Date: Fri, 17 Dec 2010 15:22:50 -0800
Reply-To: Donna Skarloken <dskarloken@GMAIL.COM>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: Donna Skarloken <dskarloken@GMAIL.COM>
Subject: Re: Was Can you run without coolant...Now How Badly Can You Abuse
a WBX? (Very long)
In-Reply-To: <AANLkTi=tMurujuOB+SZ-pXsjjJkpbn7uj1XyQdBArbFk@mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
This is why I have trouble with my poor husband. Until recently he was an
American car guy only and just can't understand what he considers
temperamental German vehicles. My son is like that too - instead of a
Vanagon he needs a Honda or some domestic vehicle that will run even when
severely abused.
For some reason, my Dad adapted well even though he was also a
Midwesterner. He put up with my brother's British car obsession and drove
them too, then went along with both aircooled and watercooled VW obsessions
including Vanagons. We had Mopar vehicles, then lastly a Buick that
coexisted along with all this (oh, a couple of GMC pickups in there too).
RIP.
Donna, 87 Syncro
On Thu, Dec 16, 2010 at 6:25 PM, Don Hanson <dhanson928@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Thu, Dec 16, 2010 at 3:51 PM, John Bange <jbange@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > >
> > > "Rubber Headgaskets"? What were they thinking when they built that?
> > >
> >
> > I t Even the base model Vanagon is heavily instrumented
> > compared to (say) an 82 Oldsmobile with nothing but a TEMP idiot light
> that
> > really ought to read THAR SHE BLOWS. A coolant level sensor is
> essentially
> > UNHEARD OF for domestic cars of that vintage, but VW engineers clearly
> > felt
> > it was necessary for catching problems BEFORE they cripple the vehicle.
>
>
> You ever try to ruin Detroit Iron? It takes some serious abuse to make
> one of those go belly up..... I bet about 50% of all the Dodge and Valiant
> slant six motors ever built are still running somewhere...I had some
> friends
> in Jackson Hole who had one on an open trailer with a huge sawblade on the
> end of the crank....no radiator....They used it to freehand cut 1/4-round
> log cabin chinking....Ran it like that for years...hour or two at a time,
> till it got red hot..then they would let it cool down and crank it back up
> again...
>
> Unlike the Vanagon engine that I read about all the time....going
> "Ker....Blooey!" cause the blinking light didn't come on and the temp went
> high enough to snap a couple of the cylinder seals.... Porsche gave that
> crap up right quick with their 993 half and half motor...air cooled with
> the
> same style water pumper head as the vangon.....They went back to the board
> and came out with the 996 motor with real head gaskets and water
> passages...
>
> >
>
>
> >
> >
> > > Does anyone know why they never brought the South African inline motor
> > to
> > > world wide production for the vanagon?
> >
> >
> > I believe the SA inline powered Transporter was developed BECAUSE there
> was
> > no longer world-wide production of the Transporter and the wasserboxer
> was
> > NLA. VWSA probably looked at the T4 and said "Nah... I think we'll just
> > update the T3" and gave it a new engine, bigger side windows, and a new
> > dashboard.
> >
> > --
> > John Bange
> >
>
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