"Are you happy with the WEST System? I know plenty of guys who swear by it and a couple who swear at it."

It is my favorite hands down. Last summer I used both WEST and MAS. I preferred the WEST. I thought the MAS was far from odorless, and the odor was gross chemical. I like the smell of WEST, which is probably a bad thing. WEST is just very high performance, it is not the easiest to wet out fabric with, but it plays best with wood. The fabric problems are with the heavy knits. While the problems exist with lighter cloth they are totally manageable.

WEST was more expensive for a long time, particularly when people doing boat sized projects passed on the project discounts that were substantial. These days the costs are pretty competitive with brands like System 3, the cheapo RAKA of an earlier time, being more expensive. West price is the same or lower than the 70s. I know guys who hate WEST, it seems for the cost only. I have a friend who is doing a large catamaran, who did everything to avoid using WEST, and made himself sick with all kinds of discount brands (not that WEST is a picnic if you get yourself saturated in the stuff). He is now a WEST proponent. Drives me crazy. All that said there are a lot of projects or steps within a project where you can easily get away with any of the semi credible brands, and there can be advantages to other brands like longer pot life, or easier wet-out.

The other thing one hears against WEST is that it is hard and cracks So other brands market themselves on flexibility, which is normally a big negative, like wanting soft cement in a fero cement structure.