Volkswagen Scirocco

The Volkswagen Scirocco is a sport compact car manufactured and marketed by Volkswagen in two generations from 1974 to 1992 and a third generation from 2008 until 2018. Production of the third generation ended without a successor. It is a three-door hatchback with a front-engine, front-wheel-drive layout. The Scirocco derives its name from the Mediterranean wind.

First generation (1974)

Volkswagen began work on the car during the early 1970s as the replacement for the aging Karmann Ghia coupe, and designated it the Typ 53 internally. Although the platform of the Golf was used to underpin the new Scirocco, almost every part of the car was re-engineered in favour of a new styling (penned by Giorgetto Giugiaro) which was sleeker and sportier than that of the Golf. The Scirocco debuted at the 1973 Geneva Motor Show.

Launched six months before the Golf, in order to resolve any teething troubles before production of the high volume hatchback started, the Scirocco went on sale in Europe in 1974 and in North America in 1975. Type 1 models featured a range of four-cylinder engines with displacements from 1.1 to 1.6 litres, with a 1.7 also offered in North America, all featuring a single-overhead camshaft and two valves per cylinder.

The design of the vehicle combined with the lack of D.O.T.-approved rectangular headlights, made it necessary to have four round headlights, two for low beam use, and all four for high beam use for all the cars imported to the US. Many European owners of Scirocco with smaller engines replaced the two rectangular headlights with four round headlights to eliminate the differentiation between smaller and less powerful engines and larger and more powerful ones.