It's much less safe than your '85 Vanagon, which has a pretty solid front structure.  It's certainly not good enough for today's crumple zone and air bag requirement, but much better than just having a piece of sheet metal in front of you to keep the wind out.  My daughter had a low speed crash in our '78 van when she was 16 that nearly broke both her legs.  Of course I had just put a new engine and transmission in it, but I was able to sell them for about half of what they cost.

Search www.youtube.com for "vanagon crash test" to see what I mean.

Stuart
'85 Westy

Original message On Behalf Of Jeff Palmer:

I know it's not legal and I would never ever do it but sheesh you guys are ruining my dreaming. 
I would never sneak the car in mostly because it's not safe. And I'm a peace, order and good government kind of guy!  But at the same time is it more or less safe than my 85?

Jeff