At 04:44 PM 7/30/2010 Friday, B Feddish wrote:
>Lots of people poo poo the 83.5's to 85's

I don't see any reason for that.  I drove an '84 Westy as a daily
driver from '92 until I lost it a few years ago, put over 160,000 mi
on it (total about 250k) and became rather intimately familiar with
it.  I now have an '89 non-Westy.  They're certainly much more
similar than different.  The handbrake lever is the "must-replace"
that I can think of*; the '85-up are much easier and more
effective.  If it's a non-power-steering one definitely stay with the
skinny tires as low-speed steering effort rises drastically with tire
width.  The '85+ sliding door is lighter and some nicer but not a big
deal in my opinion; I lived very nicely with the older door even
after owning an '85 7-pass and learning the difference.  The 2.1l
engine has a little more power on top but maybe a little less torque
at the bottom.

Oh yes -- the '85-up plug wires are much easier to deal with; the
older ones have a nasty tendency to leave the terminal in the
distributor cap when you try be it ever so carefully to remove
them.  That means new cap and coil as well, so the nice terminals fit.

Yours,
David