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VW vans ( California Beach)

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VW vans ( California Beach) Empty VW vans ( California Beach)

Post by frederic Sat Jul 26, 2014 8:26 pm

Was talking to an owner of one of the above and he told me about the corrosion problems that they were having with the roof pressings and ally roof, trim.
see [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] (under roof corrosion)
Hope there is nothing similar on the new Mercedes panel van or the VW's with the rising roofs
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Post by boxerman Sat Jul 26, 2014 8:41 pm

If you sniff around the internet, particularly the rebuild & welding forums you'll find that the early VW campers, the Bay Windows and the Splittys etc.. were right rotboxes, despite their street cred. Nobody says this though 'cos they're the holy grail  hugegrins 

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Post by Hubert Sun Jul 27, 2014 8:29 am

We've owned two VW Californias, the first showed no sign of the corrosion problem. I part ex'd this one after three years for the newer facelift model in 2012. Our second one however started to show the corrosion after 12 months. The corrosion is due to the two dissimilar metals used i.e. the aluminium roof section and the steel bodywork. Ours was treated and resprayed by the dealer and wasn't showing again when sold to purchase our AS Symbol. Others have reported a return of the corrosion which has resulted in VW offering the same solution which the German owners have had for the last year.

VW have now authorised 4 dealers to carry out the work which involves complete removal of the elevating roof  yikes  which being electric/ hydraulic on the SE model is not a simple task. I believe a rubber gasket or similar is then used to isolate the two.
The problem was known about when we had our first California but strangely seems to be more common on the newer models. Whether that is purely down to the increased sales I can't say.
New ones (2014 model year on ?) are supposedly free from this problem.
What surprises me is that although it is a widely known problem within the California owners, it hasn't been in any national press or monthlies considering the cost of the California.

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