Date:         Fri, 31 Jul 1998 09:11:35 -0700
Reply-To:     Ari Ollikainen <Ari@OLTECO.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <Vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         Ari Ollikainen <Ari@OLTECO.COM>
Subject:      MBZ Vito?
Comments: To: vanagon@vanagon.com
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

        While leafing through the current issue of Road&Track (or was it
        Card &Driver?) picture of a vehicle transporter loaded with
        Mercedes Benz Vito (?) mini-vans struck my eye. Allegedly the guy
        that snapped the picture in May of this year had chased the
        transporter over the LA freeways to its mysterious destination in
        Colton California...

        This raises the obvious question:

        Does MBZ intend to sell the Vseries in the US...at last?

        And in what configuration(s)? The ones I've ridden in were diesel
        powered and had seats for 9 and performed, from my perspective as a
        passenger, no differently than the 240D taxis that were everywhere in
        Europe in the eighties. As I recall, the Vseries was to be optionally
        powered with the VW VR6...perhaps this is the one MBZ is testing in
        California?

        Too bad VW's marketroids appear to be lobotomized ...the Mercedes
        alliance with Westfalia has produced an interesting line of leisure
        vehicles in the form of the Vito F, the Vito MarcoPolo, and the
        Sprinter JamesCook, none of which we'll be able to buy in the US,
        either!







      OLTECO                         Ari Ollikainen
      P.O. BOX 3688                  Networking Technology and Architecture
      Stanford, CA                   Ari@OLTECO.com
      94309-3688                     415.517.3519