At some point I think the tanks were redesigned or reformulated. In the
early years these failed so frequently I traveled with a spare. Both my 84
and 87 needed tanks before three years. I like to see them clear. If yellow
it is probably time to change them.

Dennis

-----Original Message-----
From: Vanagon Mailing List [mailto:vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com] On Behalf Of
David Beierl
Sent: Tuesday, February 22, 2011 11:12 AM
To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
Subject: Re: Coolant pressure tanks - it's time to examine them.

At 09:42 AM 2/22/2011, Kenneth Lewis wrote:
>   I was surprised how inexpensive a new one from the dealer was the last
>time I purchased one. It even came with the level sensor.

Yes, and it's one of those parts you really don't want to have
fail.  I also take Max's point about welding old stressed plastic -
and even worse, it would be contaminated by coolant.

As I said at the beginning, for anyone with an old tank I think it's
time to pull it and take a good hard look at it (if not just replace
it on general principles).  It does have the feature that unlike the
hard plastic parts it should give warning before it fails - if you
look hard for it.

Yrs,
d