Im in the market to buy a rabbit, im looking at years 80-82(I want to use historic tags) It would be nice to have a Rabit truck(caddy) but I will be putting alot of miles on it and Im concered about the loss in MPGs. Can anyone tell me how many MPG's I would be loseing if I were to purchase a rabbit(4door) VS the caddy pickup?
thanks very much
I have a 1981 Caddy, working on improving the airflow-just a front airdam so far- and I am consistently getting 42-44mpg driving 25%town and 75% highway(at 70mph) every week driving a total of 550miles/week. I have the 1.6na and a 5spd slinging an a/c pulley. Best of luck with your decision-caddy's are hard to find but are available. Tad
everyone says that the drag is greater with the caddy but with the same engine I was able to achieve up to 51mpg, and in a 4 door 84 rabbit I cannot get over 46, ussually 42, but the caddy was consistently above 44 mpg (probably the bearings and or alignment
Get rid of that AC for starters.
What tranny do you have?
the 84 4 door isnt ac, and does not have power steering. I ran the same tranny in both, it was an ff 5 speed. now I run the 4a 4 speed since the 4th gear and final drive is a little better than my ff plus a limited slip
Superman, I don't think the Caddy is the aerodynamic dog, actually it's probably more the other way around. Rabbits have a pretty horrific drag coefficient with such a vertical windscreen and truncated tail, as well as other problems. In actuality, pickup trucks in general ( without bed caps ) with flat bed tonneaus and a small horizontal tailgate spoiler ( like the plastic tailgate extension on Chevy trucks ) conform to the preferred 15 degree departure angle from the back of the cab to the top of the tailgate. Make sure you use a decent front spoiler. You want to shear off the air going under the truck, not to let it "see" all the junk underneath like control arms and such.
i wonder how much, if any, the weight difference makes. the caddy i would assume to be lighter, helping get the better mileage.