I love my Carat Automatic.  Yes there is a little power loss but it still
gets up and goes without any problem and it is more reliable than a 4spd.

The price is good too but I wouldn't believe the mileage.  Check the heads
for leaks and all the other stuff.  But if the engine goes bad it still is a
great van.  Just put an inline four from David Marshall in the back and
you're ready to go!

Alan Grobey
'91 Carat
Sherwood, OR

-----Original Message-----
From: Vanagon Mailing List [mailto:vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM]On Behalf
Of Alan J. Flint
Sent: Friday, November 05, 1999 9:44 AM
To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
Subject: Re: Carat

Advice and past experience:
        Beware of claims surrounding "broken" odometers.  Evaluate this
vanagon as if it had no odometer - on condition alone.
        As a new Vanagon Westfalia owner, I have to say that I would be
concerned about the power loss of the automatic.  Not much to spare as you
surely know from your '84.  Others will advise you better here.

Good luck.
Alan.

On Fri, 5 Nov 1999, karen brown wrote:

> I still love my '84 Westy, but I'd like a car for around-town driving.
I've
> found an '89 Carat with only 57k miles (the odom is broken but the seller
> says he has maintenance paperwork that shows that this is about the
correct
> mileage) for $3900.  My only beef is that it's an automatic transmission.
> Any advice or past experiences??
>
> Thanks, and happy Friday!
>
> Karen Brown
>