(Twenty-five years ago, in 1999, I drove and reviewed a Volkswagen Beetle with a turbo-direct-injected diesel engine. A list in the recently released book, “2,600 Cars and a Dog Sled,” shows I drove 105 VWs in my career, sixth most of the 72 brands driven. Following are excerpts from the 1999 column:)

The red Volkswagen Beetle delivered in early February 1999 wasn’t discernible from the one I had driven the previous year. A definite lookalike, except color; inside, it was the same friendly interior, with a big yellow daisy smiling up from the bud vase.

Fire it up, though, and a cackling or light clattering sound from the engine gave away it secret – it’s a diesel.

This one is no ordinary diesel. It’s Volkswagen’s TDI diesel (turbo-direct-injected diesel). The injection system forces the fuel-air mixture directly into the cylinders, resulting in less unburned fuel and increased engine efficiency. With a turbocharger, a smart brain and high-tech combustion chamber, the engine swirls fuel rather than guzzling.

Before the week ended, the Beetle produced the second-best fuel mileage reading I had attained to that point. From southwest Denver, we drove north on U.S. 85 to Greeley, then several stops throughout the city, before heading home via I-25. For the 140 miles, the VW averaged 50.7 miles per gallon. Its EPA rating was 42-49.

The only higher mpg reading I had recorded by ’99 was five years previous to that when a ’94 Honda Civic VX showed an astounding 61.2 mark. Other top averages I had achieved by 1999 were:

• a ’78 VW Rabbit Diesel 47.9;
• ’96 Geo Metro 47.6;
• ’91 Geo Metro 47.0;
• ’97 VW Passat TDI Diesel 46.9;
• ’81 Isuzu I-Mark Diesel 45.6;
• ’79 Renault LeCar 45.1;
• ’94 Suzuki Swift 43.6’;
• ’91 Nissan Sentra 43.3;
• ’95 Hyundai Accent 42.0;
• ’81 Toyota Starlet 41.6;
• ’81 VW Dasher Diesel 41.3;
• ’81 Plymouth Champ 40.8 and
• ’95 Geo Metro 40.0.

The VW Beetle is very roomy inside; enough room for a Stetson. Its deep side windows create a problem from too much heat on a sunny day. The sun visor is too small to help by pulling it around the side.

Turning circle of the front-drive Beetle is only 32.8 feet, one of the shortest circles of all cars. Seats, as has long been the standard for VW products, are adjusted with knobs and rollers. Front-seat height is adjusted with a ratcheting pump handle.

The TDI engine added $1,275 to the cost of the Beetle, boosting its sticker price to $18,425. It was equipped with air conditioning, cruise control, power windows and locks, AM/FM/CD stereo, 16-inch alloy wheels and fog lamps.

As I stepped out of the 2024 Toyota Tacoma in the parking area at a Greeley Post Office, the man exiting his pickup beside me said, “Oh, that’s the new generation Taco; I’ve been driving this one (pointing to his 1999 Tacoma) for years, but I’m planning to give in and purchase the new ’24 model.”

The ‘new one’ is the 4^th generation Tacoma, which many midsize pickup owners have been awaiting anxiously.

Delivered to me was a preproduction model of the Tacoma Limited Double Cab four-door; it is also available as a two-door XtraCab, a two-seater with extended storage behind the front seats.

The Tacoma has been around for almost 30 years, introduced in the spring of 1995 as a compact, replacing the small Toyota Pickup (known as the Hi-Lux in Japan). Since arrival of the second generation in 2005, it has been classified as midsize. Production of the third generation began in ’15.

Improved ride and handling, attained through a redesigned multilink, coil-spring rear suspension, are noticeable with the new-gen ’24. It is built on the TNGA-F global platform shared with the brand’s other body-on-frame units – the Tundra, Sequoia and Land Cruiser.

It’s got “the iconic Tacoma look,” said Toyota on the truck’s introduction, “with a high lift, big tires, slim body and a powerful athletic stance as inspired by prior Toyota Baja racing models.” Its supersonic red exterior finish is a $425 option.

With a 5-foot bed (a 6-foot bed is available), the Tacoma review model is 213 inches in overall length, about an inch longer than the ’23 pickup. A bed feature, in addition to being lighted and with a deeper box, is the aluminum tailgate power opening and closing functions.

The Tacoma’s retractable running boards deploy into position for relatively easy, comfortable access into the updated cabin.

A new turbocharged 4-cylinder engine matches the power of last year’s 3.5-liter V-6 and exceeds its torque rating. The 2.4-liter, mated to an 8-speed automatic transmission, delivers 278 horsepower and 317 lb.-ft. of torque. When properly equipped, the truck’s tow capacity is up to 6,500 pounds.

It carries a 20-23 EPA fuel-mileage rating; we managed an average of 22.6, helped by a 110-mile highway run to meet Kurt and Tammy Wells for an early lunch at Panera off I-25 at 144^th Ave.

Sticker price on the Double Cab Limited 4WD is $54,595. The Tacoma is available in seven other trim levels. All Tacomas are standard with Toyota’s Safety Sense 3.0 driver-assistance package, including adaptive cruise control and proactive driving assist.

Following its introduction in 1995, Tacoma sales in the U.S. averaged about 150,000 per year for 20 years, and for each of the six years since 2018 have been beyond 200,000, totaling 252,490 in 2021, 237,323 in 2022 and 234,768 last year.

What better place than the King Ranch during a big snowstorm.

That’s where I was on a Sunday (in 2007) during the near-blizzard, in the driver’s seat of the 2007 Ford F-150 King Ranch Super Crew 4-by-4 pickup.

That big four-door truck, named for the historic 825,000-acre Texas ranch, handled the ridges of ice left from previous storms and the 6 inches of new snow with barely a slip.

It also offers an extra twist under the hood – its 5.4-liter V-8 engine, mated to a 4-speed automatic transmission, will burn ethanol, in addition to gasoline.

My tests, first with gasoline, then with 85 percent ethanol, produced results for the Ford very nearly the same as earlier comparisons with E85-capable Chevrolet pickups and SUVs.

With gasoline in the tank, cold-morning starts and about 30 percent of the driving on snowy and icy city streets, the Ford averaged 15.2 miles per gallon of fuel. With ethanol, the same ratio of city/highway driving resulted in an average of 12.3 mpg. I experienced the same 3-miles-per-gallon drop with ethanol in tests of Chevrolets. Price for the ethanol was $1.99 per gallon; gas was around $2.05.

Ford Motor Co. is the world’s leading truck builder, and the King Ranch edition should please the more discriminate driver. Its Castano leather seats, of noticeably higher grade than those in a Lincoln Town Car, are a trademarked product from the King Ranch and its leather shop.

The saddle-work-type leather, logos and stitching are a highlight of the interior, which also includes leather console with floor shifter, navigation system with Sirius Satellite Radio, automatic temperature control, power adjustable pedals and power moonroof.

The truck is also equipped with running boards, power-fold heated side mirrors, 20-inch aluminum wheels, skid plates, trailer-tow package, reverse-sensing system and a locking removable tailgate. The truck’s bed is deep, so much so that it is near-impossible to reach over the side to the floor.

Sticker price is $45,340.

The Specs (2007 Ford F-150 King Ranch Super Crew) –

• Vehicle type,
• 4wd four-door pickup;
• Price, $38,665 base, $45,340 as tested;
• Wheelbase, 150 inches;
• Length/Width/Height, 244/79/77 inches;
• Weight, 5,777 pounds;
• Engine, 5.4-liter V-8;
• Transmission, 4-speed automatic;
• Fuel mileage, 15.2 mpg (EPA 14-18);
• Warranty, 3 years/36,000 miles basic, 5/60,000 powertrain;
• Competitors, GMC Sierra, Chevrolet Silverado, Dodge Ram;
• Built at Kansas City, Mo.

Especially impressive to me among the many automotive models I tested during 2023 were the Chevy Colorado ZR2 midsize truck, the Toyota GR Corolla Core all-wheel-drive crossover and the Hyundai Ioniq 6 electric car.

The Colorado ZR2 was updated with Chevrolet’s turbocharged, high-output 2.7-liter 4-cylinder engine and a bit more ground clearance; the Corolla is powered by a 300-horsepower, 1.6-liter 3-cylinder with a 3-exhaust emit; the Ioniq 6 is a trendsetter in style and roominess among electrics and traditional sedans.

The Ioniq was one of nine fully electrics I drove during the year; others were Audi Q8 e-tron, Cadillac Lyriq, Ford Mustang Mach-e, Genesis Electrified GV70, Lexus RZ 450e, Nissan Ariya, Nissan Leaf, Tesla Model 3.

As we close out Year 2023, following are highlights in my automotive coverage:

Price range – From $26,540 for the larger, improved Chevy Trax to $162,045 for the BMW 760i xDrive sedan with its luxurious interior.

Christmas goodies – Lemon bread from Lucinda H., Centennial, and Wisconsin kringles from Mary C., Denver, oh, my!

Great looker – The new Toyota Crown hybrid four-door, replacing the Avalon.

6-speed stick – The ’24 Acura Integra Type S matching its short-throw-designed manual to a 320-hp, 2.0-liter turbo 4-cylinder.

The drive – The Land Rover Defender 110S with Bill and Kathy Allen to Kearney, Neb., and Morris Publishing on last day of November to haul back to Colorado the first load of my book, “2,600 Cars and a Dog Sled.”

Followup – Two weeks later, son Dale making the same run alone to Kearney in his Ram Longhorn 1500 turbodiesel to bring back 400 more books to be hardbound by Denver Bookbinding Co.

The Book – A special feature is a written revelation by John Fielder, Colorado’s eminent nature photographer, that he is “a car guy,” and explanation why, given to me shortly before his death in August from pancreatic cancer.

3^rd O’Meara in HOF – Brian joined his grandfather, Alfred, and father, Al Jr., in selection to the Colorado Automotive Hall of Fame.

Cornering – “Its cornering capabilities may be the best of anything I’ve piloted to Estes Park,” I said of the ’23 BMW M340i xDrive four-door sedan in late January.

Tremor trim – Ford’s economical, little pickup, the Maverick, flexed a bit of muscle with an added trim level called Tremor, with turbocharged gas-only engine, all-wheel drive, 1-inch lift for ground clearance and tow capacity boosted from 2,000 pounds to 4,000.

Hornet name returns – Dodge Hornet GT revives the name dating back to the Hudson Hornet in the late ‘40s and early ‘50s.

Fuel mileage – 48.6 with Prius Hybrid AWD, 47.6 Honda Accord hybrid.

Gas hog – Lexus LX600 Ultra Lux, 15.1 mpg.

Large touchscreen – The Ford Mustang Mach-e electric, 15.5 inches positioned vertically.

Pure power – BMW XM, the brand’s 1^st -ever electrified M vehicle plug-in hybrid with 644 hp, 590 torque. We drove it to Denver’s old Buckhorn Restaurant.

Jan’s favorite – 2024 Mercedes-Benz C300 4Matic sedan.

Best greeting – Happy New Year!

After a 325-mile drive to Kearney, Neb., on a late-November evening, the following morning I backed the 2024 Land Rover Defender 110S into one of Morris Publishing’s spacious warehouse areas, where a team of workers loaded into the SUV several hundred copies of my book, “2,600 Cars and a Dog Sled: Bud Wells’ 67 Years of Newspapering and Automobiles.”

Joining Jan and me for the drive there and back were daughter Kathy and Bill Allen of Greeley. I visited with Ryan Morris, fourth-generation family member working in the printing business with his father, Scott.

With electronic air suspension, 395-horsepower supercharged inline-6 engine and 119-inch wheelbase, the Defender handled the added cargo back to Colorado with ease. Son Dale Wells of Johnstown in his Ram brought back from Kearney a second load of books.

The soft-cover books are on sale and being mailed to purchasers. Hardbound copies are being finished in December at Denver Bookbinding. Either can be ordered at budwellsbooks.com, or by contacting me at [email protected].

The Defender, like other Land Rover/Range Rover products, is an excellent offroader; decent, too, in on-road travel down the highway. Its squared-off rear end maintains its styling tradition, though does little for aesthetic appeal. I like the inline-6 performance, it is plenty powerful and shifts imperceptibly with its 8-speed automatic transmission.

The Defender rests on the lower end of the fuel-mileage scale. While the drive into Nebraska averaged 19.5 miles per gallon, the return trip with the cargo load was only 18.1. From a base price of $67,900, the sticker reached $82,053 with options added, including headlight power wash, configurable terrain response, electronic active differential, cabin air purification, tasman blue exterior with white contrast roof.

There sat a Toyota Corolla in our driveway on a fairly quiet afternoon; not just an average nondescript Corolla, this was the 2023 GR Corolla Core all-wheel-drive crossover in a supersonic red exterior finish.

The GR is for Gazoo Racing, Toyota’s performance and motorsports division.

The compact hatchback has excellent presence with a black matte grille and angular LED headlamps out front and rear spoiler, rear diffuser and triple exhaust – a pipe for each bore. Yes, it’s a turbocharged 1.6-liter, 3-cylinder with 300 horsepower and 6-speed manual transmission. The three-exhaust emit is great sound and, of more importance, reduces back-pressure on the engine.

Inside the sporty five-door, Jan and I headed west into the Big Thompson Canyon, forking to the right at Drake. That put us on the lightly traveled Devil’s Gulch Road, away from the much-busier U.S. 34. The gulch is a 17-mile back-roads’ diversion from Drake to Estes Park. I drive it often.

The numerous sharp bends and short sprints in between are conducive to near-perfect testings of the 3-cylinder/6-speed manual setup. The GR is quick with response and while shifting back and forth between 3^rd and 4^th gears on the descent back toward Drake, I might have touched the brake twice.

To say of the GR Corolla Core, “It’s not a great ride, it’s a great drive,” is acknowledgement of the extreme rigidity the Gazoo team builds into the specialty vehicles. So devoted it is to a car at a time, the production rate is 49 GR Corollas per day.

The GR Corolla has both front and rear differentials; twist a knob on the center console, you have all-wheel drive with a 30/70 rear ratio, twist it again its AWD is front-based 60/40. It rides on 18-inch wheels, with Michelin Pilot Sport tires.

The special Corolla averaged 24 miles per gallon; its EPA estimate is 21 city, 28 highway, 24 combined.

We were a bit late to get into the Glen Haven General Store (and its cinnamon rolls), which during November is open only on Saturdays and Sundays and closes by 4 p.m.

The GR Corolla’s base price of $35,900 climbs to $39,659 with addition of the limited-slip front and rear differentials, along with JBL eight-speaker premium audio and amplifier, fabric sport seats and GR-trimmed leather-wrapped steering wheel.

On the safety front, it is equipped with pre-collision and pedestrian-detection, lane-departure alert and lane-tracing assist, automatic high beams and road-sign assist.

The GR is on a wheelbase of 103.9 inches, with overall length of 174 and curb weight of 3,250 pounds. Toyota has established a dedicated GR factory at its production facility in Motomachi, Japan. Among competitors are the Volkswagen Golf R and Hyundai Veloster N.

The Volvo XC90, introduced in 2003, has through the years retained strong popularity among the luxury midsize SUV competitors – the BMW X5, Mercedes GLE, Porsche Cayenne, Range Rover Sport, Lincoln Nautilus and on and on.

My recent drives were aboard the XC90 Recharge AWD Ultimate seven-seater, a plug-in hybrid which with a fresh charge will provide up to 38 miles of all-electric power before falling back on its regular gas engine.

The powertrain combo of turbocharged 2.0-liter, 4-cylinder engine and 18.8 kWh battery, with 8-speed Geartronic automatic transmission, delivers a combined 455 horsepower and 523 lb.-ft. of torque; mash the throttle and be amazed at the thrust of power.

My Autel charger at home replenished the battery three times (4-to-5 hours per charge), which was enough to hand us an overall mpg of 42.7 for around 200 miles. With four-corner air, the highway travel was smooth, other than an occasional bump too severe for absorption by the 21-inch Pirellis, and a bit of shudder on transfer of power sources.

The big XC90 carried Jan and me in to Denver on a Friday for a stop at the Colorado Auto Dealers Association, then lunch out north with Ted and Shirley King. The Kings are up to their elbows in fudge, preparing and distributing hundreds of delicious batches through the holidays from a long-used secret recipe. 

On first opening the driver’s door, I was surprised by the gray-colored, wool-blend seats, instead of leather. Volvo says the seats are perfect, and aims for the day when its products will be all-electric and all-cloth, no leather seats.

I considered Volvo’s seats as among the best in the business 15 to 20 years ago, especially with the XC70 wagon, one of my alltime favorite cars to drive. The wool-blend seats in this new XC90 review model are stylish, form-fitting, comfortable. But give up leather? Are you kidding?

The air suspension and Bowers & Wilkins premium sound added $5,000 to the Volvo’s sticker price, which reached $85,495. Drive-mode settings, adaptive cruise, lane-keeping, heated steering wheel and crystal shifter were among many other highlights.

The XC90 was built in Gothenburg, Sweden.

Bob Smith, a friend from Lochbuie, was carrying an old scrapbook when he stopped by our home in Greeley. Smith, whom I’ve written about previously, is the former longtime, highly successful wrestling coach at Wray High School.

His scrapbook was more like a large photo album in which he had dozens of pictures and newspaper clippings from Denver midget-car racing, a fascination of his growing up in the late 1940s and early ‘50s in north Denver near the Lakeside race track. Jan and I enjoyed turning the pages to the long-ago happenings.

Two weeks later, in an exchange of emails with Jeff Ball, a boyhood friend of my younger brother Kent at Sterling High School more than 60 years ago, we learned some of the racing success of Jeff’s father, who lost his life in a crash in Arizona in the early ‘50s.

Midget car racing at the Lakeside track in Denver was a big attraction in the late 1940s.

Prompted by Smith’s and Ball’s connections, I remembered a summer morning at Wray, probably around 1949 when I was 12, when I sat down and joined in on an outdoor neighborhood gathering. I listened to a couple of the older boys tell of the races they’d seen the night before in accompanying their parents to Lakeside.

They kept referring to the “Offys” (Offenhauser engines). “They’re the fastest,” they insisted. My family still owned and operated Dale Wells Ford Garage at Wray, and I quietly remained loyal to the cars powered by V8(60) engines built by Ford, which competed with the 4-cylinder Offenhauser-powered race cars.

Midget racing at the Lakeside Speedway, begun in 1938, was halted for four years during World War II, then resumed in 1946. Bob Smith’s scrapbook is filled with photos and writeups of such race drivers as Loyd Axel, Johnnie Tolan and Roy Bowe into the 1950s, until stock cars emerged as main interests.

Bobby Ball, Jeff’s father, did some racing at Lakeside in 1949, though his main achievements in midget cars were in California and Arizona. In an 18-race midget series at the Phoenix South Mountain Speedway in 1950, Ball won 14 times and was runnerup in the other four runs. He was winner of the 1950 Western States and Arizona Midget series championships, then finished fifth in the 1951 Indianapolis 500 in the Blakely Oil-sponsored Schroeder Indy roadster.

Ball on Jan. 4, 1953, suffered severe head injuries in an accident at Carrell Speedway in Los Angeles, remained in a coma for 14 months, passing away in February 1954.

Smith and Jeff Ball are included in the chapter, ‘My Favorite Car,’ of my book, “2,600 Cars and a Dog Sled: Bud Wells’ 67 Years in Newspapering and Automobiles,” being printed at Morris Publishing at Kearney, Neb. Each cited his first car as ‘favorite:’ Smith a ’36 Ford, Ball a ’51 Chevy. Books can be ordered at budwellsbooks.com.

Jeff Ball enjoyed a career in sales and management of automobile and motorcycle dealerships in northern Colorado. As a young man, he owned two Lotus Super Sevens; a series 2 car with which he toured Europe with a brother in winter of 1966. The second was the Twincam. “I set records on road racing tracks and a world record in AHRA drag-racing class for the car; it ran 13.7 seconds at 103 mph in Scottsdale in 1971 and I won SCCA season championship for its class in sanctioned autocross competition four years in a row,” Ball said. “I promised my mother when I was 10 years of age that I’d never do professional racing, so amateur racing in the Sevens was gratifying.”

Bob Smith graduated from Denver North High School in May 1954, attended University of Northern Colorado (then known as Colorado State College), accepted a position as wrestling coach at Wray High School and directed the Eagles to 30 conference championships in 33 years and 10 state titles. He’s been a car collector. As a young teacher in 1960, he helped overhaul the engine in his Model A in the shop at the Ford Garage at Wray.