Paying $8000 for almost ANY vehicle that old is out of line!
You did the right thing. In the 60's we were junking 5 year old
cars.
            Eric                   86-VW4x4
            vw4x4@fyi.net          72-240z
            Pittsburgh, PA USA     1936-Chrysler

On Mon, 9 Nov 1998, Mark Gajewski wrote:

> I went to look at an '86 Westy on Sunday.  Actually I think it was a
> weekender with pop top (and bed up there) but frige/sink/stove looked
> like aftermarket add ons, not westy originals.  Stove and fridge were
> behind passenger seat (so seat couldn't rotate, although is has the
> rotating feature) Sink was behind driver's seat and blocked the rear
> sliding window. Has anyone ever seen/heard of this?
> Anyway, it was in quite nice shape, but left cylinder bank has white
> "scale" all along the bottom edge of the water jacket right along the
> edge of the valve cover.  Also, inside engine compartment there was a
> coating of the white "scale" all over the front left side of the
> compartment, almost looked like it got sprayed there.  Anyway, owner
> told me he was losing coolant for a while but couldn't tell from where
> and just kept topping up the level (every few thousand miles he said).
> Then he put stop leak in and no more losing coolant.  He got it pressure
> tested by a mechanic who told him he had a very small leak probably in a
> hose somewhere.
>
> Anyway, he was asking $8000 and I told him I was passing unless he could
> go way down figuring I would be in for an immediate Head job.  He
> refused my offer and told me he paid $9000 10k ago and that he believed
> the van is in great shape (136K, good shape I'd say).  He said Blue book
> is $9000 which sounds high to me.
>
> My question:  did I do the right thing?  Does this sound like bad head
> gaskets/pitted heads or at least the early onset of?  What do you think
> a weekender outfitted to an aftermarket camper set up should fetch
> (136K, body decent w/some dents one bondo patch over rear wheel)?
> What's a reasonable deduction for heads on a motor with this mileage (I
> figured $2K)?  I'm hoping a nicer specimen comes along in my area (NE)
>
> Mark
>