Stripped out VW Golf Tdi driven before eventually being handed to dealer

Remember Joe Mayer, the guy from Cincinnati who dismantled his 2010 Volkswagen Golf TDI? He is still waiting for the German company to give him a buyback appointment, and this could take several weeks after a judge warned owners of affected cars to stop stripping their cars. But this delay gave Jalopnik the chance to drive the already internet famous diesel Golf – and the experience looks like a lot of fun, to be honest.

While we are not sure this is entirely legal, an editor from Jalopnik joined Mayer for a ride around the town – and they were even noticed by a police patrol, but apparently "driving in a door-less, hood-less, hatch-less, interior-less car doesn't faze the police" in Cincinnati. The car, however, was a real hit for other people, who "honked at us, taking pictures and yelling out their windows - not in disgust, but out of genuine curiosity."

And it makes burnouts, good burnouts. This shouldn't come as surprise, because after the manipulation the diesel Golf weighs roughly 2,500 pounds (1,135 kilograms) and still has nearly 230 pound-feet (318 Newton meters) of torque from its 2.0-liter engine. However, the coolest thing about the stripped Volkswagen, according to David Tracy from Jalopnik, was the view – "with no doors and no rear hatch, it felt like I was in a go-kart, cold wind blowing in my face, tons of visibility all the way around."

So, what's next for this raw Golf? Eventually, it will be handed to a Volkswagen dealer, who will scrap it, as the owner was told in a series of phone calls. "I just wanted to see what would happen, and try to make some money off of it," Mayer claims, thinking he was not "doing anything so terrible." Volkswagen already said stripping the car "wasn't in the spirit of the buyback," so only time will tell when - and in what condition - the Golf will be accepted by the manufacturer.