I love how when it first started up, it immediately tried to eat all the tools, branches, starting fluid and everything else around the engine bay.

dude if I bought half the things you do home I'm positive I wouldn't be married any more

I like how the battery you put in matched the level of filth perfectly

I admire your determination and resourcefulness . I'm retired now after 44 years as a mechanic , I think before I'd wrench on or sit in that rolling pet cemetery it would have to have been on fire for five or six hours the day before .

In germany we called it VW Caddy. And this sound was normal to this old Diesel engine. Its called "Nageln" free translated in "nailing"

A generator to power the shipping container shop.

Glad to see that VW Diesel running! I drove VW Diesel Rabbits all my life and repaired them as needed. Even a few rebuilds! They are tough little motors, but one thing I have learned really quick is that if you don't know how long it has run or when the timing belt has been changed, I always replace that timing belt. I had a timing belt break at idle and it did some pretty good damage. Ended up with a new head, new piston and a new rod along with a new timing belt. Also, with those diesels, have glow plugs which really helps to start. But that diesel sure sounded good though, just like all of mine have sounded like!

A diamond in the rough!! I worked for VW from 1979 till 2009. My favorites were always the Rabbit and Jetta diesels. The last Jetta i had .....i gave away at 495 thousand miles......it was still running!! Once running change the timing belt!! ASAP!! ENJOY!! Sounds normal to me......... uses glow plugs......check fuse on firewall! Engines are great for running pumps or generators too!!

When they idle they sound broken. That’s just the nature of them

A moment of silence for those blankets. They gave the ultimate sacrifice.

A great video. I still have the 81' pick up diesel that I bought brand new. I have done most of the maintenance on a truck that has 562,000 miles. It's always great to learn more techniques. Thanks again.

Matt, those pickups are getting valuable out here on the west coast. After shop vac/pressure washer, you could sell the rolling chassis! All the interior can be borrowed from a sedan, so that's not an issue

Back in high school (1984), a friend had a Blue one. It would get like 50mpg. would do zero to 60 in a week, but great mileage.

I'd admit, "Did this truck used to belong to a preacher" got me chuckling good

easily my favorite engineering/mechanical channel now a days. great job.

Another nice video. These 1.6 Diesel engines have been sold a lot with us in Belgium. They were known for being very reliable, and you could drive them for hundreds of thousands of kilometers without major problems. The engine sound is typical of this small VW engine. don't worry, but be sure to check the timing belt. A new clutch kit ... and off you go. As a project I propose to turn it into a mini mobile home. Have fun with all your projects. Greetings from Belgium.

Hey ya'll, I botched the Teaser clip at the end but just picture in your mind a large machine lifting an equally large engine off a trailer 🤣🤣🤣..... hope you enjoy!

I was around these diesel rabbits a lot as a kid and they always had a low idle knock. Pretty damn tough an great fuel mileage (50 mpg).

"The best part about working on pickup trucks, they have a trash can sitting on the back of them." I couldn't agree more.

Lovely thing, we need more people like you, the more we restore and make parts for those old things the more we don't have to buy that plastic crap nowadays

The Ether Bunny brought in his old friend the VW Rabbit for some TLC

My first diesel was an 80s Golf TDI. Got to be pretty much the same lump with a bigger bore & the turbo. It'll run on raw vegetable oil if the weather's warm when you start it & there's no computer to say "Yuk, too gooey!"

I drove a VW Rabbit from the Darlington SC car auction back to High Point NC for a car dealership in about 1983 or 84. That thing didn't have enough power to pull a greasy string out of a cats rear-end and smoked like a freight train when I started out but I ran it hard all the way back. By the time I got it back to the dealership she was purring like a kitty cat. Good luck with your project and stay safe dude.

That sounds perfectly normal for a 1.6 non turbo diesel. They’re not fast but get great gas mileage and are absolutely bullit proof. The only weak part is the axle joints. They break every 100k

I admit to yelling at my screen when the throttle was pinned with the flathead while you were cranking the engine. Great video still!

"I'm pretty sure I hear a rod nock or a piston slap" Revs it even higher

I got my daughter a diesel VW rabbit for her 16th birthday and it was old then and she drove it till it hit 200,000 miles. It got 50 MPG with the cost of diesel back then she loved it. The diesel motors just sounds like that.

I reckon the engine oil is pretty well due for a change, hence the rickety knock.

Reminds me of high school when my buddy had a non diesel VW Rabbit. Took it on a little drinking road trip and he told us that we had to stop about every half hour to add more oil because the gauge didn’t work and it burnt oil. After about adding 4 quarts over the course of our journey I happened to look at the gauge and noticed that it was the temperature gauge that wasn’t working. I pulled the dipstick out and the oil level was about 3” above the full mark. Needless to say that car didn’t last much longer than that.

man this diesel four cylinder sound takes me right back won't run fast but will get you anywhere

"Kinda sounded like it almost wanted to." Man, I've said that with vehicles more than my fair share of times.

This truck here in argentina is known as Saveiro. The engine sounds this way, underpowered but very reliable.

Love that you found this. At some point in high school I learned that if you overload one of these enough, your drive wheels lift off the ground. Those German engineers were ahead of their time with proactive safety features like that.

I love this channel but at times I gotta ask “why” this man puts himself through such torcher.

Another great show Matt. I have my wife watching now and she really enjoys it too. Good stuff!

great engines. Keep it well oiled and it'll go forever. (maybe a set of lifters and valve stems at 400k+ miles but that's a small price to pay). With better fueling and the pump timed it should run better, raising the idle a hair will smooth it out. Those wheels are rare, these trucks are worth like 8 grand in decent shape. Tailgates worth 500. Bang out the front and weld up the floor if it's not that bad, totally worth saving.

Thank you ! I had a genuin laugh when the VW came off the trailer and when you whistled “Isn’t She Lovely .”

I'll be honest, I'm normally a little jealous over some of the stuff you find. This however, that guy would've had to pay me to drag that pile away.

My friend had one of these in England, 1.6 NA Diesel, it couldn’t pull the skin off custard. B106 GFW what a truck. I had one as a project which regrettably never finished D964 WJL originally a diesel but was in the process of converting it to the 1500 petrol automatic. This brought back a lot of good memories, thanks Matt.

Thanks for teaching me a little bit about diesels. I’m getting old and find that an affinity for diesels comes with age. I haven’t owned one, yet! Those diesel rabbits were slow accelerating. A guy where I worked loved his.

Yep, that's how they sound 👍

Matt that’s the way the VW diesel sounds it’s normal. And it purrs like a kitten

I bought a old 80's Rabbit diesel at a auction, rusty, but ran good. Ran the wheels off of it till the back axel broke loose from the frame from rust, found another one that had a bad motor, but was not rusted out, and swapped the motors, drove that one for many years, running parts for my trucking business! It got 40 MPG all the time, and i ran the squat out of it! That one sounds normal, they rattle like crazy when at idle, but it sounds good at higher RPM! But the way, those wheels are VW Scirocco (SP) wheels, and are worth what you paid for the car, to a collector!

Good work. The early VW diesels tended to have knocking issues as a standard feature like many others too

The engines are pretty bulletproof, but the bodies rust like mad. These are pretty rare so it will be worth something if you want to put in some time and money! Would make for an interesting resto video!

Amazing how you can detect a "knock" in that diesel engine. I mean it sounds like it is knocking just running normally. Thumbs Up!

Those VW diesels of that vintage always sounded like they were one knock away from destruction, great video reminded me of my child hood and days spent in the local junk yard 👍🏻

All the tools falling into the engine department cracked me up😅

diesel creek : Lets see if he will run! Timing Belt : PLEASE NO!!! PLEASE GOD NO !!

"Does it have a key"? That would've been one of the questions that I asked the owner.

I worked on a farm 30+ years ago and had one of those new as my work vehicle, the engine sounded pretty much like that from the word go. It was noisy, smelly and slow but so so so reliable.

Had one and Wass a lot of fun to drive. Motor sounded the same but had prob with over heating. Had the motor replaced and that motor over heated. Finally sold it but do miss it

I had a Rabbit in my early 20's -- loved it. Best car I ever owned. My car had just over 1 million miles on it before the engine finally gave out.

Sounds like it has the classic "bag of hammers" feature.

I would love to see you make some content on an old detroit you choose the platform it's in! Seems to be about the only thing you've not tinkerd with yet on the chanel! Keep up the great content too. You're one of my favourite American yt's😎

About 18 years ago I had an 81 Rabbit hatchback diesel, this sounded exactly like mine. Good little car.

We had a diesel Rabbit in the early 80's. Fun little car, it was a hoot to pull up to a truck stop with it next to the giant semi's to fill up. Only thing I didn't like about it was cold starting in Winter and trying to pass someone on the highway. You had to phone ahead for reservations to pass anyone. Ended up trading it for a 4-door Quantum (remember those) when kids came along. Miss that little car!

Being much older than you I was around when they were new. They had head gasket problems. People on this side of the pond didn't know how to drive a diesel especially an aluminium head one. They would get off the expressway and immediately turn the engine off . The temperature woud spike and eventually warp. They could be milled up to five times as I I rember. The head gasket has a tab with notches sticking out front rt side. The appropriate notch for thickness of gasket needed to compensate for material removed from head. Useable heads got to be such a problem to find that a company started selling copper shims you could use to take up more space. If people would have let em idle when they ran errands probably the engines would have lasted forever.

I had a 79 Rabbit pickup as a company truck and ran it for over 250,000 miles and it never had a problem and started no matter how cold it got. I had a neighbor that had a 1980 Rabbit pickup. He put 375,000 miles on it. The only reason he got rid of it the subframe rotted out. Those little engines are bullet proof.They all had that marble knock to hem at idle.

Hi Matt, I think you should throw that clutch in it, put some air in those tyres and use it as a farm truck. It’s always great to see strange farm trucks doing their thing. Love the channel mate, From Sydney Australia

Those 1600's always sound and vibrate idling like a tin of nails

I think you've just found the power plant for a diesel bandsaw sawmill.

Whenever you start an engine for the first time, it's always fun to watch things fall. Amazingly, things rarely fall into the fan...there was that tool kit episode...

I had a 2003 VW Golf TDI with a 5 speed for 17 years. Sold it with 276500 miles on it and the original clutch. Ran great. The knocking sound is normal when it is cold.

I appreciate ya wanting to share the smell but I am glad I do not have smell -o-vision on this one

Roommate had a Diesel Rabbit in the late 80s.. never had a good battery- we just push started it whenever..

The International sounds so much like the Perkins in my Massey. Had one of your vids up loud the other day and walked in the other room. Thought my wife had cranked the Massey up. Keep up the great content.

You're a braver man than me. I don't think I would have touched this one.

Did I see a swarm of flies come out after the door was opened??!! I laughed myself into a coughing fit! This has to be one of the all time best videos...should be a Halloween special!

I was so pumped to wake up and see a new video

Thanks again Matt always fun. Have a great day.

On the Engine will run forever, but the glow plugs and CVC shaft what’s seem to have to be replaced regularly. My dad drove the pickup version and we drove the turbo Jetta version. We made my kids learn how to drive and repair it. Seemed like we were constantly working on it, but it gave the kids a lot of exposure to working on cars. Good luck.

Motor sounds perfectly healthy!!! Would love to see it fixed up! Have been looking for one for myself for quite some time

I forgot I have one of these motors in my Linde Forflift. It has 13,400 hours. I don’t know what that is in kilometers but it’s reliable and paid for.

You could always build a small tracked vehicle using the motor and the rear differential. You could use the breaks to steer. Id put a torque converter on it like what you'd find on a snowmobile and use a couple tracks of that nature too. It might be really fun.

I grew up around those. We had a collection (maybe 7 or 8 of them). Most were $400 beaters. Now they’re bringing in 5 figures in running condition

That knock is normal, at least from what I remember from mine sounding like.

The people who owned it before will tell everybody they had a VW with a million miles on it, lol, great video, thanks for sharing.

Anyone else just watching him put shit on the core support, and watching it fall over and over again? Third times the charm…and just waiting for that stick to get sucked up into the belts! CONTACT!

A friend of mine had one of those we converted to run off used frying oil that he got from resturaunts for free. He drove it from Portland to L.A. and back with no issues. All he had to do was flush the fuel lines with diesel when it was cold out.

after watching Matt doing a few diesel starts I have decided matt must have an aversion to tubing wrenches or he just doesn't own any.

What i can hear from video, runs like normal vw IDI. Just rebuild injectors and swap timing belt and you are good to go. Bolt on turbo kits also available from EU. 1.9tdi vw engine bolts directly in to car. Pretty neat little things, too bad its FWD.

You might think twice about placing your tools above the radiator like that. I dropped a1\2 in inch socket into the fan once and got rewarded with neck of a shiner. Just saying. Love your channel.

The moment you opened the door and smelt it and almost gaged. I died laughing

Those old vw diesel got the nastiest diesel rattles, bet that thing'd do 100k more

This is the "normal" sound for a 4 cylinder diesel from VW and for having driven in GOLF mk2 1.6TD sold to 230.000km and GOLF MK3 1.9TDI the sound was identical but on the other hand were very very good engines, mine and gone to the scrap with 385,000km because of the rotten chassis. Good maintenance, a new new fuel pump and a little love and this car will go with you everywhere.

Hi Matt, no such thing as a mistake, just golden opertunites for improved learning

My friend bought a new one in the late 70s. It sounded exactly like that when it was idling, really turned the girls heads!

Only just found this channel, it's brilliant! Just something about finding a random, beat up truck that looks ready to scrap and bringing it back to life 👊👍

Thank you for the heads up. I like neither gross nor disgusting things. So I'll catch you in the next video.

I bought an '82 Rabbit diesel sedan new and it sounded just like that. Great car, would even tow a small sailboat. And, at least at the time, turbo kits were available, raising the HP from the 50's to about 75.

I thought they all sounded like that. I know all the old 6.2 and 6.5 Detroit I've been around sound like a bag of bolts in a blender lol

Good work getting this thing running, love the determination! Building a go kart could be cool, but I think one of these old VW diesels would be really cool in some kinda small budget rock crawler, lots of low end torque.

My diesel Rabbit sounded exactly the same way. That thing would just never die. Over 320,000 miles on the clock when I sold it. On a cold morning when started, the was so much smoke it looked like my house was on fire, LMAO!!! A couple minutes later, smooth as glass, loud as hell, and squat for power. But, it would never stop running and driving just fine. 😎

I like how he just willingly blows a coat of either in the intake. Yikes not worried about the pistons on that sucker.

I bet mustie1 would love to have that. He's definitely a VW lover.

just remember, if it feels squishy and juicy, then whatever it is, it hasn't been dead long enough.

Love the video keep up the great work

One of my very first cars was a '79 Rabbit C diesel. Man, that shunk of hit was real fun for a while. Si much so that all in all I ended up with a half dozen throughout the years 5 Rabbits and a Scirocco). Love them little things. Never had a pickup though.

You need to get that thing going and run it around a little bit. I think it would be an amazing project.