Westfalia, Type II, Bus, Vanagon, and all air cools!

[Labcabin]

Given the personality of TGR, I have to gather that there are many who are or have been into Vdubs. I have owned a 76, 77, and an 88 bus. I loved them all. They were all money pits, but some of my favorite rides. I loved working on them and understood the feeling when you finally got the timing dialed on those finicky engines. My water cooled 88 was just freakin awesome! However, the fact that the USA puts phosphate in their antifreeze was torture on the aluminum heads.

So I have a couple old photo's.

My '77


My '88




I am hoping to make a collection thread for you VW freaks. Maybe also leave advice and tips for those still into the scene. These are dying beasts, I never see them in concert parking lots anymore. Even the Dead and Phish lack the volume of 10 years ago (edit: I'm lucky if I see 2). They are very much harder to come by. I plan on owning another as a project car someday. I'm starting to think I need to buy soon.

[4matic]

Phosphate free antifreeze is and has always been available. It's Mercedes Benz OEM.

[Labcabin]

Phosphate free antifreeze is and has always been available. It's Mercedes Benz OEM.

You are correct. The problem was always that VW never made this known, so whenever you bought a used one, odds were good that some mysterious damage was already done. If I remember correctly the sign would be pink discharge from the heads through the rings. Van on the rag!

[Meadow Skipper]

Nice. Interestingly, thinking back to selling my 67 camper Type 2 stirs deep feelings of both regret and relief.

Every now and then I come across my old copy of the John Muir Complete Idiot's Guide to VWs and the heavily grease- and oil-stained pages remind me of the pain.

[Labcabin]

Nice. Interestingly, thinking back to selling my 67 camper Type 2 stirs deep feelings of both regret and relief.

Every now and then I come across my old copy of the John Muir Complete Idiot's Guide to VWs and the heavily grease- and oil-stained pages remind me of the pain.

I have seen a couple of those on Ebay recently. Fully restored and cherried out for close to 100 grand. Safari and such.


I don't mean this one. It's just eye candy!

[Meadow Skipper]

67s were pretty awesome - really nice camper layout, louvered windows in back, 12 volt (first year), split window (last year), 1500...even had a gas gauge.

Pure misery to drive through a desert or California's Central Valley in the summer.

If you ever ran into anything you were going to end up in the back with whatever you hit in your lap.

[Labcabin]

67s were pretty awesome - really nice camper layout, louvered windows in back, 12 volt (first year), split window (last year), 1500...even had a gas gauge.

Pure misery to drive through a desert or California's Central Valley in the summer.

If you ever ran into anything you were going to end up in the back with whatever you hit in your lap.

'88 went through the Rockies! Didn't have the balls with the '77. Heat and AC huge in the 80's!!!!!! I had some heat with and aftermarket blower in the '77. The '76 didn't even have the boxes.

[skajah]

Good times...





Bad times...



You know I've had my share...



83 1/2 (first gen waterboxer).
Had a re-build motor in it when I bought it 15 years ago, had to put another in a couple of years ago. I had "a gauge problem" for the longest time that 3 local shops could not diagnose. I say gauge problem because no one could figure out why the little red light would go on and the needle would tank right at startup when compression and everything else seemed to be all good. Ran it blind hoping I wouldn't cook it. The week after getting home from a trip to Colorado with several 12-13,000' passes, I cooked it something fierce, only 30 miles from home.
My friend found the guru of Westies around these parts for his rebuild (Some of you may know Zoltan the Hungarian) and he fixed me up including the gauge problem.
My second trip to Colorado in 2 years resulted in a failed fuel pump down in Colorado Springs resulting in 2 night at a motel with a pool much to the delight of my kids. (3rd photo)
Will soon have my 2nd tranny in and will be back at it, although I don't go far during the winter months.
I hang with a crew that all have Westies and Eurovans. It pretty funny when we all pull up in the ferry line all in single file. I've got that shot somewhere, I'll post it when I find it.
That second photo is on the Big Thompson on the way to Estes Park in better days

[DasBlunt]

The big problem with them is maintenance. After owning Audi a few times, they all posses a magic quality of emptying your wallet in a nickel a dime way, that becomes exhausting. And after reading ^^ that post, seems the van knew when to take a swim break.
but really....
I dream of a water cooled Subaru engine Syncro camper in my life, 25K+

Traveled a bunch in Utah, California, in both a 70 camper or 85 camper in past 25 years.

[skajah]

This ought to give a few of you some wood...

[liv2ski]

I know my kids (now adults) have some great memories of the 83 westy we had. Lots of camping trips and when I would get home from work with it, they would ask me to pop the top so they could play in it. To bad it was such a money pit and a lazy ass dog to drive on the freeway. I still look at them every now and then, but $25k, I don't think so.

[mobygrape]

had an 82 1/2, looked a lot like skajah's rig.

I'm with Jamespio there, great camper, crappy car, even with a newer engine. No pickup on the highway, it was a dog to get up snoqualmie pass.

when it was totaled, sold the engine and got a newer eurovan. Not the same dog, but much better fit for us.

I have a friend who's a VW nut. He owns several.
Here's his latest fixup, 72 panel bus.

[wicked_sick]

A good friend has an 82 that looks just like skajahs. It barely gets out of it's own way with the tired old diesel so he's in the process of retrofitting a 1.9l TDI engine out of a jetta.

[bagtagley]

We had Vanagons (not Westies) growing up. Started with an '81 two-tone blue diesel 3-speed manual with no radio, no A/C and brown corduroy seats. I didn't know enough to mind as a kid, but I have vivid memories of trips to the beach where my then teenaged sister was wailing about the heat with her head out the window. I got a "boom box" one Christmas, so I became the source of music for the vehicle, which also pissed my sister off. Dead reliable, but there wasn't really much to go wrong. It was painfully slow, even by Bus/Vanagon standards.

The old man upgraded to a barely-used '87 with the square headlights and bumper with the spoiler. This one had all the bells and whistles, but also had all the problems. Two cracked heads, the first covered under warranty, the second eventually covered by the dealer because they "forgot" to put in the anti-freeze the old man provided when the were replacing the first one. Also had a blow head gasket.

The transmission was finicky as fuck. When cold, you had to bump the throttle to get it to go into reverse. You had to do the same to get it to shift into overdrive. That, in addition to the two miles of throttle cable that liked to corrode and get sticky made for some good times. Plenty of cold mornings where I bumped the throttle to get it into reverse only to have it stick and rev the shit out of the engine...shut it off, run to the back, pile the shit out and hand turn the throttle, rinse, repeat. It got to the point where I quit putting stuff back there and left the foam pad in the passenger area and the hatch unlatched.

Heading home from college one time, we got on the interstate and I started pounding the throttle trying to get it to upshift. The linkage finally had enough and broke, leaving me without a throttle. We pulled the engine cover, and my buddy hand-throttled it while I yelled "less/more" back to him. Managed to get to a service station with a guy that had worked on VWs at a dealer for a long time. He rigged a fix that lasted until the old man gave it away years later. It's frightening to think of all the times that thing was packed to the gills with intoxicated teenagers. My buddy used to call it the Flying Coffin.

[guroo270]

A good friend has an 82 that looks just like skajahs. It barely gets out of it's own way with the tired old diesel so he's in the process of retrofitting a 1.9l TDI engine out of a jetta.

My dad had an old 23 window that he took to his sister's place to help her move in west L.A. in the 70's. He took the keys with him, and came back out literally 5 mins later and it was gone. He has never forgiven her for asking him to help her move.