Date:         Tue, 4 Jun 1996 16:27:39 -0700
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         Dennis Gentry <dennis@cpac.washington.edu>
Subject:      Vanagon Towing damage; request for opinions

Greetings All,

I need advice on two fronts, legal and mechanical.

I have a sad story in progress.  Friday night, while zooming
(well, if 65mph counts as zooming) out I-80 past Fairfield (CA)
in my '80 Westy, I pulled over due to some visible smoke (an oil
leak, it turns out), and after observing a pretty healthy leak
from the oil cooler, decided to have the van towed instead of
driving it and possibly damaging it.  Well, the tow truck driver
put the van in gear to hook up, and forgot to take it out of
gear for the tow, which *definitely* damaged it.  :(

About 3/4 mile down the road, at 50mph, the left rear wheel
locked up.  We pulled over and I took it out of gear, which
released the wheel, but the engine wouldn't turn over.

At this point, I think the tow company is liable for the cost of
repairs (and I have 3 witnesses to the situation), but I thought
I'd ask if any of you have been in a similar situation before,
and how it came out.  I'm going to fax a description of the
incident to the tow company tomorrow morning to let them know
that I will eventually be submitting a repair estimate for their
payment.

Also, I'd like to find out just what the damage might be.  Any
suggestions for troubleshooting?

If it's both the engine (which had been rebuilt with factory new
heads less than 20k miles ago) and the transmission, maybe the
vehicle is worth less than the cost of the damage.  Does anyone
know how much an '80 Westy Vanagon with fair paint & interior is
worth?  (The engine rebuild was about $2,200, so it *was* worth
at least that.)

If I decide to take cash and part out the Vanagon, I guess I'll
take the '72 non-westy to Inuvik.  It's sure annoying that this
happened to the recently rebuilt engine, not the '72's run out
130,000 mile one.

Thanks for any advice!
Dennis