Date:         Mon, 11 Jan 1999 19:36:38 -0600
Reply-To:     Tim Marciniak <tmarcini@MAIL.EXECPC.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Tim Marciniak <tmarcini@MAIL.EXECPC.COM>
Subject:      Re: Valves lifter knocking
Comments: To: Gilles Gallant <GGallant@RDS.CA>
In-Reply-To:  <s694d12e.037@rds.ca>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

At 3:21 PM -0500 1/7/99, Gilles Gallant wrote:
>Hi,
>
>  I recently store my 1990 vanagon for winter (I am living in Montreal and
>we have a lot of snow and calcium). After 3 week of storing, I went to the
>garage (heated one) and start my van but what a surprise when I started
>it, I got a big knocking around the engine and it seems to be the valve
>lifters that are empty.  Is there any solution to prevent that? how can I
>fill the lifter again? just by starting the engine?  If I do that a couple
>of time during winter will the lifter suffer from that?
>
>  Thanks in advance for answers.
>
>  You probably notice some grammatical mistake, I am sorry about that but
>my first language is french and I am not completly bilingual, but I try...
>
>  Gilles Gallant
>  1990 Westy
>  Montreal, Canada
>
Gilles,

The knocking you describe sounds pretty typical of any vanagon that been
sitting for a few days.  There has been much written and discussed about
this symptom and for this engine its completely normal.  The knock should
silence itself in a few minutes as the engine warms up,  it may even take a
10 or 15 minute drive for it to go away but it will silence itself.  I
would probably just start it up once every 3 weeks and let it thoroughly
warm up, drive it if possible.  I have found that cars that sit in storage
tend to have more problems than cars that are driven every day.  Seals dry
up, lifters go dry, batteries go dead etc.

Good Luck

Tim Marciniak
90 Multivan
Muskego, WI USA

By the way, your grammar is fine, we should all be as good as you at
expressing ourselves in a second language. :)