I had exactly the same thing with mine. PO tried to "fix" the leaky
heads with Barr's Stop Leak, and the only thing it sealed was the
radiator water passages. The clue that it's the radiator is that the
fan turns on. The fan is controlled by a separate temperature sensor,
up front by the radiator. If the gauge reads high AND the fan turns
on, then it's definitely getting too hot. Fortunately, radiators are
cheap. Unfortunately, they're a pain to put in, so unless you do it
yourself, it'll cost a little.

> 2.
> When I'm driving in traffic, the gauge gets way up, much higher up than on
> any of my previous vanagons.  When it gets up just about to the top, like
> 15/16th's, the cooling fan comes on and backs it down slightly, but not
> much.  There is no sign of overheating, though; everything looks good.  I
> drove it 1200 miles to Kansas City and back a couple of weeks ago, and on
> the highway it stayed right above the LED (the blinking LED) for the whole
> trip.  In traffic, it would climb way, way up there, the fan would come on,
> and it would go down slightly.
> 
> I replaced the instrument cluster with one w/tach out of an '84 a couple of
> weeks ago.  I was thinking maybe the gauge was bad, because my old cluster
> never got that hot on the gauge.  BUT, I did have the blinking LED problem
> on the old cluster as well.
> 
> I apologize for the length of this query, and I appreciate any and all
> suggestions.  This problem is making my Vanagon driving experience much more
> stressful than need be!
> 
> Thanks,
> Joe T.
> Denver, CO
> '85 Wolfsburg Westy
> 
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