1981 VW Rabbit Pickup - Caddy Shock

Renaissance Man (Ren·ais·sance man) n: A man who has a wide range of accomplishments and intellectual interests. See also: Salid Salazar, owner of this outstanding '81 Rabbit Pickup. Sal is truly a man for all seasons, and in addition to being a voice actor and vocalist, he's co-owner of Axltrampz, Inc - founded in '03 as a performance shop in Asbury Park, NJ.

"I do commercials; I've done poetry readings, children's poetry online and stuff like that. I also have a bachelor's degree in sociology," Sal tells us. "I have a band too."

You don't have to be so rounded to build a stellar Mk1, but it can't hurt...

Better known as the Caddy overseas, this little VW serves as the ideal business card for Sal and his brother/business partner, Jason Cox. But it didn't start that way. At first it was just another car in a string of projects, stretching back to the early days of the east coast VW scene.

After a number of Mk2s, he traded a 1.8 for a Jetta 2.0 16v, and that was all it took. "There was such a difference between a regular Jetta and the GLI, and I've been loving 16vs ever since. It's my favorite motor," Sal enthused.

In '99 another 16v project was completed, a Scirocco, but it only lasted three weeks before it was in an accident, leaving Sal in the hospital and a freshly built motor without a home.

"The only thing salvageable from the car was the engine," Sal continued, "I was looking for a four-door Rabbit to put it in but came across this Pickup. I couldn't test drive it because I was banged up from the accident, but I picked it up for $1800."

Sal immediately set about converting everything over from the Scirocco. "The Pickup was originally a diesel, but I dropped in the 16v and it just grew from there. It was my first engine swap, so a learning process."

Sal ran the car as a daily driver for a few years, slowly upgrading as things needed attention. "As things broke I tried to upgrade. If I have to rebuild the motor, I want to rebuild it better. If the car needs paint, I want to paint it better," he said.

Eventually the motor let go, prompting a rebuild. The bottom end was bored slightly, while the internals were balanced and the crank knife-edged. A stage 3 ported and polished head was filled with Schrick 268 cams and Techtonics valve springs, while a European 50mm intake manifold and Motronic CIS management system was swapped from a late model GTI. Autotech and Techtonics exhaust parts completed the mods, which cranked out 135 horsepower to the wheels.

Up front, Weitec coilovers were installed, bringing the Caddy down over polished 17" Boxster wheels. An array of Euro Sport strut braces and a front sway bar help strengthen the chassis and tighten handling.

The Porsche wheels measure 17x7" front and 17x8.5" rear, and the 5x130 wheels were fitted with 25mm H&R PCD adaptors, along with an additional 8mm spacer in the rear for extra clearance. The wheels were wrapped in Toyo Proxes T1-S rubber, sized 205/40 front and 215/40 rear.

"The 17s are actually too big for that car, but I like the big-wheel style and can't get into the small Euro-style wheels," he said.

Sal flipped the rear axle to lower it, having the leaf springs re-cambered to keep them from sagging. It provided a sporty and purposeful rake for the little pickup. Koni adjustable shocks from a Maserati Bi-turbo were adapted to fit with custom brackets.

Ordinarily, lowering a VW is simply a case of ordering a set of lowering springs, but not so on the Caddy. "I had to order the Weitecs from Germany, because they'll send you a pair. Nobody in the States would do that," Sal said. "Everything was more difficult with this car."