Date: Fri, 3 Apr 1998 15:53:33 -0800
Reply-To: Malcolm Holser <mholser@ADOBE.COM>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <Vanagon@vanagon.com>
From: Malcolm Holser <mholser@ADOBE.COM>
Subject: Kelley Park
I'm going to try to go to San Jose Saturday, and get in line for KP
on Sunday morning. I'll be driving the Syncro Doublecab to show it off
(but not planning on entering -- no appropriate class since it ain't
"vintage"). I'll hopefully be bringing my '80 Westy to leave in San
Jose. Any suggestions on places possibly to stay for Saturday night,
mebbe Sunday as well? Are all the voyagers meeting someplace to camp?
Malcolm
1986 Vanagon GL
1986 Syncro Kombi Transporter
1986 Syncro Doublecab Transporter
1980 Westfalia
----
parters...
1978 bus, 1981 Vanagon, 1983 Diesel Westy... that's *7* now
By the way, on the reliability of waterboxers thread on vanagon.com:
My waterboxers do better than my airboxer -- they drop valve seats like
Henny Youngman dropped bad jokes. There are lots of ads for places like
Mark Stephens where they assure you that their heads are better. The
waterboxers have head/case leaks (not really head gaskets), but I have
not experienced this -- the two Syncros only have 80,000 miles each, the
86 Vanagon has about 120k, the Westy about 140k. No leaks so far on any
of the wet ones, but two dropped valve seats on the air-pumper.
All VW engines suffer from weak areas -- the old ones were weak on
cooling for #3, weak on cases, weak on head studs. "Case savers",
welding behind one of the case webs, and line-boring to fix the pounded-out
mains is legion. The Type4 engines have stellar bottom-ends in that nice
aluminum case, but parts are expensive and they drop valve seats. Most
are burdened with horrific smog crap (I think the '80 California one is
the least burdened). Altogether, I like the 86-91 waterboxers the best of
the batch -- lots of power (relatively...) and good reliability. What is
the worst engine VW ever built? I don't know -- most have weaknesses. I'd
guess my favorite was the doghouse beetle engines, but these never were in
US buses, and as stock they have finicky smog stuff as well.
On electronic ignition:
I just spent some time rebuilding the ignition system on my '80. I would
expect that the 1980-1985 Vanagon's electronic ignition would make a nice
system on most any old VW if you can find one at a wrecking yard. They
are *very* simple, and "all VW". You will need the distributor, coil and
"ignitor" module complete with the wiring, but it is all drop-in from there.
Most mid-80s Rabbits/Golf/Jettas used the same coil and ignitor, so parts
easy to find in the yards. The ignitors and coils are pretty expensive
otherwise.
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