Many VWs in the early to mid '80s were shipped to the US with empty
cats, mine was one of them.  They easily passed the emissions for those
years without them, except in California, where they were required.  To
avoid manufacturing two different exhaust systems for the US market they
just installed empty cats.  It is obvious nothing was ever in it.  I've
seen posts about this before from many others with all sorts of VW from
those years.

--
Stuart MacMillan
Seattle

'84 Vanagon Westfalia w/2.1
'65 MGB (Driven since 1969)
'74 MGB GT (Restoring)

Assisting on Restoration:
'72 MGB GT (Daughter's)
'64 MGB (Son's)

Parts cars:
'68 & '73 MGB, '67 MGB GT