At  1/20/2007 01:09 PM, Dave Vickery wrote:

>Conversions are justified if you want more power, not reliability.  The
>engine might be more reliable but the conversion and related things will
>have you tinkering on it every weekend (really) and I wonder now whether I
>like working on my van more than going places.

I have to disagree with this statement based on my experience.
18,805 miles (plus, my speedo didn't work for almost a month) on my
Subaru 2.2 conversion. The engine had 130,000 on it when I put it in.
I had to change the head gaskets on the Subaru engine, I should have
done that when I was putting it but I didn't. That works out to one
weekend working on the engine since last May (8 months) and I did
that with the engine in the van. That's a touch better reliability
than I had with the 2.1 that came with it <g>.
FWIW my '87 Vanagon drives like real car merging on to the freeway
now, even merging up a hill.

Rob
becida@comcast.net

With a '91 Subaru 2.2 in an '87 Vanagon in western Washington.