Date:         Tue, 18 May 1999 21:16:10 -0700
Reply-To:     Valued Cutomer <ned@DIRECT.CA>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Valued Cutomer <ned@DIRECT.CA>
Subject:      84 voltage stabilizer

My friend's vanagon is an 84 (US model with a/c, std trans)that has
recently overheated due to a broken hose off the right cylinder head.  She
asked me to look into the situation and have since replaced both heads.
 The van is running fine but... no temp gauge or led and no fuel gauge.  I
looked at the Bentley at the library and looked at the voltage stabilizer
as a starting point.  The photos show all three pins connected to the
printed circuit board (foil).  This is what you would expect of course but
when I went to check hers out only the two outer pins are connected.  There
is no accomodation for the center pin (ie. nothing is broken off).  I
measured battery voltage across the two pins which was almost 12 V.  Does
this mean it is toast and not dropping the voltage to 9.5-10.5 like the
book says or does this particular stabilizer supposed to just pass battery
voltage to the diagnostic circuits? I talked to VW here and they haven't
seen a stabilizer setup as I have described.  Has anyone seen such a thing
and where would I get the replacement stabilizer if it needs replacement?

ned  (too many vw's to list)