Date: Sat, 19 May 2001 10:49:38 -0500
Reply-To: wilden1@juno.com
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: Stan Wilder <wilden1@juno.com>
Subject: Re: Corvair and Porsche 914 Engines (Was: Towing!!!)
Content-Type: text/plain
My 83 aircooled Westfalia runs down the road at 70-75 MPH. and an
occasional down hill run of 80+.
It stops at redlights, railroad crossings, behind school busses.
It gets 17-20 MGP.
It is a great camping vehicle.
I've got 110,000 miles on the aircooled engine I'm currently running.
I'm very happy with the Vanagon Westfalia just the way it is, I think VW
did a good job in engineering and they built a quality vehicle.
It does just exactly the things it was designed and built to do.
I've got zero interest in ever having a Watercooled, because I don't want
to think about engine conversions or a possible $3000.00 engine rebuild
job.
I'm thinking that the subaru must be a good conversion for watercooled
but my solution would be to skip the conversion and buy an aircooled with
the 2000cc engine. All in all it's about the same price. I see good
rustfree 80-83 aircooled Westfalias for as little as $1200.00 to a high
of $4500.00
I visit a lot of wrecking yards in search of aircooled parts, mostly
without succes but I find very nicely kept watercooled Vanagons that have
the engine partially dis-assembled with parts in the back seat, the
killer is the high cost of the engine rebuild. They also have in the area
of 220,000 miles on the spedometers. I'd speculate that most cars
approaching 220,000 miles are not on the roads since they're fifteen
years old.
I've found many Watercooled Vanagon owners with great longevity on their
vans and engines but it comes down to the fact that are satisfied dealing
with the lesser performance and just practice good preventive
maintenance.
I'm not dependent on my Westfalia for daily transportation so I look at
my Westfalia as a hobby more than a necessity.
I see many list members with four and sometimes more VW Vans of various
types listed on their closing lines and I see that they are enthusiast of
the Van, Bay, TypeII, Vanagon, Westfalias, Beatles, Bugs, Things, Ghias
so it's a hobby or collection for them.
If you're dead set on a conversion: Bruce Crower (Crower cams) Harvey
Crane (Crane Cams) have both made backwards running camshafts for me
(small block chevy and corvair to use in Baha Races in super dune buggys)
and furnished the cam gear sets and distributor gears. You are virtually
wide open to put almost engine in your Vanagon that you can shoe horn in.
All it takes is money and in the end you've still got a box to go from
point A to B and thats all VW designed the Vanagons and Busses to do.
Stan Wilder
83 Westfalia Air Cooled 256K
On Sat, 19 May 2001 10:44:31 EDT Brian McClure <SBWC919@aol.com> writes:
> I always thought that a 2.8 liter Chevy v6 and fiero drivetrain would
> be a
> good set up for a van. Never got past the thinking stage though- put
> the
> Subaru motor in, and never looked back!
> Brian 83 Urabus
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