repair Manual is one of the best. I would still recommend that you have this book on hand as well as one or two other VW Bug repair manuals. This way you can cope with every repair problem from every angle.

THe book is comprehensive but unfortunately the quality of the paper it has been printed on is disappointing. It seems like the lowest quality newsprint type paper was used. For a workshop manual this is impractical and will shorten the useful life of the book - in workshop conditions a manual such as this is subject to exposure to moisture, oils and greases etc and therefore the paper should be of a good standard. It would have been good to have some colour pictures - this would make the technical narrative easier to follow. It would have been better if the cover was a hard cover - for the reasons above.

I personally found this manual to be a little confusing to navigate, i've read other manuals that are much easier to follow. This one will do if you are cost conscious but there other choices out there. As a really good alternative try "How To Keep Your Volkswagen Alive" by John Muir.
This isn't as nearly as technical as this manual but it will give you enough information to fix whatever needs fixin' on your Type I, II, III, or IV.

-19BUG74-

Over the last ten years or so Haynes manuals have steadily gotten more and more generic and unfortunately useless, with that comment in mind this particular manual on the beetle scores as above average. It still has a few weak areas but the other reviewers covered them well enough.

I own a 1967 Karmann Ghia and my dad owns a 1968 Karmann Ghia. We are both very disappointed in this book. I did a lot of research before I bought it, and it seemed to have all the information that I needed. The wiring diagrams are weak, and it does not give any direction for rebuilding any of the components. The wiper motor went bad, and the book only said that it would be easier and cheaper to replace it. Once I opened it up it took me less than half an hour to fix, and that's including the it took my to fabricate one of the parts.
This book does have a lot of good general information (torque specs, type of oil/ gear lube needed, etc.) but it is far from a full restoration guide.
I have never used this book for a Beetle, but I imagine I would run into similar problems