At 14:18 10/25/2000, robot . wrote:
>Love my Vanagon, but don't start comparing "well Built Cars" and
>"Engineering Supiriority". There is a reason VW lost the market share it
>once had in the US.

Seems to me they went from 41% *world* market share to 10% in ten years or
so -- that was when they laid off 150,000 people.  They were better than
average once, but they stayed put while the rest of the world got
better.  When I was a kid in the '50s everybody knew that you had to
rebuild a car's engine at 60,000 miles, and Vanagons are *way* better than
that....

So far I think only VW has come up with the combination of qualities that
make the Vanagon and Microbus uniquely useful, and even they IMHO missed
with the Eurovan.  But their engineering didn't keep up with the times.  I
own an '84 Vanagon and I've owned an '84 Tercel, and next to the Tercel the
Vanagon is obviously crude.  The wiring looms are crude, the connectors are
crude, the heating system is crude, the fusebox is crude, the assembly is
crude, the plastic is crude, the rubber is crude, the seatbelts are crude,
the transmission is crude.  It's a great vehicle, IMHO one of the historic
vehicles of the world, but reliable (in modern terms) it ain't.  I wish
Yoshi would take his to Toyota and get them to re-engineer it....

david
David Beierl - Providence, RI
  http://pws.prserv.net/synergy/Vanagon/
'84 Westy "Dutiful Passage"
'85 GL "Poor Relation"