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Subject:Re: What year vanagon to buy?
From:SyncroHead
Date:Fri, 24 Apr 1998 02:37:23 EDT

In a message dated 98-04-23 20:35:39 EDT, julio@INTERGATE.BC.CA writes:

> Hello everyone, I am a new listee, and although I do not own a vanagon at
> the moment I plan to have one buy this summer.

Hello Julio.  Welcome to th list!

> My question to all of you out  their is what year vanagon westfalia should I
look for?

My preference is for the 1986 to 1991 vans.

>What is better aircooled or the wasserboxer?

There's a BIG question.  Many prefer the air cooled, but I find that I still
desire more power than my 87 & 88 "wasserboxer" engined Vanagons provide, and
the air cooleds have even less.

>What year did VW change to the wasserboxer water cooled engine?

In the USA (depends on the country) VW sold air cooled gasoline and
watercooled diesels for the first half of 1983.  In the middle of 83, they
switched to all 1.9L, 82HP wasserboxer equipped vans.  This 1.9L was used
through 1985.  In 1986 VW implemented an improved design 2.1L, 90HP
wasserboxer and used it till Vanagon production ended after the 1991 model
year.

> and finally what year did VW change from round headlights to
> the square headlights?

1986 -1991 used the square style lights.

For more details on the 1986-1991 models look in the "info" section at:
www.vanagon.com
You'll find a description of each Vanagon model for the USA market there.

Good luck,
Jim Davis
87 GL Syncro
88 GL Wolfsburg