Dave,

    Welcome to the joys of DYI Vanagon maintaince 101. Just keep one thing
in mind, it's only going to get better from here! I have no idea what the
laws are in your area. Here in Southwest Louisiana, the place you bought
your oil from, must take the old oil back for proper disposal. You may call
your city office and ask about a Haz-Mat disposal depot near you. That still
leaves you with the transportation problem. Sounds like you tried to pore
directly from the over filled pan to the bottles, hard to do with a full
pan, Did you try an old cup or such to dip the old oil out of the pan? That
and a funnel, with some care you might be able to refill the bottles so you
don't have an "Exxon Valdez" event in your van. Old milk jugs, old
anti-freeze jugs, etc. I think Wal-Mart still sells a "catch/drain/disposal
pan", all in one for a few dollars, it is fully self contained, catches the
old oil and is a container to transport it for disposal!
    In the future you may find that a minor job like a DYI oil change is
just not worth the time and hassle to save the $10.00 or $15.00 over the
price of the parts and labor to have it done by your friendly Volkswagen
shop, just chose your shop carefully! Your concern of getting the right
parts, should be an issue as you should be able to either specify the brand
of parts or supply them your self.. This may not save you any $$$ but will
end the Brand X oil, & wrong oil filter worry anyway.

Have a good one.

Howard

>Subject: [VANAGON] Oil change experience

> Recently I did my first oil change on a Vanagon.