Look At This Amazing 4×4 Beetle I Saw Roaming Around A NC Town

The other day I took a little day trip to Graham, NC, just because it’s a charming town – maybe a city? What’s the line, there, anyway? Graham has about 17,000 people. That’s pretty small for a city, but not really tiny, exactly. Is it offensive to call it a town? Maybe it’s one of those things where towns can call one another towns, but you know, I can’t. Whatever. It’s got a lot of character and a picturesque little downtown and at least one interesting custom Volkswagen Beetle tooling around.

Sadly, I didn’t get to see this Beetle up close; it was driving around the main court square that’s at the center of the town, and I was a bit away. Still, I managed to not pee myself too completely with excitement and was able to fumble for my phone to snap these few pics.

I believe this Beetle is a 1974 Beetle; it could be a 1973, too, but I think I spotted what look like larger bumper bracket cut outs; in 1974, VW changed from the simple Y-shaped brackets used since 1968 to these beefy shock-absorber-like bumper brackets with beefier bumpers to meet the new 5 mph bumper rules. Those things were battering rams.

I mean, I think that’s what I’m seeing there by the bumper bracket:

I could be wrong, and the size of that rear bumper does seem to look more like a ’73. So maybe it’s a ’73? It could be a ’75-’77 Beetle, too, but the clues to that: the FUEL INJECTION script on the engine lid and the new lower apron I either couldn’t see at that distance or was cut away, respectively.

Now that I look at that bumper, I’m leaning more toward this being a ’73. A ’73 standard Beetle, not a Super Beetle.

Oh, by the way, one of the charming old buildings in Graham has these great dragon-form gargoyle/light sconce things:

Dr.Dragon there kind of looks like they’re resting their head on a pilates ball or something. It’s pretty fun.

But back to the 4×4 Beetle! Let’s get to the interesting part, here. What’s interesting is what’s below the body, which I think is a chassis from some 4×4 truck or possibly Jeep. Look, you can see the big differential at the rear axle there, and the hint of one at the front, too:

I don’t think this is still on an actual VW Type I chassis with a rear-mounted air-cooled engine. A VW drivetrain uses a transaxle that would not be as prominent or low as that differential, for example, and the solid axles are not anything like the torsion bar, independent suspension axles a VW chassis used.

So what is this, exactly?

If I had to guess, which I sort of do, I think this is a Beetle body very carefully bolted onto a Jeep CJ/Wrangler chassis. The Beetle had a wheelbase of about 95.3 inches. A Jeep CJ-7 had a wheelbase of 93.5 inches, a Jeep YJ and TJ had a 93.4″ wheelbase, but the closest wheelbase is on the 2007-2018 Wrangler JK, which had a 95.4″ wheelbase. That’s only 1/10 of an inch longer! You could pretty much just drop a Beetle body right on there!

And it looks like that’s what someone did; I saw the front and saw no obvious cutouts for the radiator grille, but perhaps the cooling and intake air is routed in from below.

I think I need to go back at some point and see if I can find this fantastic little beast; someone did a really nice job combining these two cars, which are, ironically, sort of the Spirit Cars of myself (Beetle) and my Autopian pal and co-founder, David (Jeep) combined. I feel like if this thing is half-Beetle, half-Jeep, David and I should do a video with it or something.

Anyway, I’ll keep looking. Until then, great work, unknown Beetle/4×4 cross-pollinator!