Centre crossmember - purpose of large hole?

[BigBlueVan]

Hi all,

I'm currently making a new centre crossmember for my van, this is the panel under the floor which the fuel tank strap locate into and also the gear selector rod bush thingy attaches to.

I have looked back through the photos of when I stripped the van down and it appears that the largest hole was not used for anything other than routing a clutch pipe (which looks to have just been thrown in though there rather than factory..
Does anyone know what the purpose of this large hole is? I'll just delete it from my homemade panel if not required, maybe it's for syncro prop?? It does align with the low centre section of the fuel tank.

[davidoft1]

Hi all,

I'm currently making a new centre crossmember for my van, this is the panel under the floor which the fuel tank strap locate into and also the gear selector rod bush thingy attaches to.

I have looked back through the photos of when I stripped the van down and it appears that the largest hole was not used for anything other than routing a clutch pipe (which looks to have just been thrown in though there rather than factory..
Does anyone know what the purpose of this large hole is? I'll just delete it from my homemade panel if not required, maybe it's for syncro prop?? It does align with the low centre section of the fuel tank.

Syncro has a different crossmember, I would guess factory fitted eberspacher maybe

[BigBlueVan]

Everyday is a school day,, had to Google "eberspacher" had no idea what that was other than it sounding Germanic.

[davidoft1]

Everyday is a school day,, had to Google "eberspacher" had no idea what that was other than it sounding Germanic.

I think it is what would have been there

[Stesaw]

Water tank maybe? but heater probs the best bet.

[mrhutch]

Aircooled T3's (first few years) had a warm air vent/pipe from the rear to the cab for heating, I think that's the hole it passes through

[ZsZ]

Lot of the sheet metal parts were not changed after ditching the Aircooled engines. So you may find some brackets and holes which were never needed later.

As others already said that hole was used on Aircooled for hot air ducting and later they kept it for the additional Eberspacher BA6/DA6 heater which was an option till the end of the lifecycle.