Sorry about waiting to reply, been doing domestic duties before working on
Velma on my day off! I have ran into weird issues like that myself,I've
been lucky by loosening hose clamp,turning it a touch then re tightened. I
dunno why that's worked for me about a dozen times on miscellaneous
vehicles?? FM theory?

Velma 82diesel 1.6 na westy

On May 4, 2012 6:37 PM, "Rocket J Squirrel" <camping.elliott@gmail.com>
wrote:

(re-posted because not only were my van and I hibernating for the
winter, but my Vanagon list email account was set to "off" for the
duration. This was posted earlier today, before lunch Pacific time, and
no one commented so I became concerned that my post had somehow gotten
rejected by Gerry.)

We're back!

In preparation for this year's camping season, I've taken Mellow Yellow
(see sig for description) out of mothballs -- literally: the van was
sheltered in a Just Kampers cover all winter long and I had a bowl of
mothballs inside to dissuade mousies. Can't say whether it worked but
there were no mousies.

Took a few tries to get the engine started but it finally decided I was
serious and started.

I had a bunch of stuff to take to our storage space so I used that for
the first drive of the season. While I was waiting for a loading dock to
become available I noticed a coolant drip from under the right front.

After I did my tasks I drove home and parked the van, climbed underneath
and espied a drop of coolant at the bottom of the frontmost elbow of the
lower coolant hose, the radiator's outlet side, according to Bentley 19.12.

There are no visible cracks or failed parts, the clamp looks intact.

I let the engine idle for a bit, but it didn't resume dripping.

I really don't believe it fixed itself, and can't think of why sitting
outdoors under a cover could have resulted in a leak . . . could just be
timing.

Suggestions on what I should do at this point? We're pulling the dash
this weekend to take care of maintenance items, then we plan to go
camping next weekend. Sure would not like to have the leak come back and
worsen.

--
Jack "Rocket j Squirrel" Elliott
Bend, Ore.
1984 Westfalia. A poor but proud people.
1971 "Ladybug"-brand utility trailer ca. 1972 from a defunct company in
San Clemente, Calif., now repurposed as The Westrailia.

Sent from my kitchen.