Brew Like A Monk says that Westy only contains Dingemans pils and pale malts. Rochefort and Westmalle Dubbel contain caramel malts. Westmalle also contains "dark malt for aroma". Special B is not even mentioned in the book.
This coupled with the fact that many of what I consider the best clone recipes use very little, if any, caramel malts and no Special B is what I was driving at.
I'm sure it can't hurt in small amounts but my taste buds don't detect the usual flavors from it.
I personally think that my tastes buds perceive the "normal" Special B flavors with Dingemans CaraMunich so that's what I like.
To the OP: a good thing may be to do a few test mashes. Take some grains and a small pot and do a test. Scale your percentages down small and use a strainer to get the sweet wort out. Taste it and see what you think. Minimal investment to get a sense of what flavors you like.
I think we can all agree that this is a great style with a bit of room for stretching out with reference to sugars and a few specialty malts. You can definitely make it your own.
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