Date:         Sun, 5 Sep 1999 21:07:18 -0700
Reply-To:     harald_nancy <harald_nancy@EARTHLINK.NET>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         harald_nancy <harald_nancy@EARTHLINK.NET>
Subject:      Auto trannie final drive fluid level
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1

Marshall Ruskin wrote:
> A fellow listee (Bob Berkemer) suggested the following maintenance task
> in a p-mail - and I am posting it with his permission:

>Check the level of the gear oil in your differential. Often overlooked in
>automatic vanagons. When I bought mine used from a VW dealer it was
> empty.........
>Fill to level of hole. A bit messy if you over fill and the gear oil
stinks
>but its a cheap maintenance procedure and important.

My 2 cents:
I can't argue with that, especially since that is what the Bentley
recommends and the Haynes says the same.
To make it more complicated:
The odd thing is  Bentley on page 39.50 says
Capacity of automatic final drive "capacity 1.5 liter (1.3 U.S. qt)"

Now if you take off the oil pan from the final drive to drain the oil,
and refill the f.d. with 1.3 U.S. qt, the level will be 3/8 inch below the
fill hole.
On my automatic, if I fill it level with the fill hole, it takes 2 qts  +.
Also, after having driven thousands of miles with oil filled level
with fill opening, I discovered the drive flange oil seals started seeping.
That seeping stopped after I refilled with only 1.3 U.S. qt.
Anybody else with auto tranny noticed?
Wish you all a nice Labor day.
Harald
'90 auto westy