John-

You aren't an idiot. A moron, maybe, but certainly not an idiot.

You CAN get acceptable power from the 2.0 liter without going into
crazy-weird stuff. Consider the following relatively inexpensive
improvements to your stock 2.0.
1. Replace crank with a counterweighted crank. Gives you a little more
top-end for better shifting/driving
2. Race balance whole motor. As above, plus adds reliability, and
incredible smoothness.
3. Swap 94mm pistons to 96mm hypereutectic pistons by NPR. Great highway
performance, add a couple of horsepower without much 'risk'.
4. Have your heads swapped out for a set of 1.7 liter heads, rebuilt, cc'd,
and ported. These heads have slightly larger valves, which will help the
96's breath a little easier.
5. Seal up all the leaks in your tin, make sure ALL of your cooling stuff
is in top notch shape. A cool motor will run faster, with more HP.
6. Wrap your exhaust manifold with Race-tec? (sp?) fiberglass insulating
web wrap. This eliminates radiant head against the bottom of the heads, and
keep your exhaust gasses from cooling, and thus slowing as they leave the
motor. Thus, your motor doesn' ave to do as much work to push the exhaust
out.

Most of theses are fairly inexpensive, and carry little risk, If you drive
like you have a brain between your jug-handles.

G. Matthew Bulley
Bulley-Hewlett
Corporate Communications Counselors
www.bulley-hewlett.com
Cary, NC USA
888.468.4880 tollfree

------------------------------------------------------------------------
----------------------
Get your FREE semi-private E-mail account, use your computer at work.

-----Original Message-----
From:   John Brush [SMTP:jbrush@AROS.NET]
Sent:   Sunday, December 19, 1999 3:43 PM
To:     vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
Subject:        Air Cooled Conversion

I don't usually like to ask stupid questions in a public forum, but I just
can't help myself this time :)

I have an 81 Vanagon, excellent condition and of course, paid for. I love
it, my children love to camp and tour with it, and I have no desire to
sell it. In addition, I don't see very many around here for sale in a
condition close to mine even if I wanted one. It has 200K on it, and runs
clean as can be, but its slow, as you might guess.

I would like more power. I don't necessarily need a ton, I just want to
upgrade a bit, plus I think it is only a matter of time until I am forced
to do it, so I would rather get a head start before its necessary. I work
better with no stress ;-)

My dumb question is this: Is it stupid to consider upgrading to a bigger,
air cooled motor? I drool at the idea of a turbo diesel, or something
exciting like that.

Would it be more work than would be worth it to update the van to water
cooled? Can a radiator be rigged elsewhere besides waaaay up front? The
clutch is all but new, so I would rather not mess with the transmission if
I could avoid it.

Anyway, rather than ramble, I will leave the deal at that and see if I am
stuck in the world of air cooled, low power vanagons, or not :-)

Thanks for any comments or suggestions. If you want to call me an idiot, I
prefer p-mail for that :-)

Regards from SLC, Ut

John