5-cyl vw busses

[Gerard]

2.3, 2.5 and 2.6 5-cylinder engines, and the last range dropped the 2.5
and used on the 2.3 and 2.6 both using Bosck Motronic engine management.
As far as I've seen all those engines in the South Africa buses
(Microbus and Caravelle or Kombi :)) are all marked with Audi and VW
logos.

Production stopped maybe 2 or 3 years ago. Only last week did I manage
to get hold of the latest copy of the local classified ads paper to see
some 2.6 Caravelles stripping out for spare parts. It takes a while. Not
sure what's left on them 'cos even though I look for the ads I just
don't have time to hunt down parts off of them.

About a year and a half ago I saw a 2.6i engine up for sale for around
$2000. I believe they swapped it out for a Toyota turbodiesel engine.

A few years back I spoke to someone at a Johannesburg company who does
engine swaps on these buses and they have a 2.7-litre conversion
available.

Over here the most common conversion seen on these buses is a "JT3000".
Funky name for a Ford V6 3-litre conversion.

About 2 months ago I was also asked by some local guy looking for spare
parts for his MC turbo 5-cylinder engine which was going into his
Microbus. Some of these run without the intercooler. :P

Have to say that last weeks classified ads paper had a few ads for
adaptor plates for the 5-cylinder conversion to these buses. I believe
there are also adaptor plates for attaching the V6 Ford to the stock VW
gearbox and for hooking up a 5-cylinder to a Toyota 21R (???) gearbox
from a Toyta Cressida.

By far the best conversion I've heard of (and only spoken to the owner
about, but never actually seen. I've been promised a call once it is
sorted out again and brought round to the Killarney race track about 2
miles from me), is that of putting the Audi 200/5k MC engine into the
back of a VW (Old) Beetle. :) Actually, in that same week I went to see
someone who runs around in a Jetta VR6 that told me he was pleasantly
surprised by that little Beetle at a robot GP. :)

sneekerz at comcast.net wrote:
> 
> Yes, the SA busses (vanagons in the u.s.) came from vw with 2.3 and 2.6 liter inline 5's. They also had some other minor body and dash changes. I can't say if the motors are directly related to the audi 5, just don't know about that. Overland has a kit with a 2.6 and adapter plates, and there are a couple other flavors floating around out there. I have not heard first hand of any turbo-conversions yet, but it can't be that much more of an effort. the biggest trick for the 5cyl conversions is on the campers, getting all that stuff under the deck without raising it up more than necessary because of the cabinets and bed configurations. FastForward also makes mounting kits for many of the audi inline-4 engines to be bolted into the vanagon.
> 
> I know there are other vanagon list members here, perhaps they can shed a bit more light on this.
> 
> steve
> couple '86 quattro's
> '85 westy
> kent, wa
> > >Didn't they come from the factory like that in South Africa?  Or am I
> > >confusing it with something else?
> > >
> > >--
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