Date:         Mon, 7 Oct 1996 21:36:36 -0500 (CDT)
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         Jon Christensen <vvwca@primenet.com>
Subject:      I push started my 84!

Hi All,

After a long day at work I went out to find my Brownie Bus in the parking
lot with the headlights on since 1:00 (it was raining at noon).  Sure as
$hit, it would not even crank.  Meanwhile a couple of cops were putting
tickets on cars parked in a fire lane, watching me with grins on their
faces wondering what I was going to do.  I tried to push start it in
reverse since that was the easiest method.  Nope.  The cop's grins turned
to laughs.  By then I knew I had a good chance going downhill.  Push,
push,pushm, jump in, try 2nd, putt,putt,putt, give it some gas,
flurpel,flurpel,flurpel, vvvrrrooooommm!!!!  I wasn't so sure a Vanagon
would allow me to do that, but it worked!  I gave the cops a thumbs up and
they smiled and waved.  After the 7 mile trip home, I made sure it was
charged up, and all was fine.  8-)  I guess it's instinct to park on a
hill.

This episode reminded me of my high school years and my none-VW 57 Chevy.
For quite a while it had starter problems that I didn't have the $ to fix.
In order to get to school in the morning, I'd push it a level block to a
hill, jump in, turn the key on, jam the Hurst shifted 4-speed into second
and hoped like heck it would start and keep running without a choke on
those cold Nebraska winters.  Later in college, I finally turned my
vehicular attentions to VW's, strongly due to the influence of my father's
74 Bug that always started and got from point A to point B without
incident, esp. when my old Chevies weren't being reliable.  I guess we get
smarter with age..., but still park on hills.  8-)

Jon Christensen        /V\      Membership Coordinator for the
~Certified VW Nut      \W/        Vintage VW Club of America 
vvwca@primenet.com             Co-Editor of the VVWCA Newsletter 
http://members.gnn.com/vvwca        KC Kombis' NEATO Co-Rep