I am the original owner of a '90 Westy with 129k miles. The only time it let
me down on the road was on a gravel road when a small rock was thrown into
the power steering belt and knocked it off the pulley. I always carry spares
and replaced it and was on my way.
I drive very conservatively, 60-65mph, depending on whether I have a tail or
head wind.
It has never done anything that it shouldn't do, i.e. not start, not idle
right, etc. I take that back, it did have the intermittent hesitation at
highway speed, but that was fixed long ago with the VW harness fix.
I frequently, throughout the Western U.S., take "the road less traveled" and
I don't  WANT to break down in the middle of nowhere, so I practice
pro-active and preventative maintenance, something I also learned working in
a very large computer room where downtime costs $$$ and the phones light up
like a Christmas tree.

It also helps that I have owned it since new and been able to do this.
Nothing here says I haven't had problems, I just "head 'um off at the pass"!

Jerry
----- Original Message -----
From: "Andrew Fox" <afox@USGS.GOV>
To: <vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM>
Sent: Thursday, January 25, 2001 10:02 AM
Subject: Re: How fast should a 1.9L go??

> Hi all,
> Does anyone know if there is a relationship between the usual highway
speed
> a vanagon owner drives at and the length of time between head gasket
> failures or other major engine problems?  I've heard some list members
> mention that they have gotten 200,000+ miles out of a wasserboxer w/ no
> problems.  Are these the same drivers that refuse to push their vanagons
> over 4000 RPM?  Would some of the listmembers with impeccably good engine
> reliability please comment on their driving habits?
>
> Andrew
> 86 GL
>