Don't think this is going to be of much help, but your suggestion of
"damage to the transmission" reminds me of my teenage years, when I drove
an old 67 Parisienne (nicknamed by my friends as "The Boat"), handed down
to me from my father.  In order to save gas, I used to coast to a stop by
popping the shifter into neutral and applying the brake (there WERE no
hills in Winnipeg), when one time I inadvertently popped the shifter TOO
FAR and ended up jerking the automatic transmission to a halt by going into
reverse while the car was still rolling forward.  Ouch.

Katherine
89 Westfalia

At 3:08 PM -0700 5/7/98, Stuart wrote:
>My '90 Multivan gets only 16-17 mpg.
>Is this normal?  It's an automatic.
>
>Would coasting in neutral down hills help much? (Sure keeps the RPMs
>down.)
>Or would this do damage to the transmission as I pop it in/out of
>Drive/Neutral?
>TIA,
> Stuart