--snip--
> Changing out a manual Vanagon trans is easy. It's
> more complicated with the Syncro, and a real bear
> in a automatic.
>
> I make one concession- If I found someone to
> replace the automatic trans for 1,000, and the
> Vanagon was worth several thousand, like a
> camper, I say- yes.
--snip--

This must be a 'different strokes' kind of thing... I find auto trannys in
general easier to r&r than the manuals I've done. It does help to have a
second person for a few minutes to put the auto back in the vanagon but it
isn't strictly necessary. I haven't done a vanagon manual and after reading
what you guys go through with them I don't know that I want to, but the auto
seems pretty straightforward.
The worst time I ever had putting a tranny back into a car was a five-speed
on a Rabbit diesel with the engine in. I must've been doing something wrong
in the first place, and I think if I ever had to do it again I'd drop the
engine and put them back as a unit.
My floor jack had crapped out and I put the tranny on my chest and benched
it while my step-dad tried to guide it onto some splines on the flywheel, or
vice versa (this was twenty years ago). I must've benched that damn thing
forty times before we got it on right. It slipped one of those times and
dumped a bunch of gear oil on my face, mouth and neck. For years after
whenever I smelled that rank 90w smell I would gag. Yum.

Cya,
Robert