Draft tubes have not been used in a LONG time. 1972 Beetles had them, 1973 did not. So it was somewhere around then.
The problem with these, and to some extent all VAG engines, is that they do not use the same type of breather system many other manufacturers do. They do not have an in inlet/outlet way of scavenging the crankcase vapors. So, name almost any other engine, they'll have an inlet... filtered air from the clean side of the air cleaner (so post filter), to go INTO the engine, then an outlet that is affixed to the intake manifold, usually with either a spring loaded valve, or some sort of orifice (commonly called a PCV valve).
So those engines always run with a potential negative to neutral pressure in the crankcase, although technically it varies based on engine load (vacuum), engine health (blowby past the rings), RPM, etc. But when you turbocharge things, you have situations where there is POSITIVE intake pressure (boost), so you cannot simply dump the PCV into the intake manifold. You have to have a way to regulate the scavenging. Switching over to porting it into the intake air stream is an easy way to do this. And TDIs are already like this, because they run unthrottled under most conditions, or all conditions, depending on which version you have. They do not run with intake vacuum.
The VAG non-turbo gasoline engines are also like the TDIs. And they generally do not have any problems save for the later 2.5L 5 cyl and that is easily fixed with a new valve cover. The problems arise from the turbo gas engines, and VAG seems to struggle with a surefire way to make the crankcase breather work reliably. The older engines, like my AWM Passat for instance, have an excessively complex mind numbing array of check valves, suction pump, bleeder valve, tubes, hoses... it's nuts complicated. And it is all quite fragile, and a problem with ANY of it results in either poor driveability and/or the ubiquitous MIL staring you in the face. Plus, much of it is buried under the intake manifold and is not easy to get to. The transverse cars add an extra layer of crap because they place the SAI pump in the way, so THAT has to come off to get at anything, too. 1.8t NBs are tight quarters!
However, those setups, while fragile and troublesome, never ever caused some catastrophic loss of oil. They greatly simplified this on the first of the DI turbo gas engines based on the old belt driven engines (BPY, for instance), and those crankcase pressure regulators, while they could fail, never caused any major problems either. And I applauded them for at least simplifying the design and doing away with a lot of the nonsense the earlier port injected turbo engines had.
But somehow, while they kept the simplified setup on the new EA888, they managed to create so many other fragile bits... the rear main seal design being one of them... that the simplified breather system gets overshadowed.
So yes, I recently rebuilt the breather system on my AWM, for the second time since it left the factory, and have done so on countless second gen 1.8t engines (AWM, AUG, AWP, AWW, etc.), and it sucks, the engine proper remains 100% intact and untouched. Head has never been off. Transmission never been removed. Timing belt, which is cake easy on the AWM (a little tougher on the transverse cars, but not awful) has been done twice, I'll gladly take that any day over worrying about some spontaneous chain explosion that could happen at seemingly any time past about 50k miles.
But yes, some sort of reengineered breather system (which the aftermarket does have some for some engines, but it obviously isn't EPA compliant) would make great strides in at least making ONE weak spot of the EA888 family more durable.
But that is hardly the only weak spot on these.
