TheSamba.com :: View topic - Moving to a Eurovan? Opinions, etc... the good, the bad.

Mon May 19, 2008 4:25 pm

After another 160 mile trip (320 round trip) in my no-AC, 89 GL Westy with all 98hp chugging for everything they are worth thru 90 deg heat... with wife and 1 yr old in back and 5 yr old in front.. cross winds and side winds and grades and flats... and being too tired at the end of said trip home to have remembered if I had fun or not...

.. is it time for a change?

I was never gonna sell my 72 Westy... and vanagons just didn't have soul.
I was never gonna sell my 81 Westy... the WBXer was too complicated.
And I was never gonna sell my 89GL Westy...
..but now I'm short on comfort, driving is getting to be harder.. or I'm getting too old for this stuff and I need a Volvo wagon.

Is the vanagon worth new seats, retro AC, a bigger powerplant, new wheels and tires and brakes, a paint job? Way more than $10k in upgrades.. not to mention time and effort..
Or is the Eurvan the better option?

Who out there has made the change?
Pros and cons, please (beside the $18k price tag for one that is in good shape.)

All comments, welcome.

Mon May 19, 2008 5:33 pm

My thinking has been mpg and I don't dare go for the eurovan, but I do like them. Vanagons mpg is a bit better, but $4-5 dollars a gal and I can't see me keeping mine. I've thought hard about going back to pre 72 bus for better mpg but what's the point, and no a/c either. I really want to save up for a tdi conversion for my 91 carat and I guess 10k for such a fun to drive VW van is not bad. The vanagon is the last of the line in fun to drive vans, its more like the bus-feel than the eurovan. Anyway, it looks like my 84 toyota Dolphin mini rv might just be what our famly needs and its great on gas too.

Mon May 19, 2008 8:27 pm

I guess you can see my bio I made the change, although I still hang on to the 79 Bay......bad case of the teutonic plague, I guess.

If you do the search, this is a much discussed topic.

Bottom line: Newer = faster, quieter, better heat and a/c, better reliability. Older = more soul, and a tighter community. You have to decide what's important to you.

Personally, I reluctantly went to a Eurovan and have been pleasantly surprised. It's fast, quiet, and a great highway car. I did a lot of research and ended up with the 5 cyl stick which I love.......super reliable engine with lots of power and avoided the auto tranny issue on Euros. The 5-speed is a delight.

Best of luck in your decision.

Mon May 19, 2008 10:30 pm

I love my 81 Westy although we have the Volvo wagon for trips around town and the primary family driver. I too have a 10 month old and 3 year old. When I fire up the Westy on the weekends I appreciate it more than if I drove it daily.

Is it me or does the Eurovan look smaller on the inside? Never looked at specs but the one I have been in looked smaller. Also I am thinking bigger bucks to maintain?

Tue May 20, 2008 3:52 am

i'll give up my 99 euro before i let my 87 vanagon go

there are more cons on the euro van
1 is the trans - the elecric control was the worse thing they did
2 the interior parts are flimzy and cheap ,and expensive to replace.
3 road noise . it's more noisier than the vanagon going down the road
4 cost for any work or larger parts. trans replacement alone is $5000.00 plus
5 the avalablity(sp?) of parts,at least in NJ about 4 days
6 recalls. there are a few recalls on the jetta / passat but they will not include the eurovan which has the same engine / trans failers.

shall i go on.........

it's a shame to what vw has done to themselves :oops:

Tue May 20, 2008 6:49 am

I labored over this decision a few years back when my '85 had reached the point of being iffy to take on longer trips. I opted for an '02 Weekender and have never looked back. While it lacks the soul of the Vanagon, it more than makes up for it in driving comfort. I can cruise comfortably all day at 75-80 with the AC on, while still being able to carry on a conversation with my wife (or listen to music and normal volume). *NOTE* since last summer, I have dialed the speeds down to 55-60 and have had a steady 23 MPG return on the highway. I can live with that.

Pay attention to the maintenance schedule (including transmission flushes on the AT every 40,000 miles) and you should be fine. Like most newer VW's they are more costly to service and repiar....but who ever said the Vanagon was cheap????

There are several good on-line resources for these vans ie. europarts-sd.com; busdepot.com and Yahoo Group's ev_update (the go-to group for these vehicles).

There are days when I miss the '85. But then I recall the thousands of care-free miles I have logged in my EV and the longing passes. and the feeling passes. Since buying the van, I have taken trips to Yellowstone, Colorado, Glacier/Banf and Niagara Falls as well as countless weekends spent at Sate Parks here in MN. I don't regret my decsion to make the big switch, because each one of these trips has been comfortable and enjoyable. Simply being able to pass slower traffic on long mountain inclines is worth the price of admission all by itself.

Tue May 20, 2008 7:37 am

There's a lot of talk about "soul" here... that's subjective and shouldn't really enter into your equation, or at least should be given a lower weight. If we were to get into the "soul" discussion, for me VW lost the original soul after about 1967 when they went to Bay Window busses and the Bugs got streamlined bumpers. Does that mean I want to go back to a splitty? Maybe someday just as something to tool around in, but I love the Vanagon and I've been very pleased with a couple trips I've done in my brother's Eurovan too. I'm a convert... for reliability, safety, and comfort, modern is better. His van is a MV (Weekender layout with pop-top).

Mileage: In my experience my brother's 6 cylinder Eurovan (I think it's a 2001) gets about the same mileage as my 88 Wolfsburg. That's not really a fair comparison since I drive the Eurovan faster but I still netted around 18 mpg on a trip fully loaded from Salt Lake, UT to Olympia/Seattle, WA.

Noise: My Vanagon with the stock 2.1 WBX was quieter than the EV (the 2.1 is dead and it's getting a Subaru engine, so we'll see how the noise level is). Even my sister-in-law commented about how much quieter the Vanagon was when I picked them up at the airport about a year ago. She should know... they had just returned from living out of the EV while driving around the continent for a year. She made that comment from the back seat, so she was even closer to the engine.

Trans: The later EVs came with automatic transmission only. This trans apparently has a reputation for crapping out prior to 100k miles. Last I heard my brother's van had about 80k miles and the trans was starting to make him nervous... but maybe that's because he's read so many accounts of this trans going bad.

A/C: You could install A/C in your Westy but from what I've read the A/C can be somewhat disappointing since there's no good way to channel the cold air to the front with the pop-top hole in the roof. I wonder why VW didn't use the upper heater channels over the windows to move some cold air up front. Anyway, my brother's EV has the opposite problem... nice cool A/C up front where you want it for driving but the back gets hot and stuffy because there's no way to pipe the A/C to the back.

His Eurovan has been reliable, and, as I stated, he and his wife circumnavigated the continent in it a couple years ago (Salt Lake to the West coast, up to AK, down through Canada to Salt Lake, out to West Virginia and North Carolina, up to PA, back through Utah, then down to the southern tip of Baja, then back to Salt Lake). They had problems with an oil change in Canada that was the mechanic's fault and a porcupine chewed through a front brake line in Canada or Montana or thereabouts, but AFAIK the EV performed flawlessly. My Wolfsburg performed fabulously on our trip from Salt Lake through Nevada on Hwy 50 (the long way), Tahoe, Oakland/SF, Shelter Cove and the Redwoods, then back to SL along I-80 in 100+º temperatures last summer... A/C keeping tempers down the whole way.

IMO They're both good vans but they have their limitations; "Soul" is provided by you and your family.

Tue May 20, 2008 7:58 am

I have owned a '93 EV since '94... it's been a relatively good vehicle with a consistent 20 mpg and reasonable comfort. It is currently going through it's +150k mile aging pains with the AC grenading a couple of years back, followed by the timing belt (the earlier 5 cylinder audi engine is a non-interference flavor), last fall the water pump went, distributor, and I just replaced both front axles and the drivers side front wheel bearing. I think it would add up to 3-4k worth of repairs but hopefully we're over the worst and have our fingers crossed for some carefree miles once again.

Tue May 20, 2008 8:05 am

I had an 01 EV that I was tired of dumping money into. It was capacious, powerful, fast and fun to drive but I could not afford the upkeep and I didn't feel comfortable attempting to fix many issues myself. It was never a real daily driver and that is good since the maintenance cost me +/- 4 grand over 15,000 miles.

I bought my 83.5 Westy shortly after I decided to dump the EV and I've been very happy since. Of course the vanagon has its own set of issues and I agree that comfort is one of them but I do have a volvo wagon for those instances when comfort is a concern.

I guess it came down to a simple cost analysis but the quirks of the vanagon are also much easier for me to accept because of the nebulous "soul" of the vehicle.

Tue May 20, 2008 8:29 am

I owned an '85 7-passenger Vanagon and a '93 Westy Weekender EuroVan.

I liked the Vanagon more because:
- it was cheaper to maintain
- got a little better gas mileage
- was easier to drive around town
- was easier to park
- didn't go through brakes as quickly
- didn't have elctrical issues

I liked the EuroVan more because:
- it was better on the highway
- it was quieter
- the engine never was a problem
- it didn't get as affected by crosswinds
- parts were a liilte more available

The brake issue was partly because the EuroVan was heavier being a EuroVan, the EuroVan was heavier being a Westy, and the EuroVan had the engine up front.

The gauges of the EuroVan were soldered twice and by the time I sold it, it was an issue again.

The a/c lasted longer in the EuroVan but both compressors went kablooey over time.

The automatic in the '93 was goofy at best (if driven by owners manuals suggestion) and problematic if driven the way it seemed most intuitively. I have heard the automatic that came with the later models VR6 was better. The Vanagon's 4-speed was as nice as EuroVan's engine. If I would ever get another '93, it would be a stick.

EuroVan's parts are more expensive and getting to some repairs required a fair amount of labor. More than once I had my mechanic say, "While we are in there, we might as well ..." because eventually the same disassembly was going to be necessary for something that would come up in a year or so.

I had heard some water-cooled Vanagon parts are harder to come by now. I don't know if that is solely true of the 1.9 liter engine (1982-85) or if that includes the 2.1 liter engine (1986-91) as well.

Bottom line: I liked both for what they were. I would own another Vanagon, water- or air-cooled, gas or diesel. I would another EuroVan as well. If I got an earlier one like the '93, I would hold out for a 5-speed -- but they do fetch much more money than their automatic brethren.

Tue May 20, 2008 9:02 am

wow.
great feedback guys..

You've all hit on all the reasons pro and con that I've figured are mine thus far.
And FWIW, this thread has been much more informative than the previous 3 or 4 I dredged up in searches.

I can't help but reckon that the EV is a better choice for the reality of my family and the types of trips we take. We are looking to do a multi national Parks tour in a few years.. and prepping the 89 for that means major work.

I dread letting go the 89 and all the plans I had... but first up we'll go drive a couple EVs and see what we think.

An automatic transmission is a biggie. Wife doesn't drive stick.. and even though the vanagon is an easy stick to drive, its been 7 yrs and she doesn't jump at the chance to drive it. I'm thinking that rules out the ealrier ones and I'd like the 6 anyway.. yay! More money we don't have!

I'll dread the thought of minimal offroad capability.. it always seems the last 500 yds are the most important and they have ruts and rocks that the vanagon crawls over with ease.

But imagine AC that works? ...can't shake a stick at that. Or 80 mph when its called for?

Hey.. how about towing? Front wheel drive? That can't be great.

Keep the ideas and opinions coming.

Dammit, I wish I had space for 2. Put the 89 in back and hunt for an SVX.
Pull those windows.. swap for a three window tent.

snif.. snif.. I think I'm gonna emote. :shock:

Tue May 20, 2008 9:24 am

j_dirge wrote: snif.. snif.. I think I'm gonna emote. :shock:

I'm pretty sure there's an icon for that! :)

If you haven't been there, go do some information shopping on http://forums.vwvortex.com/zeroforum?id=33. There's much more EV traffic over there. While you're there, check out my little brother's threads on his 'round the continent trip... some beautiful scenery. You can see the trailer he brought for a "garage" for all the toys (mt. bikes, skis, kiteboards, kayaks, etc). If you're planning on being on the road much, he also found a replacement base for the passenger side seat that is a very solid safe for your valuables while you're away from the van. Since you're not sitting on top of the wheels that's an option.

http://forums.vwvortex.com/zerothread?id=3070313
http://forums.vwvortex.com/zerothread?id=2890485

Oops... looks like a lot of the image links are broken. See pics here:

http://www.lizandbrian.net/may_june_july/
http://www.lizandbrian.net/august_september/

Tue May 20, 2008 9:25 am

Hey dirge
Whynchou get a Bostig conversion w/AC and put on a set of new 2wd springs/shocks from Gowesty and a set of solid Michelins? Then you'd have the modern reliability, a motor that will even run with no coolant and a solid A/C compressor setup?
My 2cents.

Tue May 20, 2008 10:49 am

j_dirge, you may be coming to the conclusion that you need an appliance instead of a toy.

And if you need an appliance, then you probably need to drop the VW kick entirely (heresy, I know).

You're simply going to be in a much easier position with a Honda/Ford/GM vehicle than any kind of VW, whether Eurovan or other. Chrysler doesn't rank in my list because it won't exist in another 5 years, but I'd otherwise throw their minivan in as an also-ran.

The Volvo wagon may seem neat, but (1) it's not as easy to get parts & service if you break down in Buttfvck, North Dakota, as Honda/Ford/GM.; and (2) they have lousy headroom if you're tall, because of the sunroofs. I have a Volvo 740 Turbo as well as a 1.9TD Westy, love them both, but recognize they are both more on the "toy" side of the equation than the "appliance" side.

If you really need the space of a minivan, you should check out the V6 Honda Odyssey. Notorious transmission issues (too weak for that engine), but add a trans cooler and you're good to go.

You have a small keelboat to tow, too, and if you have to do that regularly, really you have to move up in size even from the minivan to something with a serious tow rating capacity. Probably you're looking at a full sized domestic diesel van. Search "Sportsmobile" on this forum and try to wade through Terry Kay's sarcasm.

I just met a guy this past weekend with a Eurovan who tows a Melges 24, and it's killing his Eurovan. Boat and trailer weight are iffy just by themselves, but then he has all manner of heavy gear in "dock boxes" welded to the trailer. He says it's really not a cool setup, but the boat is costly enough that he doesn't want to upgrade the tow vehicle until it's good & dead. I was a bit nervous just seeing him pull the boat up the seaweed-encrusted ramp in Seattle with that FWD box, but pulling mountain grades in the heat of high summer would be far scarier.

Tue May 20, 2008 12:18 pm

Witless Joe wrote: j_dirge, you may be coming to the conclusion that you need an appliance instead of a toy.

And if you need an appliance, then you probably need to drop the VW kick entirely (heresy, I know).

You're simply going to be in a much easier position with a Honda/Ford/GM vehicle than any kind of VW, whether Eurovan or other. Chrysler doesn't rank in my list because it won't exist in another 5 years, but I'd otherwise throw their minivan in as an also-ran.

The Volvo wagon may seem neat, but (1) it's not as easy to get parts & service if you break down in Buttfvck, North Dakota, as Honda/Ford/GM.; and (2) they have lousy headroom if you're tall, because of the sunroofs. I have a Volvo 740 Turbo as well as a 1.9TD Westy, love them both, but recognize they are both more on the "toy" side of the equation than the "appliance" side.

If you really need the space of a minivan, you should check out the V6 Honda Odyssey. Notorious transmission issues (too weak for that engine), but add a trans cooler and you're good to go.

You have a small keelboat to tow, too, and if you have to do that regularly, really you have to move up in size even from the minivan to something with a serious tow rating capacity. Probably you're looking at a full sized domestic diesel van. Search "Sportsmobile" on this forum and try to wade through Terry Kay's sarcasm.

I just met a guy this past weekend with a Eurovan who tows a Melges 24, and it's killing his Eurovan. Boat and trailer weight are iffy just by themselves, but then he has all manner of heavy gear in "dock boxes" welded to the trailer. He says it's really not a cool setup, but the boat is costly enough that he doesn't want to upgrade the tow vehicle until it's good & dead. I was a bit nervous just seeing him pull the boat up the seaweed-encrusted ramp in Seattle with that FWD box, but pulling mountain grades in the heat of high summer would be far scarier.
good points all...

I am not kidding myself in thinking the EV would tow much better than the Vanagon.. but I limit my towing to around town, or from dry storage to hoist. 3000lbs+ all up. I beg/borrow for long haul towing.. as in, crew is providing his large SUV to tow home from SB after Coastal Cup. We won't be doing any Roadmasters Series without a real tow rig.

Trust me.. I am not keen on the large American SUV format.. but I admit envy when I see them cruising by at 75 in relative comfort all soft and squishy in their lazy boy seating...

But the bottom line is I have no parking for such a large vehicle here in San Francisco. The Eurovan is even a bit long for that purpose.. and the Volvo wagon is a nightmare to park due to its length.

So now I swing back to keeping the Vanagon because it is really a pretty handy around town hauler....
Maybe I just need to start renting plush-mobiles for the long vacation trips.

Wed May 21, 2008 10:53 am

.. going to look at a Eurovan MV, today.

2003, 110k miles, V6.

Slippery slope.

Wed May 21, 2008 2:45 pm

I miss my 86 Westy and now have an 86 syncro. But for practical daily driving I wish I never sold my 93 Eurovan GLS.

Therefor we are going to sell the syncro and get another Eurovan V6 MV next spring. As much as I would like a pop-top MV I cannot justify spending $10,000 more just to have a pop-roof but I have seen some great deals on 95097 EVCs.

This will solve all my needs, more power for towing and daily driving, better dependability, easier daily driving on the highway. Yes it may be easier to fix my vanagon but my Ev just never failed.

Downsides would include less character but their rariety still works for me.

As I stated I miss my westy and will miss my syncro but for all the wrong reasons. They are a pain but fun to own. My eurovan was flawless and I do know they have a weak link with many transmissions (and expensive to fix).

As far as the MPG my 95 (5cyl) got the same gas mileage as my 2.1L wbx. Now with my syncro down around 14mpg it has to go!

Wed May 21, 2008 5:22 pm

It's hard for me to believe that you guys are getting over 15 mpg in your Eurovans. :shock: as i was looking for a family van and all my research a few yrs ago I decided that it would cost more in the long run to own one. Lack of my knowledge of them was my main concern, needing to take it to a dealer to have work done on it, very little moral suport on here, lack of choice in drivetran, 5 speeds are rare and automatics aren't reliable, but most of all I can at least see what I am working on and know what to expect when it comes to a Vanagon. So what did I decide to buy? A 1999 Chevy Astro high top coach conversion. What a great choice that was, very little work ever needs to be done to this beast, it just keeps going and going. Do I like it? Hell no, but my wife does. I much prefer the ev or the vanagon. Hey, I have my vanagons as toys but I would never risk or compromise my family's safety and well being by depending on any Vanagon, bus, eurovan on any kind of long trips. As much as I would like to see a nice, shiney, silver top of the line eurovan in my drive way its a no brainer, safety and reliability with the Astro over risk and uncertainy with the VW. btw know wonder the new van is going to be built by chrysler. that way vw wont have to take all the blame if it all goes bad :lol:

Tue May 27, 2008 6:20 pm

I've loved every one of the 3 vanagons I've had, but there's something to be said for an EV loaded to the gills with the AC on going 80 mph up the hills of Kentucky passing slow pokes.

P.S. The kids had a great time at Mammoth Cave too :wink:

P.P.S Only saw one bus all weekend :(

Thu May 29, 2008 6:26 pm

Put a Subaru motor in the Vanagon, better fuel mileage (I get 24 mpg on highway), plenty of power for A/C, and quiet/dependable.

Vanagon still will have 'soul'... just a faster more trouble free soul.