How is it June already? When did this happen? I still feel like it’s barely 2025, but here we are, having already eaten through half of this year-sandwich, and yet I still feel like January is barely over. Remember what was going on in January? All kinds of madness, including those awful wildfires in California. And during those horrible wildfires, you may recall that a symbol of hope arose. A defiant loaf of mildly-scorched blue, standing proud and defiant among the charred remains of Malibu. A mechanical beacon of optimism in a sea of ash! A 1977 Volkswagen Type 2 Microbus that miraculously and improbably survived the fires. In honor of International Bus Day (which was on June 2, which is also, by chance, my own personal manufacture date) Volkswagen will be restoring the bus to its former, uncooked glory.
Now that we’re many months away from the initial story, it may be hard to remember just how powerfully that AP photograph of the bright blue bus among all the ashy grey wasteland hit; those wildfires were genuinely terrible, a grim dystopian-feeling disaster that, for a time, seemed like it would go on and without stopping, a smoky nightmare of destruction that was ravaging the state.
So, when the photo came out, everything was feeling pretty helpless. And then we saw this:
That bright blue bus really made a difference to a lot of people, in one of those deep-hitting wordless ways, a visual way of getting peoples’ hope glands pumping again.
Megan Weinraub, the owner of the bus, which she’s named Azul, wasn’t initially allowed to go into the burn area to collect the VW, and was concerned she wouldn’t be able to retrieve the bus before it got damaged more. Happily for her VW reached out and offered to restore the bus, both out of altruism and because VW is no dummy; with the new ID.Buzz out as a re-born EV Microbus, the marketing potential has to be pretty great, and if that helps get this old bus restored, then fantastic. But I do think VW just wanted to do it for non-commercial reasons, too, because fundamentally they’re people like we all are, and hope is hope.
Volkswagen was able to arrange with the city of Malibu to collect the bus and take it to their heritage and restoration center in Oxnard, CA, just 35 miles away, so that was convenient. Weinraub was, as you may guess, pretty excited to accept VW’s help on this:
“Getting that call was such a relief. I knew Azul was becoming a symbol of hope and that people wanted to see more of her, but I had so much to work through at the time that I wasn’t sure how to approach it.”
VW’s restoration team was impressed with how little damage the Type 2 sustained on the “good side,” but there was still pretty extensive fire, smoke, and heat damage to the car, resulting in paint and bodywork damage as well as mechanical damage, as all sorts of rubber hoses and wires and plastic housings and pipes and other parts in the bus’ air-cooled Type 4 flat-four engine got pretty well melted and cooked.
Also, that front side marker lamp melted into what looks kind of like a potato chip.
VW estimates the restoration will be finished later this year; I’m excited to see how this Toasty Type Two will look and drive when it’s all completed.
California has been recovering slowly and steadily from the fires, but when you visit the LA area, you can still see evidence of the destruction. Just like the picture of the bus’ unlikely survival became something that inspired hope, I feel like seeing the bus fully restored and back on the road will make a nice and uplifting bookend to what was a very difficult time.
“But I do think VW just wanted to do it for non-commercial reasons, too, because fundamentally they’re people like we all are, and hope is hope.”
Yeah but Dieselgate….
And happy birthday. I enjoy your writing a great deal.
Happy Birthday. Or, if you call it date of manufacture does that mean you can claim to be a year younger – as aren’t cars being released now MY2026?
As a fellow air-cooled VW lover, could you please try to follow this restoration through it’s completion if you can Torch? I would love to see the final result in detail.
Also, Happy Birthday!!! 🙂
(/movie announcer voice) “Azul: Back From The Ashes. Coming this Fall to a Malibu near you.”
Modern-day VW doesn’t do much for me, but this is a wonderful gesture. Would love to see a better pic of that Montana Green GTI…
I hope there isn’t another fire like this coming. I fear I can anticipate the next Murano Cross Cabriolet challenge. :SHUDDER:
How did I not know that VW had a heritage and restoration center in Oxnard?
We already knew about the MB Classic Center in Long Beach (formerly in Irvine)
What other manufacturers have such facilities in the US?
I believe we need someone to do a series of visits and articles about them for us….
Oh, so that’s what that big MB building in Douglas Park by KLGB is!
The “Fly DC Jets” building used to be just the MB Tech Training and Prep center from about 2017 – Then they moved the Classic Center from Irvine there in 2022.
https://mercedesheritage.com/classic-mercedes-culture/the-new-mercedes-benz-classic-center
OC Mercedes Benz Club just held a Cars & Coffee at the Classic Center last month. However, there are a few previous vehicles to see inside the building every day along with accessories, gifts, and parts. If you own an older MB and want to see how it should look in original condition, their showcase cars are good for reference.
So to avoid “belated” Happy Birthday Week Torch! Hell I’ll give you the whole month! Happy Fourth of Torch!
Wow, that shop looks amazing… 😮
(I mean, of course it does, it’s the resto facility for a major manufacturer, but still.)
I recall a Mercedes Benz technician telling me they kept their shops so clean you could eat of the floor. Except you weren’t allowed to bring food or drink in to potentially contaminate the gear. He also said something about the lunch room being a pigsty.
Hey you share a birthday with the great Charlie Watts! [also shared with one of my best friends from high school, so it’s an easy one for me to remember]
and yes, good on VW here. Good move and good PR for them.
I forget what year that thing was. If it’s 1975 or older, the engine needs a few improvements during rebuild.
Anything beyond a mechanical restoration for drive-worthiness would be a crime. If it gets a full cosmetic restoration, it’s just a regular VW bus. But if they leave the scorched paint, that’s patina (and a story) that could never be replicated.
We have now reached Peak Patina.
Sometimes damage is just damage.
The owner really might not want that, I know I wouldn’t under the circumstances
VW owners love their patina so much they’ll spend hundreds of hours with chemicals, carefully stripping off layers of repaint to get down to the original paint underneath. Some people have recovered some pretty cool logos/sign writing on their buses, but man that’s a helluva lot of work.
Got a link to this? I did some googling but didn’t turn up much. I’m genuinely intrigued.
https://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=76072
Kind of a master thread, it’s older so idk how many of the pictures still work!
Here’s an Instagram page dedicated to some truly fantastic restorations, with more original paint goodness: https://www.instagram.com/vw_barndoor_force?igsh=MTBtZnYwcWlqMnBrMQ==
Thanks! Man the patience needed to do that is nuts. Definitely not for me. Some of those old logos are really cool though!
Also, man do I miss pre 2010 internet. Decentralized, enthusiast forums were the best.
God I miss forums so much. Nearly every DIY for my Sportwagen has come from a mostly dead forum, and it’s depressing. TheSamba seems to be doing fairly well though.
I actually tried the paint stripping route on my 72 Super Beetle, only to find out the car had been sanded and prepped for the repaint better than I’d thought.
I would vote for a full cosmetic restoration except for one panel, maybe a smaller one.
This – some of that smoke and debris is toxic, but that van earned its patina.
I know that VW gets a ton of crap in the post-dieselgate era, but sometimes a little bit of philanthropic give-back, even if it is wrapped in the vein of a PR stunt is still pretty cool. Those buses were and are still very iconic and its great to see to see a full restoration for the owner.
Sure, the buses were never cool in the style of say Steve McQueen or James Dean… but they didn’t ever need to be. This was the cool factor for people who wanted to plow their own path in life… the thinkers and the dreamers.
This is a vehicle that (sorry Kia) had real soul about it. This was more than the sterile appliances sold at dealerships these days, but it didn’t come with the crazy markups we see on iconic marques in modern times, this was a people mover for the masses… that dared to drive one.
VW has kind of been down this road before, about 7-8 years ago, they had their factory in Puebla completely rebuild and restore a ’67 Beetle for its original owner in California, after she kind of went viral for using it as her daily for 50 straight years
I love those kind of stories
There was a woman that bought a 1960s Dodge something and still is daily driving it. She made a point to always buy parts with lifetime warranties to keep running costs low. Ex battery dies during the lifetime warranty… free new battery and repeat…
Another woman who was in her laten90s that regularly (not sure if truly daily) that lived in Birmingham, MI that had a beautiful 1930 Packard since new… here it is Margaret Dunning is her name
https://www.cartoq.com/101-year-old-woman-driving-1930-packard-inspiring-story-margaret-dunning/
I knew a guy near me who was still driving a 1936 Buick his parents bought him for his 16th birthday – he didn’t drive far, but it was his daily, getting to/from the office and for the local errands he ran, like doctors appointments and shopping. Died a few years ago at 103, was driving it pretty much right up to the end
That is so cool.
I have an uncle that still has a Ford Model A that he originally bought for a few hundred bucks in the 1950s. Originally he bought it as a gift for his younger brother (my father).
Guy was interesting to talk to, used to let community groups use his property for free for like fundraisers and kids day camps and stuff. Told me he vividly remembered when he was 7 years old in 1927 watching his older sister plant two small bamboo shoots, and was cursing that he now had acres of the stuff and told us we could cut as much of it as we wanted, because even a few less was an improvement
Nice.
I’ve heard that about bamboo.
Before planting better have a clear idea how far you want it to grow and include physical barriers in the ground… bc it will spread incredibly well on its own.
Fascinating and useful plant, but it will go out of control and completely take over very, very quickly if you let your guard down
With the VW of today touching it, i wonder if it will be more reliable or less reliable than it was pre-fire…..or even post-fire.
Is June 2 your manufacture date, or your release date. It’s a little creepy, but very on brand if you know your actual manufacture date! Also – kudos to VW!
I can narrow my manufacture date down to a roughly week long window, and know the approximate location, which in hindsight is weird, but it’s one of those things my parents told me well before I had any concept for why that was weird, so it sits in this liminal space in my brain of “I know this is strange, but it doesn’t *feel* strange”
I had a friend who was named after the town he was conceived in, which he didn’t know until he asked his parents as a teenager why his brothers had normal names and he had a less-common one. Given two of my siblings were born in the same hospital as me, I have a pretty good idea where I was conceived, but at least I am not reminded of it each time someone says my name.
Wow that is certainly a choice, and awfully amusing one from the outside, but a choice nonetheless. AFAIK I was the only internationally manufactured child of my parents, shame no second passport thought.
There was a Chrysler ad where the daughter was named Concorde. https://youtu.be/lwXAFGmDWu4?si=58g5wCVKCliV0CyK Creepy.
Back when my kids were in school there were a couple of sisters about the same age as mine. They were both named after cities and when I asked the older one about it, then a senior, she replied that those were the cities where they were conceived. Her father was in the military so they had moved around several times.
They should be glad they weren’t conceived in Scranton.
Check out Ron Howard’s kids. Bryce Dallas Howard?
Manufacture date is the day you roll off the assembly line.
It doesn’t really matter unless it was a Friday afternoon in Detroit. Walking around all your life with an empty beer can rattling around in you would be a bummer.