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Date:         Thu, 9 Nov 1995 10:53:07 -0600
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         jlfoster@siu.edu (John Foster)
Subject:      RE: Volkswagen 'quality'

Tim---

Saw your note---

>I must have missed the note that this is responding to, so please bear with >me. Hopefully I won't start another insulting exchange on the list...

My note below started this one. I was not trying to start a fight over the state of the world or auto industry----the intent was to inform other Vanagon owners that they might save themselves significant inconvenience by checking a critical, but vulnerable part, and carrying a replacement with their spare drive belts if they had the wrong one.

>I came across a reference in the archives to a cooling system flange problem and want to flag this to (at least) 86 vanagon owners...and probably several later years. On the 86, a cooling hose enters the engine block under the alternator through a plastic flange. (See Bentley p19.14--lower right of the diagram with the 20 Nm designation.) This flange easily snaps off if any of the drive belts break. VW apparently discovered this problem and has a replacemnt flange 025 121 160D made from steel which apparently solves the problem. > >As best I can tell from Bentley the equivalent to this part on the 1983-85 models was made of metal. My Bentley does not go past 1986, but I assume VW changed to the metal replacement sometime after 1986. I recommend (from painful experience five years ago) that you check to see if you have the plastic or metal version. If you have the plastic version, order the metal replacement (about $10 with new o ring as I remember) and at least carry it with you until your next coolant change when it can be easily installed. > >I was extremely fortunate that mine broke while in the St Louis region and that one (of the then half dozen dealers in the metro area) actually had the replacement part in stock. You clearly risk major engine damage driving with this part of the cooling system not functioning.

At the risk of starting a fight over the broader questions, (just as I am getting off the list) there is no doubt in my mind that cars, in general, run better and longer now than they used to. Consumer Reports has powerful evidence for this in their 40 years of annual owner surveys [e.g. see pp 285-286 April 1995 issue]. I assume the flange mentioned above was part of the movement towards plastics to save weight that all manufacturers have followed. This particular part seems to have been a mistake (given its vulnerability), and it appears that VW recognized this...at least after a few years.

John Foster


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