More on the squeaking front wheel situtation:

When I jack the front wheels off the ground and spin the suckas as fast as I can nothing but silent running, and an almost imperceptible scrape from the brake pads. No excessive motion in the wheel top to bottom or side to side, so I'm ruling out bearing problems. Thank god. But other people who have experienced this same problem say it was corrected by replacing the tires. So I'm led to believe that Vanagons are the only vehicles on earth that cause their tires to squeak!

Damn this is one unique mode of transporation...