I had forgotten I shot this cheery yellow-and-beige air-cooled Vanagon last winter. As we have been on a bit of a Brougham-A-Thon lately, I thought now would be a good time to trot it out.
I have already done a Vanagon Westy CC (check it out here, if you’re so inclined), so I’m going to focus on the fundamentals.
Introduced in 1980 to replace the much-loved “Bay Window” Type 2, the Vanagon was much more car-like and was available with many more creature comforts. Early models were air-cooled just like the previous model, but due to overheating issues in warmer climes and ineffective heating in cold Midwestern areas, water cooling was added in the form of a 1.9L “Wasserboxer” four-cylinder in 1983.
Water-cooled Vanagons can be discerned by the extra grille below the primary faux grille, as shown on this ’84 model. And I mean faux in that it did not provide cooling to the engine, though it did contain the fresh-air intake.
Despite the Vanagon’s clear break from the previous “Widow’s Peak” and “Bay Window” Buses, the driving position was still quite bus-like, with an up-tilted steering wheel and high-rise driver’s seat.
image: hotwheels.wikia.com
I never knew anyone who owned one of these, but I was fully aware of Vanagons through the “Sunagon” tan and orange Hot Wheels Vanagon I got at an early age. Despite being a favorite of mine, and my destructiveness with my toy cars back then, my Sunagon has survived to the present day in near-mint condition. When we moved in 1995, I actually found the pop-up top for it. It had been missing for years!
The Vanagon hung in all the way to 1991 with little change save a 1986 facelift, upgraded seat trim and available alloys on more expensive versions. It was the last of the original VW-type van, as the ’92 Euro Van took a page from Ma Mopar with a front engine and FWD. They may have been more practical, but they were not as cool as Vanagons like these!
Drivers under 50 often didn’t experience these vehicles although they were sold in the US until 1991. They just didn’t sell once American manufacturers figured out how to put a box on wheels and make it capable of climbing hills, go expressway speeds, and get out of it’s own way. These vehicles couldn’t do any of that.
My German neighbor was enamoured of German cars, so he had a few of these. We could always hear him driving off in them because of the noise they made as he tried to budge them down the road. The little engine would whirl loudly and make farting noises and the van acted like a constipated whale that attempted suicide by beaching itself in our street.
So I rode in more than one and always expected the experience to be pretty miserable. Having such low expectations each time better prepared me for a trip that seemed to take twice as long as it would in a normal car.
The reason so many of these vehicles were decked out as campers is because they took so long to get anywhere, you needed to pack a friggin’ lunch. You needed a refrigerator so your groceries wouldn’t spoil getting them home from the store. I guess guys owning these things felt that their families wouldn’t mind taking longer to get anywhere as long as everyone got an on-board snack, a deck of cards and some recreational drugs.
When this model was unveiled, more than a few of us saw the grille and wondered if VW finally figured out that a van should have it’s engine in the front like a normal van. Once we realized that wasn’t the case, we readjusted our expectations to their previously low positions of this vehicle. There was no way VW would bother to update the body AND make the engine capable of actually performing.
Having such piddle-poor performance wasn’t the only problem with these vehicle.
They were tippy. If you didn’t eat breakfast and no one served you food at the cafe table inside, you could end up barfing as the Vanagon pitched and swayed. Seating so high upon such an abnormal chassis position took a bit of orienting. Young inner ears twisted in young heads, trying to fathom the direction they were traveling. If you got stuck seated backwards, coupled with the pitchy ride and sway, it is no wonder how us kids kept the weight off or why yack-colord paisley stay fashionable among VW kids.
Somehow these vehicles got a reputation for being dependable, or that is one of the reasons given to onlookers wondering why someone they knew bought these vehicles. Our uncle said so, and he was a smart businessman. He didn’t make us pay for gas as we were driven around sightseeing in Colorado, and we were too cheap to afford it anyway.
Nothing prepares you for driving uphill in these things. You load one of them up and the world stops as you attempt an incline senior cyclists could climb while chain smoking unfiltered Pall Malls. Once while we were trying to climb a hill in my uncle’s VW, I swear I saw us passed by along the side of the road by an animal just hit by a car and still bleeding out it’s butt, looking for a place to die and bloat up. The poor creature was limping, but still moving faster than that van.
If you sat in the back, the radio couldn’t be loud enough to be heard over the jammering of that little engine – that couldn’t. This was really a sad piece of work to put into a vehicle capable of carrying people, anyone of whom could weigh over 10 pounds. Even with the manual transmission slammed into first gear, it struggled to get us over Route 34 near the Continental Divide.
By 1996, I got into a new German VW bus – as a American university student in Germany – and it was loaded with performance options capable of thrilling acceleration and performance. While it still gave me a sensation of tipping over on curves, it seemed that after fifty years, VW figured out how to make their van move. My buddy let me actually drive it, and it was OK. It was also damn expensive. I couldn[t figure out why anyone would have one. His father needed it for his hardware store in Niedersachsen.
Let’s stop before we discuss rust. A real problem in these vehicles driven where roads required salting.
I give this post my vote for the funniest piece I have ever read on this site. Hilarious!
It was funny.
Ah I see I’m not the only one who can see faults in VWs Overheating in warm climates was always a VW problem its the main reason they are not reliable and possibly the reason the engines only last a matter of months before dieing. Slow is a VW word any hill stops one like running into a wall crawler lanes are installed here so trucks can get around Volkswagens and water cooling the chaffcutter at the back didnt work all that well either it leaked and the vans broke down again. Old Spits and Bays are cool but crap these didnt make cool just crap.
Well that was a surprisingly entertaining read from a person dealing in vanilla.
A couple of points (believe me, there are tons more):
-what you call a “faux grill” is not as faux as you think, a good portion of the radiator is exposed behind it.
– in ’82 and ’83, North America did get a water cooled I4 diesel powered vanagon. Slow as heck (I had an ’82 westy diesel). Was an un-turbo’ed 1.6 litre engine. Rest of the world continued with the diesel, getting both a 1.6 turbo and a 1.7 naturally aspirated.
– the slight body style change happened through the ’85 model year. Some nice changes happened – better fuse panel and improved sliding door for example.
– awd syncro model introduced in ’85 model year.
– 16″ wheel version of the syncro (not in North America though) had reinforced body and suspension, different R&P ratios.
– The syncro running gear was designed and installed by Steyr Puch in Graz Austria. Bodies shipped from Germany (Hannover?).
– 1992 was last year of production in Europe. Limited numbers though. Production continued in South Africa until 2002.
I’ve owned 2 Vanagons, the aforementioned ’82 diesel westy (I put an 1.8 litre gas engine in it in ’94) and currently have an ’86 syncro (still with stock 2.1 boxer). Daily driver and backroad/logging road escape pod. Never let me down, never been stranded. I really like the vehicle.
My blog has some of my trips and mods to the van:
http://shufti.wordpress.com/
alistair
One of my fav pics of the syncro from last summer (west coast of Vancouver Island)
I rode in these several times when my GTI was in for service, since my dealer used one as a courtesy shuttle. I remember being surprised that VW was still using anything with the old boxer in it, water cooled or not. Can’t say that I ever had a desire to own one of these.
I cannot get past the disgusting color combination inside and out. Yuck!
Friend had a mid-1960s VW bus and it was great fun to cruise the burghs of the east San Francisco Bay Area.
Few hills to contend with.
Up just high enough to provide a better view than the typical car.
Quintessential Baby Boomer my friend, the VW’s owner, and I.
We looked so neat on the seat as we rolled around observing the huddled masses who I have no idea if they were yearning for freedom.
We may have had more fun than some wealth-endowed dude in his $70,000 Porsche or whatever.
I’m a VW Bus guy, more of a split window one than anything else and I can tell you that you wouldn’t dare catch me in a Vanagon unless it had some sort of engine swap.
The aircooled engine was slow in the splits and baywindows but this generation was just too much for it. Then the waterboxer sure loved to blow those head gaskets. Ugh.
I knew a guy with an ’80 Vanagon Westfalia camper. My ’67 Bus with a 1600 would easily out run him. That’s really sad.
I LOVED riding in this van.
But as a young child, I have almost as many memories of riding in a tow truck with my mother. She bought her 84 Vanagon GL, brand new. Two-tone navy with blue.
If the Vanagon was going to overheat, it would generally be within the first 10 minutes of driving. If you made it to 10, we were good to go. Usually Dad would drive it around the block several times to see if we were in the clear to go somewhere. Keep in mind, the van was only two years old at this point.
This thing left us stranded everywhere. Grocery stores, relatives homes, even on Christmas morning.
I remember one roadtrip alone with my Mom. It was late at night, in a rural area between Sacramento and Petaluma… I was very sick and kept throwing up. Mom was crying, but she wouldn’t stop the car. She just kept repeating “I’m really sorry honey… We have to keep going… We’re almost home. I can’t stop the car or it might break down again.” Ah, the days before cell phones.
After 3 years of overheating and untraceable coolant leaks, My parents finally threw in the towel. I remember tearfully hugging the Vanagon goodbye before I left for school one morning.
Dad sold the 3-year old Vanagon to a man for $6000 in 1987. He gave the new owner an honest account of why we were selling it. Despite Dad’s advice, the new owner planned on driving it across the country. We never saw it again.
25 years later, I still long for a Vanagon of my own. Dad thinks I’m crazy. I really loved this van. This one just didn’t love me back.
The antidote to VW van performance woes: Porsche installed a Carrera engine in several T3 Vanagons, calling it the B32, for use by the 959 racing team, I hear. Naturally they tuned the suspension a bit as well. Despite the brick aerodynamics, they claimed it would surprise GTIs on the Autobahn, maxing out at ~130.
http://www.autoblog.com/2008/04/15/did-you-know-porsche-built-a-vw-t3-vanagon-based-b32/
Ah…so much Vanagon hate. I share hostility towards the Volksvagenwerk service volk…but the vehicle itself…it suited me to a T.
It was a bit active in the ride department, yes. Due to the soft springs and short wheelbase. But if the shocks were up to it, it shouldn’t have compared to an English Channel crossing.
The driving position, in SOME ways, compared to a bus. I found that a good thing – I liked my time driving buses. Some of them are designed with a thought for the driver. Although…the Vanagon steering wheel took pains to be in a car position, including to an obviously-tortured kink in the steering shaft. Having it lap-set would have saved cost and maybe even made it easier in use.
The water-cooled model was a bit noisy; but then, my experiences were of econoboxes. The Vanagon Westfalia compared well against those in noise.
Reliability? Good. Until it develops issues, and then the challenge is, getting it fixed instead of getting one’s self gulled.
So I bought a VW 1980 T25 T3 that was made in West Germany and imported from Manchester UK to New Zealand in 1988. So what do a call it? Transporter, Vanagon or ?