It looks so bare here in the Jimmy Payne VW service department in Memphis, TN; just VWs with guys bending over their engines, and a few tool chests.
Here’s another:
This one’s from Dewey Motor Company, also from Memphis. The sign reads: Customers – Please Wait In Showroom;Â All Shop Work Strictly Cash
Silly me… I thought the guy on the far right in the first picture was on his phone but no, he is holding some papers and the taillight of the T2 is what I mistook.
Who else has replaced their car’s points on the side of the road, set the gap with a matchbook cover, adjusted the timing “by ear” and finished the rest of your road trip without incidents?
That and more, greasing wheel bearings somewhere at the shore of the dead sea, replacing a deiveshaft with one from a junkyard somewhere in Spain, and countless other small or bigger repairs. The joy of older cars!
Yup. Point rubbing block broke on the ’72 bus on cold night in the Sierras with a load of skier friends on board. One held a flashlight while I readjusted the points to get us home.
Changing the clutch in the front yard of an acquaintance in Santa Barbara was a bit more challenging.
Yep, but usually on Triumph motorcycles.
My back hurts just looking at the first photo. Those technicians’ backs would hurt a lot less at the end of the day if they weren’t all hunched over like that. I want to raise all those hoists a foot or two.
I think it’s pretty safe to say this was a staged shot.
When was the last time you saw a single-post hoist like the ones in these pics?
Good lookin K-G there. I note the CASH ONLY sign – as a guy who’s owned several German cars I’ve had servicing done that absolutely required a credit card LOL
Someone asked me ,as a former technician, what is the single most important piece of shop equipment, to which I answered, “a hoist”, which they have. An air compressor would be next, which they also have, (especially before the days of cordless electric tools) as those particular hoists function with compressed air. I
Other than an alignment rack, everything they need can fit in a toolbox. I think being a VW tech back then would be a nice gig, the cars were all much the same, making service jobs far more predictable. Being a general service tech today would terrify me, everything is so complex and quite different, model to model
But could todays ” fitter” adjust points and balance twin carbs?.. Todays EV are just an I -phone on wheels.
I’m thinking the top picture may have been a publicity shot from when Jimmy Payne VW opened in 1961. Below is a flyer from their Grand Opening.
Dewey Motor Co. was a bit older – looks like they sold VWs from 1955 (originally named Sportscars Ltd., but changed to Dewey Motor Co. in 1957).
Looks like the Jimmy Payne building is still there… and still bearing the corporate look of a 1960s VW dealership building. It’s a gym/training facility now:
Google StreetView image here:
https://goo.gl/maps/zjbREJLLuDq7iAcc6
Staged or not…the diagnostic tools are in the mechanics’ HEADS.
Same place where they would have been in a GM, Ford or Chrysler dealer. Or in Gus Wilson’s “Model Garage.”
https://gus-stories.org/
Does that guy really need his head all the way in the engine compartment in the back of that bus?
For the staged shot, I would have thought having them all working on engines would leave an impression that VW engines were unreliable or needed a lot of maintenance. A few should have been working on a brake or something else.
Yes, more room in there to work than a Beetle, but no access to anything from above. Except for valve adjustments, no more frequent maintenance than US engines. All had points, plugs and an air filter.
No no no, that’s no tech but a new owner used to US car performance, who’s been told there IS in fact an engine but either doesn’t take their word for it, or is, more likely, searching for the rest of it.
That’s an interesting reality in the adolescence of the internal combustion engine. The buyer accepted that its existence and capabilities were a modern miracle, and it was a continuous negotiation with the available technology. The buyer mostly wanted to be reassured that the genie would quickly be returned to the bottle.
How about the guy wearing a tie? He stands out more than any of the tools or lack of.
Here’s a rather charming, 2-part film about what it took to be a Volkswagen dealer.
At least half of engine maintenance was valve adjustment. That’s where the hoist would come in handy.
These guys seem to be sort of examining the distributor without opening it. No timing lights, so they’re not actually turning the distributor.
Plugs and points and belts and idle were best done sitting in a chair behind the car.
Terrific photos. There’s a tiny VW/Audi dealer in Ottawa, located at the same location on Montreal Road, since the late 1960s. Quite amazingly, they still operate out of the same building, with two service bays in front. As a little kid, I remember walking by East Motors, as Things, Squarebacks, Dashers, and Rabbits adorned their lot. Same logo, same flagstones and ramps as the beginning! I used to love to peer into their service bays, and similarly seeing two bugs being worked on.
https://www.google.ca/maps/@45.4430479,-75.6408597,3a,75y,5.8h,92.99t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1skwR4JANOYpO3Jycw2lpPTA!2e0!5s20210501T000000!7i16384!8i8192?hl=en
The shop building looks identical to the VW dealer shops I worked at in the early ’80s, down to the single post lifts and overhead fluid and grease dispensers. No doubt VOA had authority over how the building was laid out and equipped.
Paul, there’s a good bundle of photos of VW/imports dealer in Montgomery, AL (1961-ish) here, including a few of very tidy service area. Wow, did they sell the vans to the local businesses! https://digital.archives.alabama.gov/digital/collection/photo/search/searchterm/hamel
Wow! Makes you wonder what kind of pull they’ve got to keep that facility going.
It’s not commonly known how popular and influential the VW Transporter was in the mid-late ’50s in the US. It was an eminently practical and economical tool for businesses, and there was nothing on the market quite like it. It directly led to two consequences: Detroit’s compact vans, and the notorious “Chicken tax”. The combination of the two dealt a major blow to VW’s commercial van/pickup business, and it had focus on the bus as a personal passenger vehicle as a consequence.
I’ve long been meaning to do a post on that subject, but lacked images. Here they are!
Some of the VW’s have white wall tires. Must of been a North American marketing concession.
If I could go back in my Time Machine, I’d grab the Ghia in the second photo. Learned stick shift on my sister’s Ghia.
Interesting to see one hazet assistant, then more standard tool carts. I would have thought the hazet would have to have been the de-facto setup for a VW specific shop.
As a long time VW Mechanic I can attest to the need for a smaller tool box than most garages .
I too hated bending over and for many years used a three legged milking stool to sit on .
-Nate
IIRC the VW Electronic Diagnostic Tool showed up in 1969 when the 411 got Bosch EFI. because I remember seeing print ads fo rit.