2001 Volkswagen Beetle review from North America

I have the crayon smell that is talked about frequently here. Had to replace the carpet and underlayment to reduce the odor ($850). It would literally saturate your body and clothing when it was hot out. I live in Arizona so its hot a lot. The mechanic said that he would have to replace the firewall material to get rid of the smell completely, but would involve taking out the dash. I did not do that yet. I was able to look at the underlayment after it had been removed. Simply touching it made my hand reek with that crayon smell. I would estimate the smell reduced by at least 90%.

The plastic on this car is very, very poor. While removing the carpet the mechanic managed to break the plastic pieces below the upper seat belts attachments ..these are part of the interior panels next to the rear seats. He also broke the plastic panels that run along the running board.

I thought that this was simply due to rough handling until my daughter had the passenger door handle break off in her hand. It's plastic and I went to replace it. I figured new handle, couple screws, no problem. No way, VW has managed to mold this handle into the complete door panel. So, the only way to replace this handle is to get a new door panel with it's integrated handle. The door panel has a separate piece on the top that has been painted at the factory to match the car. Now I have to get a new door panel then have it painted to match the car.

While looking into the handle problem I got to experience firsthand the plastic problem issues. That stuff is just brittle. While GENTLY pulling the door panel away from the door the plastic simply snapped in the panel. This is the same material that the handle is made of.

I have routinely had the check engine light come on. The mechanic said it might be the mass air sensor. Went to msn today and see that VW has extended the mass air sensor warranty to 7 years/ 70,000 miles because so many have gone bad on this model year.

Bottom Line... I'm really tired of problems that should never have occurred. As far as I'm concerned these are VW problems that were never addressed and and I'm stuck with. What a piece of (engineering).

Cute Car/Poor engineering, execution.