Hi Folks,

I'm a new vanagon owner, but experienced type 2 Westy owner, and I'd be
very thankful if anyone can help me with this scary ($$) problem.  My
recently acquired '88 Westy is exibiting the following symptoms:

1. The temp gauge is always at least 3/4 full scale.
2.  It 'boils over' under moderate loads before the gauge registers full
scale and the radiator usually feels warn to the touch.
3.  The fan comes on only when it's really hot AND at idle or low RPMs.
It's not running when I pull over after the flashing light comes on.
4.  When bleeding the cooling system, things get flakey once the engine
gets hot (ie. at a constant 2K RPMs, it sporatically overflows the
reservoir, then bubbles).  I've managed to bleed it as long as I'm
fairly quick about it.
5.  Doesn't seem to 'boil over' under consistent conditions.  Seems
somewhat unstable.

Other things to consider:

a.  It gets runs good, has good power and gets 20MPG+ on the highway.
b.  It has VW-approved blue coolant (installed by VW - a fiasco, but
that's another story).
c.  It has a new thermostat (see #b).
d.  Heads appear to be bright and shiny compared to the block (??).

I've done a bit of research poking about on the net and have a couple of
hunches.  It seems as though there may be two problems.  One is that
there seems to be some blockage in the system which doesn't allow
sufficient flow through the radiator (merely warm when temp is high).
There's also a greasy film which coats my reservoirs; could it be some
sort of 'Stop Leak' product?  The second problem could be that exhaust
gasses are leaking into the cooling system sporatically when it's hot,
forcing coolant into the overflow and creating a 'boil over'-like
condition (indication).  I've read that you can sometimes fix this
problem by re-torquing down the heads.  Is this hard to do?

Anyone have any insight and/or suggestions?

Thanks,

Dick Myers
San Diego, CA
'78 Westy
'88 Westy