You might have bad rings.  Although I know you didn't do this, sometimes
this happens when someone installs a blower on an otherwise stock motor-it
shoots the dipstick right out!  I'd do a compression test, and see how the
rings are.

Craig

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Craig Standley                             cstand@u.washington.edu
University of Washington     http://weber.u.washington.edu/~cstand
Physics
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On Wed, 7 Oct 1998, Vernon Craddock wrote:

> This may be a silly question, but...
>
>         The dipstick in my '90 Vanagon will not stay in place.  Every time I
> open the licens plate, the dipstick has popped out about an inch.  Is this
> normal???  It does not require much effort to pull it out, but should there be
> enough pressure behind it to do this?  Does this cause/indicate other problems?
> The van runs very well and I want it to stay that way...
>
> Thanks,
> Vernon
>