> My mother owns a '91 Jetta Diesel.  I can drive from southern CT to
> central NY and back on a single tank (600mi).  It's great on fuel, almost
> never needs engine work, and is fun to drive...
> But, VWoA simply dropped the 52 hp diesel engine onto the regular
> gasoline tranny, so the torque is not taken advantage of, and acceleration
> is dangerously slow =^0
> 
For some reason, they did this around '89-90 or so. Earlier diesels 
used a different final drive and sometimes different gears (5th 
especially). My '85 is about perfect for a diesel - at 100km/h in 
5th, it turns only ~2600 rpm. Using a gas trans gives about ~3000-
3300 rpm depending on the model.

The only Vanagon diesel I've driven was similar (too noisy at 55mph), 
VW should've made the 5speed a standard item to fix this problem.

Shawn Wright (VWnut@smus.bc.ca)
'88 Westy (336k)
'85 Jetta TD (358k)
'69 Wife
'97 1st child (! :)