Any Brickboarders out there that own / have owned an old VW camper van (1970s)? Just want to know how easy they are to work on. Any comments would be appreciated!!!

I'd love to get a classic camper, but the storage hassle for the winter months would make it a bit of a luxury anyhoo........... my next door neighbour ran a volkswagen dealership for 35 yrs and his father before him, it was well known that they would not work on them because of how labour intensive and cramped the engine compartments were not to mention hunting down parts.

Hi. I used to own a 1969 VW bus. It was fairly easy to work on. However to be honest I never felt too safe in it. No front to protect you. Very light weight. Blow about in a strong wind especially if up high such as a bridge. Good luck.

I have owned several air cooled VW's.
I learned to wrench on a VW with John Muir's Idiot Guide.
I don't feel too safe driving a VW Bus because if you look at the front you will see how much of the frame is between you and whatever may hopefully not hit you!
I like the VW's. The air cooled, well oil cooled, engines are way more tempermental than water cooled engines and everything about the whole engine is very critical to keep well tuned. It seems as if there is a fine art to tuning the engines which is definatly learnable as long as you are someone who has the capacity to do so. I never owned one of the fuel injected models, but if you could get a well running one it might take care of some issues.
I have seen newer ones, from Mexico, with the '68+ body style that have a water cooled vw motor in them. That would be the ultimate conversion I think...
Good Luck. There Is certainely the best availability for an older vehicle for any part you should need.

I have a fuel injected 1978 VW Westy. It is wonderful! Very easy to work on. Make sure you have all the engine tin in place and the foam seal around the engine as the motor, as you know, is air-cooled. Bad seal is the equivalent of a coolant leak as air is the coolant. Make sure to check compression. It should be 100 over. any lower and you're looking at $350 in parts for a rebuild. They are not fast, but don't let anyone tell you they are dogs because they're not. I can do 70 no problem full loaded. Try the Samba www.thesamba.com It's a very helpful forum. Also thier is a guy named Atwell has an awesome site www.ratwell.com If you need heat, the heater boxes are $250+ a piece. Good luck! email me with any other Q's mycoleptodiscus@yahoo.com

I haver never seen anything that can eat a bigger stram of new parts than a water cooled VW. If you need mechanic practice, get one of those.

in orlando a volvo mechanic has put volvo 2.3's in vw vans, i'm considering following his lead

Did you really mean water cooled and not aircooled? I have owned six upwards air cooled VW's and one water cooled VW and there is absolutely no comparision vs the drive-trains. I did not have to do any tinkering at all with the water cooled motor or tranny except to replace corroded wire. With the NA air cooleds it was constant tikering and tuning.
Peace...

The 745 turbodiesel is basically a water-cooled VW :)

and most of the probems with it are water/cooling related too!

Yes I do mean water cooled.
true the engine management system on the newer cars is tinker free(and not much different from a Volvo)
its the repeatedly failing mechanical parts that bother me.
I took car of one for about 50K:
brakes ...all4, twice
CV, three times
water pump
misc relays
throttle cable
rebuilt trans
exhaust full replacement
door handles
mirrors
speedo replace
valve job 2x, dumped the car when #3 was due

I'm sure there was more...
Aircooled have so many less parts to go bad, and simple electricals.