A Beetle-Based Car I Never Heard Of Is Named For Pneumonia: Cold Start

As you may be aware, our own David Tracy is on, of all things a cruise, where the man who normally revels in pain and discomfort is being pampered and encouraged to graze like an emperor at lavish buffets. It’s hard to picture, I know, but it’s happening. One nice perk of it all is that, of course, David is still David, so he’s keeping an eye out for interesting cars, and boy did he spot some while in Mazatlán, Mexico. These are fascinating cars, a kind of air-cooled Volkswagen Beetle variant I wasn’t aware of, and one that only exists in Mazatlán. They’re called Pulmonias.

And, yes, that name is the Spanish word for pneumonia, because when these first appeared in the 1960s, there was a belief that riding around in an open car could give you pneumonia, which I’m pretty sure medical science has disproven, otherwise there’d be a lot of very sick Miata owners.

It seems that the whole thing started with a man named Miguel Ramirez Urioui, who made the first open taxis from three-wheeled Cushmans in the 1960s, but these proved a bit too small and unstable, so by the 1980s the baseline Pulmonia had changed to a VW Beetle-based machine. This, of course, makes a ton of sense, as Mexico was producing huge numbers of Beetles (Vochos) at the time and Beetles were already in use as cabs in Mexico City, among other places.

Also, the Beetle works well because the whole body can be removed from the chassis very easily, allowing the Pulomina custom fiberglass bodies to pretty much just be plopped onto the pan and bolted down. These bodies appear to be pretty much one-piece, with fenders and seat benches just molded right in.

I wonder how well those air scoops work? Also, I wonder how many people can fit in these? They’re four-door, and that back bench looks fairly wide; I bet cramming six or so in these is not uncommon, because, you know, vacation rules and all.

There looks to be a few different styles of Pulmonia bodies, some with more Beetle-like front ends, some with a more boxy design, some having what looks like engine lids from a VW Type 181 (the Thing), some with maybe VW Type 2 bus engine lids, and, as David shows in this video, no two seem to have the same kind of taillights:

 

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Just from that little clip I saw Chevy S-10 taillights, 1972-1978 or so VW Bus lights, Escalade lights, round aftermarket “flat” ’73-and up Beetle taillights, the ubiquitous “box” taillight seen on Jeeps, maybe some Daewoo lights, and more. See what you can spot!

I’m so delighted by these things, for a number of reasons; first, they’re what a bigshot executive at Nissan once described as a “Galapagos” car – something that, like a Galapagos Tortoise, can only really exist in one part of the world. The Nissan exec was talking about Japanese Kei cars, but these Pulmonias definitely qualify, too.

I’m also thrilled because they’re yet another example of how the old air-cooled Beetle refuses to die off or at least just retire into a comfortable, undemanding status of collector car. Long after they were phased out as Mexico City cabs, there’s hundreds of old Beetles, now in disguise, doing real taxi work in this one city, and, it seems, thriving. These drivetrains and chassis are all likely decades old, but, since Mexico made old-school Beetles until 2003, there’s still likely some fresh, barely 21-year-old VW pans out there, if needed. The resiliency and unstoppable character of the old Beetle never fails to thrill me.

Of course, these are getting old and rough, and I’m sure at some point they’ll get phased out for something else for safety reasons, but I doubt they’ll have the ramshackle charm of these.

The city of Mazatlán does at least seem to appreciate the little Beetles-in-work-clothes that have become their unofficial mascots, and have even erected a bronze statue on the oceanfront to commemorate these hard-working machines:

So, no matter what the future brings, the Pulmonias will be remembered, as they deserve.