I bought an '85 cab new, sold it with about 80k miles three years later. The only real problem was the clutch; I replaced it once and the next on was in sight when I sold it. Might have been my driving style, might have been commuting 70 miles a day through LA traffic.

It had the old Rabbit GTI engine, 90 horsepower (my God, now I wouldn't even buy a motorcycle with 90 hp), it was fine for normal driving, but you could definitely feel the effect when the AC compressor kicked in. For an engine that size, mileage was okay but not spectacular - right around 25 mpg, and highway driving didn't seem to change that.

Get leather or vinyl if you can, the stock cloth was crap and started tearing pretty early, but I drove with the top down most of the time, so it was getting beaten up by the sun. Finally, since the top folds into an external lump in the back (similar to the old Beetle convertbiles), if you don't use the tonneau cover (and nobody does, it takes a few minutes to install) the vinyl headliner, which was always white iirc no matter which color car you had, got filthy and was pretty hard to clean. Note that there's very little trunk room, though I think the rear seats fold down. Interior is surprisingly roomy, I'm a big guy and I was always comfortable.

Aside from the clutch, those are all fairly minor issues. It was a really fun car, and I enjoyed it a lot for the period that I owned it.

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81 300SD
08 MDX Tech
93 525i

05 F650GS