Well Dr Dan........ I've always accepted your information as factual but
you're way off on the silver socket.
If you notice, they are found mostly on Vanagons with Air Cooled engines.
The Silver socket is to plug in your electric warming suit in winter
months.
The VW engineers speculated that it might cost somewhere in the
neighborhood of $2.87 to make the heating system on the air cooled fully
functional but this was not budgeted so they installed the silver socket
and had a vendor produce the Silver Sockets and Warming suits in an
effort to make enough Marks to generate budgeting for the needed $2.87
retrofit on the Air Cooled vehicles.
However BMW motorcycle captured the warming suit market by installing the
same silver socket ..... the $400.00 warming suit works wonderful but
requires about a 60 mph breeze to regulate it down to the point that you
don't roast.
This quality warming suit doesn't work well in Vanagons since the cold
breeze is only circulating at about 45 mph through the Air Cooled
Vanagons and Westies in winter months.
It has always baffled me why the air cooled heating system produces
enough heat to explode a soft drink can in summer months and shuts down
completely in winter months.
The lawsuit between VW and several Root Beer companies is still ongoing
when the Root Beer Companies coined the phrase *Frosty Mug* to describe
the faces of VW Air Cooled test drivers they saw around Hamburg in the
winter months.
I hope this sets you straight on the Silver Socket.
If you have one of these notorious Silver Sockets, stick your ignition
key in it, blow the fuse and neutralize its mysterious powers.

Stan Wilder
83 Air Cooled Westfalia

On Thu, 23 May 2002 14:32:44 -0700 Dan Snow <dieselvanagon@HOTMAIL.COM>
writes:
Snip >

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