NSR: our old VW bus

[Stig / Major Tom]

Came across this old photo this morning....1991 GL Vanagon

This baby was like waxing a 3 bedroom house!
Loved it for 21 years!
My one complaint: VW sent them over with a Michelin tire not sold in the USA.

We were the only folks on our side of the street with a vehicle made in Austria!
Never seen anything that beats a VW bus for 'people space' in the design...4cyl EFI. w/c, engine is under the mattress - rear seat flips down, slides forward flat for a bed. The camper versions are still going for big $$ these days - but only seat 4, so we bought the 7-seat passenger model.




I kept a German (München, place of my birth) license plate on the front for years. Never once question about it - though wife was sure I would be sent to Riker's Isl. for it.
Stig

Parked behind it is wife's '89 Jetta in nearly the same color.

[randyo]

I might have an old 35mm photo of mine somewhere,  but my son saw one identical to mine a few days ago and sent me a pic
  known to my son's  friends as the "hippy van"  mine had a gas heater. '81, last year of air cooling

[Iahawk]

can't recall the last time I saw a VW van..guess they're old enough to have all rotted out, here.  Great pics.

[Stig / Major Tom]

I might have an old 35mm photo of mine somewhere,  but my son saw one identical to mine a few days ago and sent me a pic
 known to my son's  friends as the "hippy van"  mine had a gas heater. '81, last year of air cooling

This is the only surviving photo of our first Vanagon, 1980. air/cooled. Cream over orange!
My ex-Marine son in the driver's seat.
I see that I added a wooden gear-shift knob! It had an enameled Wolfsburg crest on it.



found this pic on the internet of one like our's ---- Chocolate brown interior.



In the VW showroom we had a choice between a 1979 Champagne Edition baywindow (T2) or this 1980 Vanagon (T3)
The bay window was $7000.00, the Vanagon was $10,000.00. Both had the same engines. The Vanagon was much heavier....slower and thirstier! Gas prices shot up that year!

The Champagne Ed. bay was gorgeous!


I'd owned a '69 baywindow after I came home from Vietnam. loved it.
After feeding that Vanagon for a year - even though it was considered "The Porsche of Vans" - I came to wish I'd bought the Champagne baywindow~!

Live and learn......

Stig

[randyo]

I was transportation for half of my son's hockey team once, the other parent that was riding with me that -30°f night, turns and looks at me and says "gees, that gas heater is like a wood stove"  I only got  about 6mpg that night. instead of the normal 20±