HA!!!! You thought this would be simple!  The VW engineers of the past have
presented you with more than one choice of oil pan for your diesel Vanagon.

If you have the drain plug with the truncated cone tip and does not have to
be removed to drain the oil, I think you're out of luck.  The conical part
at the tip of the bolt bears directly on the aluminum pan for sealing.  I
had to have my pan welded to fix cracks caused by the stupid PO
over-tightening.  On the bright side, welding the hole closed and
drilling/tapping was not necessary.  My pan cracked on the reinforced area
on the inside of the pan, just inside the drain plug hole.  I had a thought
at one time that I should machine a groove in the conical part of the drain
plug to hold an appropriately sized o-ring to create a positive seal.  The
oil plug would still have to fully seat in its hole, but this would
certainly discourage over-tightening to prevent minor leaks.  I never got
around to it, but it still sounds good to me.  One of these days....

If you have the later pan that requires bolt removal to drain the oil, you
can and should have a washer between the bolt head and the pan.  This one
seals by clamping the washer between the bolt head and the outer pan
surface.

Mike Snow

-----Original Message-----
From: Vanagon Mailing List [mailto:vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM]On Behalf Of
Evil Pig
Sent: Tuesday, July 03, 2001 12:16 PM
To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
Subject: Diesel Pan plug

Hi folks,
My old diesel pan plug tends to leak
just a little, I'm wondering if anyone has
come up with a solution short of welding
it closed and redrilling for fixing that.
Is there supposed to be a weird gasket
of some sort??