Back in 1990 I was faced with needing heat from my '79 van, we were
in Hawaii and were moving to Chicago. I was looking into the aux gas
heaters. I bought an '86 syncro, that solved the heat problem.
Probably not your answer but maybe the aux gasoline heater would work for you.

Keep in mind your idea of heating water off the aircooled engine will
probably work with a good bit of tinkering. If you really enjoy the
tinkering then go for it, but there are other already engineered
fixes for the need for heat.

Rob
becida@comcast.net

At  2/4/2007 06:22 PM, neil wrote:
>Hi all.
>
>BION (believe it or not) I have an actual Vanagon question.
>
>On a 2L AC engine. An idea that's been on my mind.
>
>How crazy is this:
>
>Open up heater boxes,
>
>wind 3/8" or 1/2" soft copper pipe around each exhaust pipe,
>
>assemble/install boxes, (plug hot air outlets)
>
>connect copper coils to create a circuit
>
>install pump, heater core, etc.,
>
>run coolant through to provide interior heat?
>
>Other parts would include an expansion tank, fan etc. Likely the
>biggest cost would be the pump.
>
>Hard to answer, but would there be enough heated coolant present in
>system to provide any appreciable amount of heat?
>
>Purely hypothetical, though i do have 2 spare heater boxes.......
>
>Likely someone has tried this before, but I am curious.
>
>
>
>Pax,
>
>
>
>--
>Neil Nicholson. 1981 Air Cooled Westfalia.
>
>http://web.mac.com/tubaneil
>
>New Video!
>
>Dash board removal:
>
>http://web.mac.com/tubaneil/iWeb/Site%205/Movie.html