Date:         Wed, 4 Dec 2013 19:32:59 -0800
Reply-To:     Stuart MacMillan <stuartmacm@GMAIL.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Stuart MacMillan <stuartmacm@GMAIL.COM>
Subject:      Re: Anyone in/near PDX have extra Vanagon dash pod??
Comments: To: Ben <syncro@GMAIL.COM>
In-Reply-To:  <6686F4B1-C83C-4FFB-87D6-136DE4FA9551@gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

Mine is held together with epoxy, tape and big washers.

The tooling for this piece would be very expensive because it would have to
be created from the part itself, unless VW released the specs into the
public domain.   Maybe 3-D printing will be cheap someday, but you still
need the specs.

My other hobby is MGBs, and British Leyland released all their tooling and
production documents into the public domain when they went out of business
in the '80s.  Most parts are still available from aftermarket manufacturers
and affordable, if of variable quality, but good vendors find the good
products.

VW instead seems to want to tease us (and our vendors) with their "Classic
Parts" division, which would be fine if they would just DO SOMETHING!  They
are the largest passenger car manufacturer in the world after all (but not
in total vehicle production, that's Toyota).
(http://www.marketwatch.com/story/worlds-biggest-car-makers-2013-11-01)
We should expect more.

Stuart

-----Original Message----- On Behalf Of BenT

These items are going up in price recently. I was making fun of a friend who
posted just the tach for $100 on Samba. He's laughing all the way to the
bank. Sold 2 of them just a couple of days ago. There's someone else selling
one in the same ad section for $150. Now these are the tach ONLY.

Remember when you would pick up a complete 2wd cluster for under $50? Seems
not that long ago. But then you used to be able to buy Sycro tintops for
under $3K in tiptop condition. Now they are $9K-$18K on CL. Vanagons with
blown motors are going for 10 times what they used to sell for 10 years ago.

Here's hoping someone starts replicating the fragile housings. It seems
these clusters are being parted out because the housing have disintegrated
from age.

BenT
sent from my electronic leash