I just had a similar problem with my 85' - I will try my best to explian it
(please bear with me I'm not a gear head - yet). I found that I had a
coolant leak. Of course the leak didn't make itself apparent unless the
engine was running and someone was giving it a little gas. What was
happening was once the engine and exhaust got warmed up the coolant was
leaking down onto the hot parts and creating the infamous blue/white smoke
you are talking about. It actually looked sort of neat coming out of the
side vents. I repaired the leak and haven't had any smoke problems since. I
was fearing the worst - or close to it anyway. You may not have the same
problem but it's worth looking into I suppose.

Thanks - Jeff

-----Original Message-----
From: Vanagon Mailing List [mailto:vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com]On Behalf
Of Andrew Fox
Sent: Monday, February 10, 2003 5:01 PM
To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
Subject: white smoke/power loss?????

Before I start repacing parts at a whim or paying someone $60 an hour to
work on this I would love to hear any advice on what to check or how to go
about solving this problem:

After warm up my 86 Westy intermittently blows lots of whitish/bluish
smoke out the tailpipe and simultaneously experiences significat power
loss.  Head gaskets were replaced 1 yr ago and it does not appear to be
loosing coolant or mixing coolnat into the oil.  The amount of smoke is
amazing.  It is kind of amusing when people are tailgaiting and they get
smoked real bad then they back way off.  The power loss is not sharp like
you would experience with loss of spark but rather a general loss of power
(about a 50% reduction) but it still stays running.

Thanks very much for any ideas!

Andrew Fox
86 Westy
Ft. Collins, CO