Hi all:

As you may or may not know, I've been slowly, slowly rebuiding a couple
of air-cooled Vanagon engines.  I was doing this for reason I really can't
explain because the  GEX rebuild that was in the car seemed to have been
running just fine.

The "slowly, slowly" part got significanly accelerated when, about a week
and a half ago, the GEX self-destructed by snapping off the head of the
exhaust valve in number 1 cylinder.  Not a pretty sight.

Luckily, one of my rebuilds was almost to the point of "turn key" status,
and I installed it in my Vanagon.  (After a couple of detours for new CV
joints all the way around and all new seals in the transmission.)

I started the engine today and.... it ran!!!!  Yahoo!!!!  Gave it the 20
minutes at 2,000 rpm, changed the oil and filter, so I'm almost ready for
my first drive, after a check of timing, idle speed, and fuel mixture.

The GEX surprise is...  I emailed the President of GEX about my engine's
self-destruct after only 28,000 well-cared for miles and he agreed to
replace the destroyed parts and/or take the engine back for repair!!!!!
I haven't done anything about this yet since I've been busy, and I'm not
yet sure what I'll do, but after all the GEX-bashing that's gone on I was
surprised, to say the least, at GEX's response.

I'll let you know how this all works out.

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Tom Young               young@sherlock.SIMS.Berkeley.EDU
Lafayette, CA  94549    '81 Vanagon
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