Date: Fri, 14 Sep 2001 09:59:39 -0700
Reply-To: Shawn Wright <swright@SLS.BC.CA>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: Shawn Wright <swright@SLS.BC.CA>
Organization: Shawnigan Lake School
Subject: Re: My Westy as an everyday vehicle... a little long.
In-Reply-To: <a5.1b65f6f1.28d36dca@aol.com>
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On 14 Sep 2001 at 10:27, Jeffrey R wrote:
<snip>
> My point is, the Westy is cool. It's great to have. But you only use about
> 20% of it's worth when you use it as a commuter. And every mile you put on it
> on your way to work is a mile you won't be able to use on a destination to
> parts unknown for a trip. So you could feasibly use up all the available
> mileage having wasted 80% of the vehicle in the process. (this kind of math,
> I'm sure, makes sense only to me). A vehicle is a finite entity. One day your
> bus will be worn out. Could be ten years from now, or it could be three.
> Could have years of memories from great trips far and wide or could have
> dings in the door from the parking lot at work.
>
> I've driven my Westy every day for the last year. I used to use it only for
> trips and put about 6,000 mile on her a year. This year I've put on about
> 20,000. One long trip cross country--great. And the rest piling on the mile
> going to work and the like. Right now I'm doing all I can to get a second
> car. Driving the westy daily was part of the plan when I moved...but the plan
> was temporay--till I could afford a second car.
>
> Here in LA it doesn't fit in many parking garages because of height. It get
> dinged up at Ralph's (grocery store). It's crappy on gas in city driving. It
> has no power steering which is no problem on the open road--but squeezing
> into tight spots is a drag. And with every mile I put on her I know that's
> one less mile toward Wyoming, or Colorado, or parts unknown. And that
> frustrates me.
>
> I can't wait till I can park it. Catch up on some upgrades, maintanance and
> repairs. And drive some VW Fox--or if I'm really living large, a Honda-- till
> it will go no more.
I agree, but I do think you under estimate the life span of these
vehicles. My '88 is at 367k km and doing well. 320k of that was put on
the by the PO, who got plenty of camping use out of it. My uncle's '89 is
somewhere around 470k km last time I checked, and is in better shape
than mine, due to heavy highway commuting miles. I know of 2 other
local vans that are well over 300k kms and running well.
But I agree, it is crazy to commute in a Westy, where the cost per km of
fuel and repairs (due to fragile WBX engine and trans) are higher than
many vehicles. I urged my uncle to park his Westy and buy a diesel
Golf/Jetta to commute with, which would pay for itself in about 2 years
of fuel savings alone, but he still drives the Westy because he loves
it... (he's on his 3rd WBX engine now, but the original tranny went to
420k km amazingly).
Personally, I now only drive the Westy 6 months out of the year, nearly
100% "recreational driving", and pile the mileage on our Jetta TD, but
to each his own I guess... :-)
========================
Shawn Wright
Computer Systems Manager
Shawnigan Lake School
http://www.sls.bc.ca
swright@sls.bc.ca
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