Date:         Fri, 28 Apr 1995 14:17:26 -0700
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         wabbott@townshend.Corp.Megatest.COM (William Abbott)
Subject:      Muir Books:

	There are several books from John Muir Books. One by Muir,
the rest by his school or dojo or what ever you call it. 

	The classic Idiots book, by Muir until his death, is
How to Keep you VW Beetle Alive. A book of Step By Step Procedures for
the Complete Idiot. This covers aircooled cars, type I, II, III and IV.
(and can be used on your VW-Porsche 914 and 912E engines)
	Some use for an AIR COOLED Vanagon owner, but the chassis isn't
going to match the pictures!

	Poor Richard's Rabbit book, aka How To Keep Your VW Rabbit/Jetta/Sirocco
Alive. A Book Of Step By Step... you get the picture, covers the A1 series
of water-pumpers up through 1984 model Rabbit/Jetta and the end of the 
Sirocco. (I'm mispelling that aren't I?). If you have a diesel Vanagon,
this book is a good one for the engine, if nothing else. This has the
best illustrations, by Peter Aschwanden, and the best writing, by
Richard Sealy, IMHO. I believe this book is the best technical reference
every written and show it to people as an example of how to do it.
	Ian says there's a second edition of this available, with
coverage of all the GTI/GLI engine and fiddly bits. 

	There are three other Muir books that I've seen: one for
Honda Civics, one for Toyota Pickup Trucks and one for Subarus. These
all figure as appealing to the same New Mexican hippies that maintained
the original Muir book and wrote the Rabbit book.

	Only the Beetle book, 25th anniversary editon, seems to be
in print these days, so I will only part with my Rabbit book when
the pry it out of my cold, dead, fingers.

	Just for completeness, Ten Speed Press, the people who have published
5 million copies of What Color Is Your Parachute?, used to have a bike book
that was remarkably similar to the Muir style, called "Everybody's Bike Book".
I still have mine. Recomended. 

	Farfig, etc.
	Bill