1979 Vw Westfalia Show Quality Camper Bus - No Rust. No Bondo. Special Interior. on 2040-cars
San Jose, California, United States
Body Type:camper bus
Engine:original
Vehicle Title:Clear
Fuel Type:92 octane
For Sale By:owner
Interior Color: Green
Make: Volkswagen
Number of Cylinders: 4
Model: Bus/Vanagon
Trim: none
Warranty: none
Drive Type: manual
Mileage: 22,232
Options: Cassette Player
Sub Model: westfalia
Exterior Color: custom green
I am finally selling my beautiful 1979 VW Westfalia. It has been my baby for a long time and is like a member of my family but I'm going to let someone else take her to shows and get waves and horn honks now.
It has been a 12 year project that I am finally finished with.
The story behind this camper is that it is actually 2 buses, now one.
The bus is complete and runs perfect. I didn't buy it to drive it but I wanted to use it as a show car for local shows like Kelley Park and stuff like that. It has been stored for nearly 10 years and I recently got it smogged.
I found the current body sitting in an auto shop in 2001 that was perfect, no rust, no dents, no accidents, no bondo with non faded original paint so I bought it. However, it had no engine, no transmission, no clutch.
Then I set out looking for a great original engine, tranny and clutch. I found it a few years later in a bus that just came to California from Utah. I bought it and drove it to San Jose, put everything in at San Jose Bugformance in 2003.
I had the front windshield taken out and new rubber put in. No leaks.
Later, I had it repainted with custom paint (when it was painted, I asked the shop to add a little black to the mix so that it would take out some of that bright green look, it is still green but a much more mellow green. People ask me why it looks so good and I just smile. If I didn't tell you what I did, you would really never know).
The interior was redone with a beautiful hippie pasley headliner from front to back. Later, I repainted the wooden area over the lower bed in black. The cabinet is custom and I did not do that, it is interesting and you will love it. I also sanded, primed and painted the poptop with special paint. I did not put a westfalia sticker on yet. You can see the old one on there so you can just put a new sticker over it. That is the best way to do it.
The stereo is a cassette. You can hook up a CD player to it if you like. The reason why I didn't put in a CD player is because I couldn't find one that would fit in the original space without cutting hole in the dashboard. I would never do that and if you want to find the original VW radio online and put it in that would be best.
The carpet inside has really never been walked on while I have had it. I cut out a piece of gray carpet to protect it. The bench seat is really nice and it folds down really nice. It has the table. I am currently trying to figure out away to keep one of the cabinet drawers from coming open when I drive. It is an easy fix, just trying to think of something perfect.
My nephew closed the canvas when we were cleaning it all up and got it caught on one of the hinges and there is a small hole in it now but I am going to get that sewed up. Nothing big and the material is still great. Like I said all original.
The carpet is perfect. No rust at all inside or outside. It runs amazing, never a problem. In fact, you could drive it all day at 55.
Recently, I took the car to Fred's Garage in Redwood City where Paul completely redid the:
DRUMS,
BRAKES,
TIRES,
FUEL PUMP,
INJECTORS,
WINDSHIELD WIPERS
and some other generally small stuff.
Now what about how I drive it...
I have put about 500 miles on it since I did all the major work to it ten years ago. Once in a while, I drive it over to the beach in Santa Cruz or to Half Moon Bay, nothing far and nothing hot. It has never been in a position where I was overheating the engine due to the temperature. It doesn't have air conditioning so if it is hot outside, I stay out of it.
I never go over 60. If you do that, you keep the engine within an acceptable RPM and it never really gets stressed and sounds pretty quiet. It is only when you get up in a high rev that you hear the engine whine. I drive quiet listening to the engine. When it gets loud, I take my foot off the gas.
90% of the time, I use 92 octane gas. It has an air cooled engine so any cheap gas will cause the engine to work harder to get up to speed. 99% of VW people will tell me that I am crazy and that it makes no difference but I don't care. Higher octane gas is better gas and this bus is 33 years old now. It deserves to take it easy as much as possible.
When I drive I keep the clutch in 2nd and third for as long as possible and never over run them. I spend as little time in first as I can and roll through stop signs as much as possible in second or neutral. As you can tell, I don't like first.
The car is warmed up before I drive it because that keeps the engine longer plus these buses tend to buck a little bit with the 92 octane until the engine warms up properly. Basically, this bus has been babied.
The bottom line is that there is not another bus like this in the world. The color is unique, the interior is unique, no rust, no accidents, as clean as they come. Take it to any mechanic in San Jose that knows buses, they will tell you the same thing. I encourage you to.
In a 30 year old bus the seats are not new but a little shampoo and they will look great. I have kept them in expensive seat covers since I bought it but they slide around a lot.
New gauges (oil and temp) are in the dash and I have not gotten them hooked up yet except for the odometer. I might not and sell it as is, just drop down the price if you want to do it. I will probably never use them anyway.
If you are looking for a special original California bus, this is the one.
Call me at Four Oh Eight 2 Oh Nine Oh two 4 Eight. I would love to talk to you.
I have a ton of pictures and a video if you want me to send them to you. I am pretty firm on the price because I know what I have is rare and I have spend hundreds of hours putting it all together.
On Jan-28-13 at 09:19:35 PST, seller added the following information:
**** AS OF JANUARY 27TH, I AM BUYING AND INSTALLING A BRAND NEW POPTOP CANVAS FOR MY BUS. I DON'T FEEL RIGHT SELLING THIS BUS WITHOUT HAVING A NEW CANVAS INSTALLED. IT DOES HAVE A SMALL TEAR NOW BUT WHY NOT SELL THE BEST. YOU WILL BE HAPPY THEN.
Volkswagen Bus/Vanagon for Sale
1978 volkswagen westfalia camper id # 99-309 serial # 02266000
68 vw double cab crew cab pick up truck rare bay window not split not camperAuto Services in California
Zoe Design Inc ★★★★★
Zee`s Smog Test Only Station ★★★★★
World Class Collision Ctr ★★★★★
WOOPY`S Auto Parts ★★★★★
William Michael Automotive ★★★★★
Will Tiesiera Ford Inc ★★★★★
Auto blog
BMW, Ferrari, VW cars use tungsten mined by terrorists
Thu, 08 Aug 2013Bloomberg Markets is reporting that BMW, Volkswagen and Ferrari have been using tungsten ore sourced from Columbia's FARC rebel terrorists. The extensive story focuses on Columbia's illegal mining trade and calls into question the provenance of the rare ore that is used not only in crankshaft parts production, but is also found in the world's computing and telecommunications industry for use in screens.
The ore is mined by the FARC (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia, or Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia - People's Army), and exported to Pennsylvania, where it is refined. The refined ore is then sent over to Austria, where a company called Plansee turns it into a finished product. Now, it's important to note that we aren't talking about the world's supply of tungsten here. In 2012, Plansee's American refinery purchased 93.2 metric tons of tungsten, valued at $1.8 million. That's peanuts, with the entire Colombian tungsten mining industry producing just one percent of the world's supplies.
That doesn't make indirectly supporting FARC any more acceptable, though. BMW, VW and Ferrari are all committed to not accepting mineral supplies from the Democratic Republic of Congo, which is also in the grips of a guerrilla insurrection funded, in part, by illegal mining. The same commitment would figure to extend to Colombian mining, but as BMW points out, it's difficult for a multi-national manufacturer to know where every item in its supply chain comes from. A company spokesperson says as much, telling Bloomberg, "These few grams out of the billions of tons of raw materials passing through the BMW supply chain are of no practical relevance."
Volkswagen breaks 40-year-old sales record in 2012
Sun, 13 Jan 2013The last time Volkswagen moved this many vehicles in America in one year, Richard Nixon was still a President in good standing, Let It Be was a radio hit and each car wearing the VW badge boasted an air-cooled engine. That's right, with a grand total of 580,286 vehicles sold in the US last year, the VW Group has broken its own four-decades-old sales record by 2,899 vehicles.
Of that 580k total sold, 438k were Volkswagens and 139k were Audi products - increases of 35.1 percent and 18.5 percent, respectively, in year-over-year sales. The ultra-premium members of the VW group also fared well; Bentley delivered 2,315 vehicles for a 23.3-precent increase, and Lamborghini delivered 520 units for a 52.9-percent jump. Bugatti, we're told is "right on track."
Jetta (pictured) sales paced the marque with 170k models sold, and Passat also finished very strong with sales of 117k total. Tiguan also racked up its best year on file, with 31,731 models shifted.
Audi rumored to buy Alfa Romeo, officials deny it
Thu, 28 Mar 2013For more than two years, Volkswagen has been making public statements about its willingness to buy Alfa Romeo and quadruple the Italian brand's sales, and for just as long, Fiat CEO Sergio Marchionne has replied with some version of "Mr. Piëch, drop it." According to a report in Ward's Auto, all that jousting might be over: it claims that sources close to both Marchionne and Audi CEO Rupert Stadler admit that the two are in talks for Audi to buy not just Alfa Romeo, but a production plant in Italy. In fact, a final deal could possibly include partsmaker Magnetti Marelli.
Against that backdrop, a report by German news weekly Stern quotes a Fiat spokesmen as saying it doesn't comment on rumors and an Audi rep has said flatly that "There is no substance in the news." If a sale is being arranged, the timing would seem to point to how eager Fiat is to raise cash to complete its major initiatives. Even though Alfa Romeo continues to delay its return to the US, it just showed off the production version of the 4C at the Geneva Motor Show (shown above) and said that preferred Fiat dealerships here would get them. Then there's Alfa's recently concluded deal with Mazda to develop a roadster based on the next generation MX-5 Miata - a deal that would seem to help both the Italian and Japanese brands.
The monetary issues are troublesome, though. Fiat is taking a beating in the European market and its weak-kneed balance sheet is delaying gotta-have-it products like the Jeep Cherokee. Fiat has been talking to banks about getting money to buy the rest of Chrysler and those financial institutions have also raised issues about debt and cash reserves, and the nasty game of chess Fiat is playing with the United Auto Workers (and now the court system about the portion of Chrysler it doesn't own) could end up blowing another hole in Marchionne's plans. It is possible that this could finally have convinced Fiat to at least see how serious Audi's parent company, Volkswagen, is about buying Alfa Romeo. Or it could be just another rumor.