Just looked at an 82 I have here with a rear drum off.
It is slightly tilted, yes.
Never had to think about that in the last 150 vanagon brake bleeding jobs.
I suppose there could be a tiny bit of air in a top corner there.

-----Original Message-----
From: Mike S [mailto:mikes@flatsurface.com]
Sent: Saturday, September 29, 2007 4:01 PM
To: Scott Daniel - Shazam
Cc: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
Subject: Re: Causes of rear brake soft pedal

At 04:34 PM 9/29/2007, Scott Daniel - Shazam wrote...
>I've bled like 4 million vanagon brake systems and have never had any
>rear
>wheel cylinder shenanigans like this.
>Are you sure your rear shoes are fully adjusted out to near the drums
>and
>your bleeding method is sound ?

One only has to look at the rear cylinders (at least on an '81).
They're tilted so the front end is significantly higher. Yes, they're
adjusted correctly, but that only leaves more space for a bubble to
form. The brakes "work" after a normal bleeding, but work much better
if you level the cylinder first.