Date:         Sun, 30 Aug 1998 14:14:41 -0400
Reply-To:     William Dummitt <williamd@COMPUSERVE.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <Vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         William Dummitt <williamd@COMPUSERVE.COM>
Subject:      Summer trips w/o problems
Comments: To: vanagon list <vanagon@vanagon.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1

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