At 01:36 AM 7/24/2009, Jake de Villiers wrote...
re: pushing reset while moving
>Old wives tale, that.  I've been pushing my reset button on the move
>for
>~145,000 miles on the one van and  ~15,000 miles on the other and my
>odometers are both still working.

Correct. The first thing that happens when you push the reset button is
that it moves a row of linking gears away from the counting wheels (and
the driving gear), so the wheels are free to turn and be reset. Very
soon after, some fingers push on cams on each counting wheel to reset
it to 0.

I made some pictures where this can be seen

http://www.flatsurface.com/vanagon/speedo/