Since newbies on the list are often apalled by the number of posts regarding problems, I thought I'd post a boring one. I just drove "Wendy" my 87 Westy, (132K miles now) from my St. Louis home on trips to Maine and Wyoming plus numerous shorter trips, total over 10000 mi. The Maine trip included a stop at Transporters by the Tunnel (thanks Stan for a great job) where I got to meet many listmembers I'd previously known only in their cyber personas. The nearest things to problems I had were a leaking hose clamp and a clogged AC drain hose. Also, it was a good road test for my ECU fitted with Darrell Boehler's digifant cable. Any concerns about interference from power lines, etc. were dispelled. The van performed absolutely normally at all times. I kept careful track of gas mileage the entire summer. I was struck by the effect of speed and wind. On long 2-lane stretches at 50-55 mpph, I approached 25 mpg. At 75 mph with a headwind it was as low as 15 mpg. Average for the whole trip was about 18 mpg. As usual the camper complained about crossing the Rockies and made her displeasure known by making me drop to second gear on high passes, but made it nonetheless. I put a lot of hours into fixing up this van last winter, and it was very satisfying to have it pay off with some great trips. To cap it all off, the camper won first place in the vanagon class at the local Strassenfest VW show, after a hasty post-trip cleanup. If only all the trips could be like this........ Bill www.geocities.com/yosemite/gorge/1706 |
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