On Thu, 9 Feb 95 13:22:35 CST Steve Johnson said:
>I'm not sure why it's a stigma with VWs.  All cars catch fire.  Maybe the
>Beetle/Buses are labeled because those vehicles sold the most over the
>years and so it goes that they should have the most horror stories.  I
>really don't think it's anything to do with the design.  The fact that
>it sold to people with minimal incomes and typically would hold off
>or completely ignore replacing things like the fuel lines would tend
>to be a factor too.

i've always heard there were two things that caused vw engine fires:
- the air-cooled engine ran hotter than american water-cooled engines, and
  in doing so, 'dried-out' the rubber fuel hose.
- the german rubber simply was not able to stand up to the heat and use (they
  planned that the hoses should be replaced at regular intervals).

my own experience seems to favor #2 (cause my own water-cooled vanagon began
the leaking-fuel-line phase at six years of age ... and its engine runs a lot
cooler than an air-cooled).

perhaps the germans use more 'real' rubber, whereas the american use synthetic
rubber (which will still be here, in landfills and junkyards, for a thousand
years), cause 'real' rubber won't hold up to outdoor sun and heat very well.

joel