Club 80-90 Forums

Hi all, I've had a few Aircooled Beetles and now I have the taste for a T25 camper.

My question is this, how much would you pay for a tired 1989 1.9l van converted to a camper. Showing 154K, it pops out of 1st gear, has no MOT, needs a new starter, has had 2 units [falling to bits] installed with cooker & fridge and home made bed.

The running gear is in good condition but the rust may be an issue.....it has a significant rust patch [20cm] in one windscreen corner [water in the footwells but these are new and well done], the sliding door seal has come away where the panel has rotted and the lip is not existent [40cm], the arches are good, the offside outer sill is on the verge of disintegrating and the body panel above looks salvagable but might not be.....other than that it's pretty good

Obviously without seeing it it's hard to assess but I'd appreciate anyones thoughts. He wants £1000 which I think is twice as much as it's worth?

agreed!

Em
x

Based on the fact they're apparantly fetching £400 scrap weight I'd work your way up from that baseline figure .... by the sound of it not too far UP though.

I'd be inclined to save up a bit more and leave this one for the scrappers to fight over. You may be able to find a decent caravelle and have a s/h interior off eBay or the classifieds here.

All the best, Ian.

Two balloons and a goldfish.

sounds more like a donor than a fixer upper

I picked mine up for £500 in similar condition.

Looks crap but runs fine now i've got it setup right

Fixing and tinkering is 2/3 of the fun

Don't know if I could stretch to 2 balloons and a goldfish!

Thanks for the advice, I think the save a tad more and by better sounds like a good idea, I'm toying with the idea of a trip to Germany, I have a German friend who will help me out with the finer points and www.mobil.de seems to have loads of vans at good prices, I'll let you know how I get on!

Cheers!

Hiya drunkenmonkey,

Have you thought about looking for a 2.0 litre Aircooled ? I know some people nickname it aircold, but it definately isn't in my case (I had to close the heater pods to reduce the heat in the cab). These vans are usually very reliable and there is very little to go wrong with them.

Another possibility is the 1.6 TD.

As far as I remember, I have read about serious problems with the frail 1.9 litre and 2.1 litre wasserboxer engines such as head bolts shearing off causing about 2 1/2 grands worth of damage (ie. new engine). The bodywork on the watercooleds fair a lot worse too.

The main thing to look for (as I found on the Wiki) is the bodywork. If it looks knackered then walk away. Peeps on here have already mentioned that it's more of a donor van than a restoration project.

Good luck with finding a good van.

drunkenmunkey wrote: Don't know if I could stretch to 2 balloons and a goldfish!

Thanks for the advice, I think the save a tad more and by better sounds like a good idea, I'm toying with the idea of a trip to Germany, I have a German friend who will help me out with the finer points and www.mobil.de seems to have loads of vans at good prices, I'll let you know how I get on!

Cheers!

Germany is a big country, roughly what part? im over again hopefully in a month (mine came from Berlin) im no VW expert at all...but if you need help finding one and bringing one back great..i love it (even with all the probs i have had before!! its fun!)

dont worry about left hand drive, only probs i have, is odd parking if its one way street, or T junctions if they are not a T exactly but bear to the left first...