Date: Mon, 4 Oct 1999 13:38:35 -0500
Reply-To: Marshall Ruskin <mruskin@PANGEA.CA>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: Marshall Ruskin <mruskin@PANGEA.CA>
Subject: Re: TBD sliding door screen
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
My 84 Westy has the fresh air duct above the door. Mine is a Canadian model,
though.
Marshall Ruskin
>Hello, Ron. I have 2 Vanagon Westy Campers and neither has the added fresh
air
>duct above the door. Looking at a later model Westy with the duct, it seems
>clear that this is the intended application for this screen. You should
list
>this fitting limitation in the product description so we don't buy it for
the
>wrong model. As far as I can tell, this duct is not present on 84 and
earlier
>models other than the 84 Wolfsburg Westy. I don't know whether or not it
is
>found on all later models. Without this duct it is not possible to fit a
lot of
>the snaps as the screen is simply too wide at the top. This puts the snaps
on
>the upper rear edge in the middle of the window glass. Obviously this is a
no
>go. If I cannot return this, I guess I may be able to someday pawn it off
on
>someone with the duct in their Westy.
>
>Mark
>
>The Bus Depot wrote:
>
>> > I purchased a zippered screen for the sliding door of my vanagon. There
>> > is no way that I can see to make it fit properly. Has anyone installed
>> > one of these in a manor that they find acceptable and if so, what year
>> > and model vanagon did it fit? Mine is too wide for the opening and the
>> > top snaps do not coincide with locations where a snap can be mounted.
>> > Also on the upper front side there is a zig that appears to be intended
>> > to clear the passenger side seat belt anchor. The problem is that it
>> > lines up with the lower anchor position, not the one that has the seat
>> > belt normally attached.
>> >
>> > Ron, can you resolve this for us?
>>
>> The screen I sell is an identical copy of the original Westfalia part,
other
>> than the zipper being a slightly different color. Rather than try to
>> "improve" on the Westfalia design, I opted to simply repro it, "warts and
>> all." The original screen was designed for mid 80's on Westfalias, so
some
>> differences may/will occur when using it on other years/models.
>>
>> A couple of list members, as well as myself, have already posted our
>> experiences installing this screen to the Vanagon list (and in fact one
of
>> the posts was quite detailed as I recall), so rather than to waste the
>> bandwidth repeating everything here, I'll refer you to the archives. The
>> bottom line is that Westfalia made some (in my mind) questionable choices
as
>> to where to locate the snaps. There is one unexplained zig in the shape
of
>> the screen that did not even match up to anything in the German Westy
that I
>> saw one of these installed in, and one of the snaps goes right under the
>> upper seat belt hook for no apparant reason. If you line up the slit in
the
>> screen with the armrest in your sofabed you'll get a basic idea of
>> positioning. Then the top snaps go along the air conduit, the rearmost
side
>> ones along the side of the van and along the sofabed, and the front side
>> ones along the side of the van. The bottom edge is designed to simply
lie
>> against the floor since it seals this way rather than with snaps, so it
will
>> bunch up slightly there. When installing mine, I opted not to use a
couple
>> of snaps that were, in my mind, placed inconveniently. The fit, once
>> completed, is reasonably tight. It does bunch up just slightly, and there
>> are a couple of spots where a small bug might be able to get through if
he
>> were really persistant, but overall the screen has functioned well for
Evon
>> and me during our camping trips this summer.
>>
>> Like I said, this is exactly as Westfalia intended it. Unfortunately,
they
>> did not provide any instructions, since many were dealer installed, but
the
>> archives do have most of what you'll need. In the future I may look at
>> coming up with a basic instruction sheet (nothing that isn't already in
the
>> archives anyway) or even modifying the screen just slightly, but for now
I
>> was content to simply offer what Westfalia did.
>>
>> - Ron Salmon
>> The Bus Depot, Inc.
>> http://www.busdepot.com
>> (215) 234-VWVW
>
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