Try putting on a new pressure cap--do the easiest things first!  Who knows
what it does when it's hot, which is why driveway testing is meaningless.

Stuart

-----Original Message-----
From: Vanagon Mailing List [mailto:vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com] On Behalf Of
Jim Felder
Sent: Saturday, July 14, 2012 3:28 PM
To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
Subject: 91 pops tank after tank

My 91 2.1 has been acting strangely. I don't drive it much; my daughter
drives it a lot though. It came down with Vanagon syndrome on Friday and I
THINK I fixed it by doing what I have done before on other Vanagons, which
is make sure the connections to the AFM cable were nice and clean. It's been
raining for days, that does take its toll on connections..

After I got it running again, I noticed the coolant was low, which is
unusual for thise van EXCEPT for the times it has had problems:

valve on the rear heater-popped the top of off the plastic housing.

one of the hoses

coolant tank--it has gone through two used ones a a new one in a little over
a year, possibly 18 months but way to soon. The tanks all split at the top.
I had this happen on my 90 years ago when it developed head problems. This
one will be the fourth.

Some time back I rigged up a pressure tester on a coolant cap to see if it
was reading too high. In the driveway, the numbers look good.
The trouble is, I can't see what the numbers are going to pulling a hill,
etc.

Car exhibits no other bad-head symptoms.

But it's got to be something, four tanks in less than two years is not a
coincidence.

Advice?

Jim