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Date:         Tue, 12 Sep 2000 09:23:40 -0500
Reply-To:     "Filcoff, David M." <FilcoffD@MISSOURI.EDU>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         "Filcoff, David M." <FilcoffD@MISSOURI.EDU>
Subject:      Towing a split window bus from New Mexico to Missouri with a Vana
              gon (2.1l)
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"

A few weeks ago I sold my 88 Fox in preparation for my new bus, a '61 mango green standard. The bus was in New Mexico, no transmission, no motor. So I bought a hitch for my Vanagon took a week off of work and headed down.

Towing with a Vanagon; The Vanagon towed surprisingly well, the bus weighted somewhere around 2000 lbs and the Vanagon somewhere around 3500 lbs. The bus had an extra front beam in it along with all the parts for a 40hp motor, two rear seats, a three seater middle seat, an extra rear hatch, several interior panels and other misc. parts. The Vanagon had a few hundred pounds of tools, luggage...

The trip from New Mexico to Missouri went well, the bus was towed flat on all four wheels, about 1500 miles. One tire blew out in Kansas, but no big problem, we had a few spares (three). We went 50-65 mph, staying on Hwy. 54 almost the whole way. I did go over 70 mph at one point, but was a bit fast considering what was behind me. Being passed by Semi's going 75-80 mph was interesting, driving on major interstates was no fun, 54 was a nice 55/65 mph highway. The Vanagon averaged just over 20 mpg towing the bus, about 21-22 mpg on the way down (65-75 mph). This is w/o my yakima rack on the roof, with the rack the Vanagon gets about 19-21 mpg on the highway. The power was great, the brakes worked well, but beat the tow hitch up pretty badly, it's bent in now, but still functional. I did loose a bumper bracket bolt, if you tow be sure to check these regularly, along with all of the other bolts on the hitch and tow bar. A larger hitch would be advisable, this was one of the not-to-impressive bolt to the tow hooks $50 hitch, but it served it's purpose.

You can see pictures of the bus and the Vanagon at <http://www.251.org/images/61Bus/Photos > Group2 are the pictures I took, Group1 are picture I got before I picked up the bus. The images are fairly large, unmodified out of the digital camera. I'll be making a page for them soon.

dave 251.org 87 Vanagon 61 Mango Bus


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