Hello;

My wife and I are new Vanagon owners and are looking for some sage
advice from the experts regarding our new vehicle.  It's an '84 and
we've done some traveling in it this summer and just loved it.  Now we
newbies need some help tweaking some of the bugs out.  We'd appreciate
any advice or wisdom the group can provide on the following:

Refrigerator -- We know its taboo to run the fridge with the vehicle not

level.  However, our driveway has some slope to it.  Will it damage the
refrigeration system to just park it for a week at a time on an incline
without running the refrigerator?  The refrigerator seems to have died
on us and this is the only reason we can think of.

Follow-up question --   Can I fix this myself?  What manual is
recommended?  Do the Bentley or Hayes manuals cover the camper functions

as well as the vehicle systems?

If fixing it in the driveway is out of the question, can anyone
recommend an honest garage that does good work on these vehicles?  We
live in the East San Francisco Bay area.

We are also missing some of the heater vent control knobs.  Are there
parts houses which can supply these or are junkyards our best bet for
small accessory pieces like this?