My impressionable young mind is getting twisted back and forth, first I thought the 1987 model year was the best choice for a 5 spd, but I was flopped to 1989 by some convincing arguments yesterday. I am looking for a drivers car, with the same $10k to $15k budget everybody seems to have, but I don't need a specific car yet, just to make up my mind which is best before I get to the buying stage.

1987 is going to have a bit lower "base" cost, and its the first year to have motor and 5 spd issues worked out, and its pre digital dash.

1989 first year with diagnostics you can talk to, pretty much all the good parts of the last cars made, digital dash, long term likely holds value better.

Any opinions, and yes I know the first nice car of either year or others I locate that I like will get pursued, but academically, which is the best year for a 5 spd?

 

1991 is better, especially red ones.

 

Airbag go boom, wallet go poof, 87 or 89

 

I can fix the airbag thing... No problem.

But to answer your question in all seriousness, They both have the pluses and minuses.

The 87 is probably slightly better suited for boosting (if that's in your future) because of the piston squirters. I'm not sure all 87's had this, but early ones do for sure. Other than that - There ain't a hill-a-beans difference between the two. The diagnostices you point to - if you mean the blinking of the check engine light - are WAY overrated. Mine worked for a while, but now I can't get it to work. Whatever.

I think it comes down to mileage, quality, and budget.

 

The 89 > have improved thicker cylinder heads and use longer head bolts. Plus the 89 with 5 speed has a 2.63 final drive , GT is 2.7272

 

Dangler,

When are you gonna take my advice and save your up front costs . Get an '85 for less initial and climb under .

When you get to that 10k-15k you would have spent initially you'll have a sweeeet ride . And you'll know your car really, really well.

 

if you get in an accident in any 928 thats values at 10K, Forget airbags, they may save your life, if its damaged an insurance company will total the vehicle if they went off or not. There are more expensive parts in the 928 library then airbags you would have to replace if you were in any serious collision.

its weird to some people airbags are a life saver. Others are oh i dont want the expense blah blah blah, i think the "its expensive" excuse is a lame arguement. If they go off chances are great that the car would be totaled anyway

 

Didn't know about the heads, and forgot about the 2.63 vs 2.72.

 

Go for the '87, our reds look better.......


Depends on what you'll be using it for, highway cruising is sweet with the 2.20 rear end. A little faster off the line the higher the rear end gear goes.

Only real early '87's have the squiters, but you can't tell until you take the engine apart to where you can see them, I think. I wonder if there are less electrical issues on '87-'88's since we don't have the digital dash.

 

Much to my peril I am looking at a 83 5 spd Monday that should increase the lifestyle of all local mechanics, but I might get smarter over the weekend and decide to buy nothing that isn't pretty sweet to start with, which brings me to 87 or 89 where all the bugs of the early 5 spd seem to have been finally worked out.

89 is the first year the ECM will talk to a diagnostic device. This I am told is a good thing.

*** Note if this 83 isn't as rough as it looks, and the price works, I may just buy it to start driving a 928 now, and sort out my final plans later, but my gut tells me its going to have some expensive PM ahead of it.

*** Looking at a 89 in Autotrader or cars.com I forget, but its $26k at some North Hollywood dealer, low miles like 27k, but ran the Vin on the smog database and last smog test was 97, EEEEK maybe sitting someplace for 7 to 9 years.

 

The gauges in the digital dash actually WORK as intended, no issues with the fuel and voltage gauge that seemingly all the pre '89s have. How many posts have you seen about a failed digital dash?

 

Just trying to poke up the demand for '87 to keep the values up.

 

Jim got here first on the above. 89s also have:

Digital Dash with cool icons
Many more have LSD
Last year of S4 5spd.

 

Yeah, but with the '87 you can say it was the fastest prduction car in the worl in 1987. Ha ha ha. I know, the '89 GT is actually (top speed) faster.

 

And an even shorter final Drive.