It's funny, we can find all these rebuild parts from the suppliers (GAP, AH, PP, etc) but none of them have the crankshaft itself.
I have a bad crank (the thrust landings are worn down to the lobes), and I cannot find a new one anywhere. I have purchased a used engine locally, to find that the crank is bent. Of course, you can't tell that it's bent until you take it to a machine shop and have some measurements done, and luckily I know the seller personally and he'll make it right with me.
I hate buying something so critical over the web/email/forums/etc, because you just don't know *for certain* if the seller is trustworthy. Or at least, there's a big time and expense in shipping a crank around the map, and that's a loss for everyone if it doesn't work out well; at least if purchased locally, a guy can run back out to the seller and say, "Dude...", ya know?
So I guess I'll haul my original crank back to the machinist, so he can see if it's worth sending in to a crankshaft rebuilder to get the thrust landings built back up and machined into spec again... Hopefully there isn't too much missing on the journals themselves, but at least he can tell me that before spending any money on it.
EDIT: Turns out the place the machinist works at (a CarQuest) has a supplier that can get a crankshaft... $336 plus exchange and shipping, including bearings (I would guess just mains, and probably integral thrust bearings, not like
http://www.vwdiesel.net/forum/index.php?topic=28317.0 < those). I might go that way... That doesn't seem too bad a price for a guaranteed good crank. Guessing it's a reman, but still...