AutoPuzzles - The Internet's Museum of Rare Cars!

The time has come.
How many of you have a list of manufacturers, a database of makers or even a site were you go to when you look for info?
How many times you find something missing in this database: a manufacturer reported in a book that is new for you, a period ads featuring a new make, a solved puzzle with a totally new name?
How many times you see pictures taken from a book or a magazine and you'd like to know more but you don't know where to find a reference to that source?
How many times you are looking from a car made in Switzerland but you can't look in all your sources, one by one looking for that name?

If your answer is not: "What the hell are you talking abaout, you mono-maniac!" this place may be interesting for you.

I have been developing a terribly challenging project during my latest 10\15 years: a list.
Not a simple list, but a definitive list.
In this list I have ...listed... all the manufacturers, coachbuilders, team racers,  designers and even the simple men who built cars by themselves.
I went further, listing all the models that I had in my papers, for all these manufacturers, keeping trace of the sources and the pictures and adding technical specs.
Nowhere can be found such a list in the web ( trust me ) and even the most comprehensive source (like, for example, the Beaulieu) does not report a lot of makes (one-offs, buggies, racing cars, concepts....).

I'd like to use your knowledge to improve it in those areas where my sources cannot arrive.
Each one of you has got a particular knowledge in some areas where my work is terribly incomplete.
In return, I offer a lifetime work: a list that each one can use at his own benefit, in a format that allows you to sort it by Name, Nationality, Years or whatever you find appropriate.

The project is huge, it will contain all the sources I know, and I know it will probably be a really neverending project.
That is why I need to know if someone is interested and before we get started we need to determine some precise rules.
We will start with the manufacturer's only: models, specs and pictures will came later.

I'm waiting for feedbacks.

Great Idea, Paul Jaray!
Back in the early 70s I started to make lists of car manufacturers. I was some eleven years old when I reached the 100 mark, a few years later I had some 500 makes, and then I gave up... But it would be great if I could be of any help in this "neverending story"  :)

Thank you.
I started when I was a kid too. I had this handwritten piece of paper with a list of supercars....
Then I decided to put it in an old PC... and the short list became a list of more than 7500 makers, increasing of hundreds (yes, hundreds) of makes each week these days! And there are all the models known for each one of them (more than 51000 but I decided to stop listing each model-year for some american cars since it was taking to much time, but it is in my things-to-do list).

I will be glad to help you, although I have never got down to making such an index - my archive is made mostly of pictures with some information added to the names of files or folders (that's why it is very difficult to search in it  :-\ ). It will also depend on time I will be able to spend on this project, but in general I'm at your service - I find the idea very interesting :)

I have a coiple questions, though. First, do you plan to add different trademarks of the same builder as different entries (for example, Ferrari and Dino or Chrysler and Imperial). Second, what about numerous assembly factories - they often made some modifications to the models they've produced under license to adjust the car for the local market (numerous Fiat factories all over the world...).

Thank you.
You do not need to have a list on your own: you can just check mine and add what is missing and fix what is wrong.
The 1st step is the following:
We have to divide each manufacturer into categories.
The list will be alphabetically sorted, but we can tag each name to be able to use it:
I'm not too good to explain, but if we add some tags to each name we can collect all the cars into separated categories when we need it.
This is the 1st matter we have to discuss.

What tags do you mean? Country, period, category (production / prototype / self made etc.) and so on?

The list, that I'll post soon, is like this:

1) Manufacturer, 2) Years, 3) Nationality, 4) Full name 5) notes
Example   
1)MARSH      2)1899-1905   3) US     4) Marsh Motor Carriage Company, Brockton, Massachusetts 5) 1899-ex Atlantic Steamer

This allows you to sort them by the name, the years and the country.
It also give you the name of the previous company (if any) or the later development of it (if any) if it is part of a group, if it is incorporated by another or if it was sold under a different name in a different country. The full name is a precious resource when you have 10 manufacturers with the same name!

The 1st division has to be about the manufacture's nature:
I still have not a precise idea, but something like this:

• Alfa Romeo, Clenet, Ginetta, Pilgrim make different cars (traditional, neoclassic, kit-cars, replicas) but should be in the same big group, the one of the Companies
• Revelli, Michelotti, Giugiaro, Exner are designers
• Pininfarina, Bertone, are coachbuilders
• Lola, Williams, are racing cars builders
• Gordini, Abarth are (something like) tuners
• a man who built his own car is a category apart

In this 1st layer we have to include them all.
Please, help me find these categories and the eventual bugs of it!

When we will include also the models, we can add the other tags, like 'replica, kit car, neoclassic, 3-wheeler, concept, buggy, ATV, race car, off-road, etc etc'
but we can't use these tags for a company:
many kit car builders have replicas in their line-up but also original fun-cars or neoclassic.
Alfa Romeo itself sold a replica of the 6C 1750, but we can't use the 'Replica' tag for the 'Alfa Romeo' make. When the 'Quattroruote Gransport' model will be in the list, we can use it, and in a search of Replicas it will show up as a valid result only this model.

In this 1 layer there should be also a category for the 'non-automotive' makers: a car built by a magazine, by a company of biscuits or by a tyre company...
another one for the cars built by the schools, the universities or the colleges.

Let's start from this:

• Regular manufacturers= companies making cars for the market in one, more than one exemplar or even as a project for a future production: here should be all the manufacturers of passenger cars, kit-cars, replicas, buggies, 3-wheelers, neoclassics,etc. When a group of people form a brand to create a vehicle to sell 
• Coachbuilders= this can be a tricky one, no doubt about some names, but how can we call a Callaway for example?
• Designers= just men, or women, who are responsable for the design of a vehicle, not the modern chief-designers, but the person directly involved in it. Some discussion is required also here
• Not-automotive Institutes= schools, university and colleges which developed a vehicle as a class project, or something like that
• Not-automotive companies= vehicles built by companies not related directly with cars, such as chemicals industries (BASF, MARBON, BAYER), food industries (Outspan, Cadbury...), magazines, and so on
• Tuners= this is another slippery field. It's not easy to put Gordini, Abarth or Alexander in the same category of Brabus, AMG or Lorinser
• Racer builders= companies which build racing cars only. Not self made specials or passenger cars used in race
• Individuals= just men, or women, who built their own car, alone or in small groups of entusiasts, for personal use or for race

Count me in!

Yes I'm new here, and yes I'm not a pro yet and yes, I doubt I can know more than you, but I like the idea.
I have my own never-ending archive, albeit pretty small compared to yours.

For as regards Callaway, it's a tuner  ;D, no doubt on that, even if it may seem weird, but they sell every single update for ordinary cars, no need to buy the full C16, for instance.
That said, it is hard to say Brabus and ENCO are both tuners. I'm not into Brabus, but there are cars out there that ? have some difficulties calling them "cars" some times.

I recently decided to archive only cars that actually exist/existed, no free-time design students projects, no visionary tuning car. Renderings are OK only if followed by serious plan and a founded business. Otherwise you won't be able to recognize between someone with good computer skills and some actual automotive skills.

Not really into kit-cars either, but I'm working on that.

I'm happy to ear that.
about Callaway, that is exactly how I listed it, a tuner, but I would like to ear other opinions, and your is welcome!
About kit-cars I have only few books, but I'm sure we won't be short of sources and experts.
In few days I will have the "A" part of the list on the net, and then we can start looking for updates.
I'm decided to archive real cars and not renderings too.
Is there something I left out in these 8 categories?
I'm thinking at all these name I have in the list and try to figure out if they can be associated to one and only one of these.
About Mc Laren, for example, they are racing car builders, but they also produced at least 3 road cars (M6 GT, F1 and the new one).

What about the companies like Magna? They've built a couple of concept cars, but mostly deal with components. It can't be listed within 'Non-automotive companies' and I can't define any other category among the ones you have specified for it. Webasto or Valmet could be in a similar situation.

and EDAG..

Will help to complete the Final List only when this board is still focused mainly on puzzles.  ;)
Anyway I guess I won't be of big help, but will do what I can..

I thought it when I was wondering of the tyres companies...they can't be considered non-automotive...
...there can be a category for companies in the automotive field, but not strictly car-makers.

Quote from: Allemano on December 09, 2009, 05:56:49 PM
Will help to complete the Final List only when this board is still focused mainly on puzzles. ;)

This is just a project, it won't move the centre of this place of an inch.  ;)

'Automotive related businesses' or something like that?
And still what about assemblers and trademarks?  ::)

Yes, something like that.
About the assemblers, I think they are just useless. It's not important to have listed all the Volkswagen's assemblers all around the world, except the markets where there are specific models, and I think they go in the 'regular manufacturer' group.
So far:

• Regular manufacturers= companies making cars for the market in one, more than one exemplar or even as a project for a future production: here should be all the manufacturers of passenger cars, kit-cars, replicas, buggies, 3-wheelers, neoclassics,etc. When a group of people form a brand to create a vehicle to sell 
• Coachbuilders= this can be a tricky one, no doubt about some names, Touring, Zagato,etc
• Designers= just men, or women, who are responsable for the design of a vehicle, not the modern chief-designers, but the person directly involved in it. Some discussion is required also here
• Automotive related companies= companies dealing mostly with components, like Magna, Webasto or Valmet
• Not-automotive Institutes= schools, university and colleges which developed a vehicle as a class project, or something like that
• Not-automotive companies= vehicles built by companies not related directly with cars, such as chemicals industries (BASF, MARBON, BAYER), food industries (Outspan, Cadbury...), magazines, and so on
• Tuners= this is another slippery field. It's not easy to put Gordini, Abarth or Alexander in the same category of Brabus, AMG or Lorinser
• Racer builders= companies which build racing cars only. Not self made specials or passenger cars used in race
• Individuals= just men, or women, who built their own car, alone or in small groups of entusiasts, for personal use or for race

Here's an alternative classification:

OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer) - this is the professional term for an automobile manufacturer. This should be reserved for the "big" ones, past and present.
Assembly plants - relevant only, when there are models suited to local tastes
Automobile companies - smaller companies, buggies, kitcars, etc.
Engineering companies - this could include contract assemblers, like Magna, Valmet and others, like EDAG, Webasto, ASC
Automotive suppliers -  BASF, Johnson Controls, Faurecia et. al. which also created some prototypes
Design studios - I think it is obvious
Racing companies - like McLaren, Lola
Schools
Tuners
Individuals - I'd group here those who designed some cars and those who built one-offs at home

A while ago I was wondering about splitting race cars from road cars (see the McLaren case, but also Ferrari or Porsche have/have had good ortion of race cars in their lineups).
I'd honestly keep it as simple as possible.

- actual automakers, like Ford, Fiat etc etc, considering also McLaren (with its 3 cars), Alpina (which is officially registered as such and not as a tuner), and also low-colume makers like exotic makers as Pagani, Spyker, Koenigsegg, Mitsuoka, Tramontana (what's its real name btw? as a company I mean)

- tuners, from Brabus to Autodelta and so on

- race cars makers, like Lola, Reynard, McLaren (once again), Audi's prototypes and rally cars

- coachbuilders...easy one like Zagato and Pininfarina obviously, but what about companies like n2a Motors from the States? The line between them and tuners soemtimes risks to be a bit too thin...

- kit-cars, whatever you can buy and assemble in your garage

- replicas, clearly inspired to something already existing, but it may even be a category mixing with others. A lot of kit-.cars are replicas too.

- concept cars, including both cars coming from Magna, EDAG, IED of Turin and so on, but in the case of IED for example, when they were commissioned by McLaren to
provide new designs for their future MP4-12C, I think that should be listed as McLaren's concepts, as they were designed because of them, with their inputs and resources.

???

@pnegyesi:
I'm looking for some classes to divide them all as a 1st layer, inorder to look through pertinent groups when we make a research.
Your division is goob, but I have some doubts here:

Assembly plants: hundreds of makers started as assembly plants for others marques (Alfa Romeo-Darraq). If we search for all the Darraq assemblers (and there were a lot) Alfa Romeo will show up as a result, but AR is also an OEM.

Automobile companies: smaller companies. How can we define how a company has to be small to be listed here? Cisitalia was a small company, Lotus is quite big, De Tomaso made few cars....And how can we keep this definition upon a growing make?

Individuals: we'll have Michelotti, Loewy and Charbonneaux togheter with Mr John and Sig. Rossi who built a powered quadricycle...

The others are more or less the same, but we need a category for the cars built by other companies, not related to the automotive field, like some magazines (Popular Mechanics, Quattroruote and others) or food industry (advertising vehicles like the Outspan Orange, the Cadbury vehicles, and others)

@TheItalianJunkyard

The division between actual and defunct is not pratical: If I have to compare two cars like an Alfa Romeo RLSS and, let's say an Amilcar C6, they need to be in the same group. And there are a lot of makers (modern ones) that are simply silent: honestly I don't know if they are active or not anymore.

Racing cars makers: almost each big company can be found here (Ferrari, Alfa, Fiat, Renault, etc...) and this won't be a real division.

About the other categories, they are all tags to be added to the models, not to the companies:
kit cars: many comanies has got kit-cars and fully assembled cars, but also original designs.
concepts: Ferrari's 408 is a concept, but we can't put the 'Concept' tag to Ferrari make.

My idea is a 1st division to have:
all the 'pure' companies in a place (Audi, Salmson, Essex, DeP, you name it)
all the 'pure' racing companies in another (Mallock, Lola*, Reynard, ....)
all the individuals who designed cars (just designers)
all the individuals who build up a vehicle (all the sel-built vehicles, present to past, from the steamers of 1896 till the car assembled from scratch yesterday)
tuners or coachbuilders: who actually do not build a car, but just modify an existing one.
schools, you got it,
engineering automotive companies: like the cars made by Webasto
non-automotive companies: magazines, etc,

The following step will be a further division into these groups.
What do you think?

Ok, the best way to find it is to do it:
Find a category, only one, for each one of these manufacturer:
Ferrari = in one category, you'll have to include production cars, concepts, gt, racers, coachbuilt cars. (Testarossa, Mythos, 250gto, 375 Indy, 250MM Barchetta)
Chaparral = in one category, only racing cars
Savannah = Savannah college of art and design, not a coachbuilder or a car designer, but a College of Art
Exner = Not as a chief designer, but as a father of concepts.
Pininfarina = A coachbuilder, but also a concept maker and a production car maker.
Harris = the man who built the streamliner in 1936, collecting parts from other vehicles.
Gordini = a tuner, who modified some engines, but who also build many racers and who gave his name to some production cars
Wienermobile = the big wurstel, where do we put it  ;D ?
Webasto = amazing concepts, how can we define the company?
Bremen = one category, for this maker of kit-cars, replicas, original vehicles and assembler. (Sebring, Lafer, Mini Mark...)

Sorry Paul, with "actual" I mean "real" automakers, not present ones  :), so we agree here.

Didn't get we were considering a "first layer" division, so now I have to say the last list you just posted seems OK.
Not so sure on how the individuals designed cars could go though.
You mean "designed" as in "engineered" or "styled"?

Like, many coachbuilded cars are often related to a single man, like the recent Bertone Mantide and Jason Castriota, but that's correct only for what regards the style.

On the other hand, cars like the McLaren F1 or the LCC Rocket are intrinsically related to Gordon Murray, but probably only the latter was (almost) designed by him and only him, while for as regards the F1 it was more of a team work, even if he was the leader and main contributor.

From this point of view, they'd both be more of a "second layer" filter, quite different cars from those really built and designed by a single man egnerally in his garage, and often replicas of some sort.


Need some elaboration on this category...



On the other hand...couldn't it be simpler to just add "tags" to all of the names, makes, models, we have?
Then you can just search trough them inserting the right tags, without any level required.
It isn't always possible to define something precisely, so more tags would just help I think.

Regarding companies like Magna and Webasto, they are "suppliers".
Which production cars did Pininfarina? as far as I can remember they modified existing cars at best, like the Pinifarina Spider based on the Fiat 124 Spider, while the cars they produce are of other makes, like the Alfa Romeo Spider or the Ford Focus CC, but they are still are respectively Alfas and Fords.

Thi brings me to another consideration:
I'm focusing to determine the nature of the maker, but its nature is determined by its products, so a McLaren is a racer builder when we consider an MP4\17 but is a 'normal' maker if we pick up the F1 Supercar.
We can still have this generic 1st layer, but we can add a more challenging layer, where we add all the tags for the models of that make:
Ferrari = 1) Normal (can't find the right word for this sorry) 2) production, race, concept, coachbuilt
Chaparral = 1) Racing cars builder  2) race cars
Savannah = 1) school 2) concept
Exner = 1) designer 2) production, concept, coachbuilt (Chrysler 300C, Mercer Cobra, Chrysler D'elegance Ghia)
Alfa romeo = Normal 2) production, race, coachbuilt, concept, replica (giulia, 33TT12, RM Sport Castagna, Gransport Quattroruote)

About the designer, that is a good question, Bertone started as a designer, but now he's a coachbuilder, like Giugiaro and his Italdesign. Fioravanti is a designer, a concept maker and part of Pininfarina's team in the past.

QuoteOn the other hand, cars like the McLaren F1 or the LCC Rocket are intrinsically related to Gordon Murray, but probably only the latter was (almost) designed by him and only him, while for as regards the F1 it was more of a team work, even if he was the leader and main contributor

You are considering the model and not the Maker\name: here we have Mc Laren, LCC and Murray.
Mc Laren = racing cars builder (but also few 'production cars')
LCC = production cars (ok is a small brand, but they are for sale and for road use...)
Murray = is not a company, He is more an individual, and if we want to include him in this list, we can include engineers with the designers.

Bertone for instance is devided in different companies: Stile Bertone and Carrozzeria Bertone (less important Bertone Engineering and Bertone Glass)

But it wasn't like this always.

I don't think it will be of any use to go too deep on each make, remember that there are thousands and thousands!
In my list, for example, Giugiaro is reported as a designer when I listed many Bertone's or Ghia's cars made by him and as a coachbuilder with Italdesign.
Bertone is listed only one time, with the car he designed and with the concepts he made.

what about a structure like this:

1 - makes, here you list all makes, from companies like Fiat to a small business like BXR Motors. Evrything is listed here, individuals and heavily modified race cars as well (not all the Porsche 956 were the same after they reached each team...)
 
    -- each item in this list has its own tags, as much as it is required, like:
        --- McLaren is a racing car comany, but also a production car company, an exotic maker, etc etc
        --- ItalDesign is a coachbuilder, but also an engineering company, and a design (or concept car) company

2 - models, this is the second layer, and all models are listed here (connected to their own makes that is, depending on the structure on the archive, like subfolders if it was Windows)
    -- each of them has its own tags once again, from the years of production to the main characters behind its project, or the name os the assembly plant,etc...
        I'd tend to divide every generation since this step, as there is no relationship between a first gen Mercedes-Benz C-Klasse and the latest, no point of having them together.

3 - as the third and possibly final layer we have model years, special versions and everything that can identify say a Ferrari F430 from a 430 Scuderia (just to give an easy reference)
     -- once again, all tags that may be helpful must be filled, similarly to those found at the second layer.


So basically you'd have a huge list of all the makes, all together, but with the possibility of filtering them with the tags (and a list of the tags is mandatory of course).
Then, once you selected one specific make, whatever it is, you have another list, as large as the cars produced, designed etc etc by that make.
You can filter this new list once again with the provided tags, and find what you were looking for.
The same goes with the third layer.

On the other hand, you could start directly with the second layer filter, in case you know you're looking for something say from the seventies and american, but can't remember the make.
This way you'd have all the American cars from the seventies, and you could apply even more filters/tags while the search advances.



Thought?



   
   
   

TheItalianJunkyard , you make my day.

I just realized that I did not wrote here what is already done in my list:
1) The name, 2) the years and few notes about its story (previous name, merges, groups, etc...) 3) Nationality 4) the Company's name.

A & M                                    (1996-....)                                         GB   A & M Specialist Cars Ltd, Redditch, Worcestershire
A CAR WITHOUT A NAME      (1909-1909)-1909-then FAL (2)      USA   Department C, 19 North May Street, Chicago
A TO Z CAR EMPORIUM              (1994-1994)                               USA   A to Z car emporium, Davie, Florida
AAA (1)                                (1919-1922)-1922-then ELEKTRIC   GER   Aktiengesellschaft fur Akkumulatoren und Automobilbau, Berlin
AAA (2)                                (1919-1920)                               FRA   Ateliers d'Automobile et d'Aviation-paris

This is what I already have done and is the smaller part of it.
This allows you to sort them only by the years (approx) and nationality.
I have also a list of each model for each make, but it will be added at the end.

your suggestion is good, but we can't use these tags for the manufacturers.
These tags as to be linked to the specific model:
if I look for a BRAND making racing cars, I'll have all the manufacturers, as I wrote before (Fiat, Ferrari and McLaren), and if I look for a BRAND making production cars, once again I'll have Fiat Ferrari and McLaren.
If a link the 'Racing' tag to a specific MODEL, I'll find '348 Challenge', 'Fiat Mefistofele' and 'McLaren MP4\17' under the model classification and 'Testarossa', 'Punto' and 'F1 Supercar' as well with the 'Production' tag.
Your idea is the next step of this project, already in my PC but it's impossible to improve all in once.
I have a big list with all the manufacturers, and an huge list, with manufacturers with each model associated.
Before we start to give tags to each model, we have to separate the individuals from the companies and the institutes from the Racers.
Then, inside each category, we can pick brand by brand and add tags according to the models.
It's easier to do than to explain.

I'll post a part of this list soon, so you'll see what I mean:
This big list of names is useless if we can't operate some operations, and we can't just start with a deep classification, because for the more than 1000 makers starting with 'A' I have something like 6000\7000 models.
But if we divide all these 1000 manufacturers into few categories, who is an expert about racing cars will keep on adding in that field, and so on.

I must admit that I don't know anything about this kind of systems, but to me the proposal by TheItalianJunkyard  sounds very convincing. Like this you get one huge list of all makes, of whatever category, and if you only want to have makes of a specific category you can use a filter. No need to make doubles if a make could be put into different categories, and - by the use of the filter - no need to read the whole list when you can and want to restrict it to one particular category.
Maybe we'd need in the beginning a category "not-categorised yet", since you've got already a list of thousends of makes and you cannot put all of these immediately into the exact category. This can be done gradually, before or when listing the model names.

In few days the draft of the 'A' list of manufacturers will be ready: I'll post a link to a spreadsheet where we can decide hot to manage it.
In the meantime, I suggest to keep on choosing those tags, for the companies\individuals and the models.

Something rather different: Many infos on the internet (and in books and other publications) cannot be controlled or checked. It would be nice if the list could get some foot note system. Of course we know whose informations we can trust within our small AP-community, but with such a note system the list might grow to be a really reliable (or at least controlable) sourcse.

All taken into accout already.
It's funny how all of you are proceeding along the same path I did!
My idea include also a "reliability indicator", that is: together with each make, we can add the sources where we can get these info.
No one doubts that there was a company called 'AUTOCAR' active in Ardmore, Pennsylvania in 1901-1912: there are plenty of sources.
But what about the '162 GLASSFIBRE' company that is only listed in one book (The A-Z of Sports Cars)?
All the makes I listed are taken from books, magazines and encyclopedias, and with few clicks I can add their names to each make.
Then we can assume that the McFee in the "A-Z of Sports Cars" is actually McAfee or that the East Glows in Georgano's New Encyclopedia is actually a Beijing.

Before I dig into my memories of stuff like this I studied at university a while ago (28/30 for the record  ;D), what system are we talking about?
I mean, is it a database (which one?), a group of folders and subfolders, Excel files?
Just to understand what we can do and what we can't do.

About the problem with companies producing ONLY race cars and companies producing ALSO racing cars.
Just give them two different tags OR different operators, like:

find RACE CAR maker but don't list PRODUCTION CAR makers.
this are the operators, THIS are the tags.

In that way you are asking the system to list all the makes which we tagged with RACE CAR, without listing those that are also tagged with PRODUCTION CAR.
Even further, adding other tags like RALLY, DTM, FORMULA 1, LE MANS etc etc we could go straight to a specific series maker, like showing Ferrari but only for what regards the Formula 1 cars without taking account of the prototypes or GT cars.

That's heavily depends on the system we are talking about though.

Ok, then, I'll take a step back, starting from the beginning.
I have an excel file, simple as that, no-operators or tags, just an excel file.
This file is made of 3 pages:
Pag.1
COLUMN-DATA
A-MAKER (All of them, alphabetically listed, racer designers, etc...)
B-MODEL (each the model of that given make, even the different model-years)
C-Cylinders (how many Cyl, from 1 to 32)
D-Disposition (Boxer, in-line, V, Rotor, W, Stellar, etc.)
E-Displacement
F-Max Power
G-Top Speed
H-Year
I-Kind of vehicle (Kit-car, Replica, Racer, Coachbuilt, One-off, etc...)
J-Cross Reference (A Ferrari by Vignale is also listed under 'Vignale')
K-About the model (if it has an engine by another make, if it was sold under a different make, if it's electric, steam powered, or other notes)
L-About the maker (the total years of production, if it was previously another make, if it was later known with a different name, merges, groups, etc)
M-Nationality
From N to AN, the sources, for EACH model, and if there are pics or technical details in there.

Pag.2
A legenda, with all the abbreviations of the index, and the sources.

Pag.3
A-Maker
B-Year (indicative)
C-Kind of manufacturer (indicative)
D-few notes about the make (the same of Pag.1 Col.L)
E-The full name of the company (very important when you have 10 makers with the same name).

I would like to share this with all of you, starting with Pag.3.
The list is now just an excell file, but once it will be released, we can choose the best way to edit it.
I'll post the "A" letter soon (I have to fix it because I have the few notes in Italian) and then you can thell me which database will be the best for OUR project.

As far as I'm aware, Excel file is not the easiest way of making an online database, as it will be very difficult to operate, if it is possible to make any filtering with them online, can't say for sure, because I'm not good in it at all. MySQL database would be better in my opinion (at least recently I figured out what it is :P ), but here one must have some knowledge to adjust it.

Excel allows to insert filters and operators, they are bitches though, it is too much of a multitasking program I think.
A good step would be transferring it to Access (or whatever it is called now), but I didn't find it so easy when I used it a few years ago.

Probably Faksta's idea is a good one, and I'd say it should also be capable of importing data from Excel as Access as well.

I'll leave the technical issues to you know and I'll focus on completing the "A" list.
When it will be online, consider that you'll see just a list of manufacturers as well as individuals and so on.
I'll put it in a google spreadsheet, so it will be easy to copy and upload in any other program.
In the meantime, you should consider how are we going to "modify" it.
My 1st proposal was to find tags or categories, to have an useful tool in our searches.
Another task could be how shall we add the 'reliability index': another column with the references for each make?
To know how we are going to modify it, we have to answer to this question:
How are we going to use it?

Wow,
Only at A/P could one find such a work in progress.
This is a huge undertaking. I have read all the comments in this topic, perhaps all are correct in one form or the other.

Might one seperate all race cars, race designers, race engine builders etc into a whole seperate area?
This might be practical and make for easy reference for an individual that only has interest in race cars or their manufacturer's through the years, might this work ?

Perhaps a simple click of the mouse, for travel , to a catagory/area for street production versions built by the same company?

Perhaps another click of the mouse to travel to shaired engine's, in essence, so and so built engines for other race cars, click here to see a complete list of all that used/shaired this engine?

Just food for thought guys !!!
Merry Christmas to all !!!
John

Hi John!

my cross-reference idea works just like that, but only if the engine-provider developed also a whole car:
In my list of Lotus cars, for example, I specified when a model is equipped with a Ford engine, and there is a 'Ford' entry with all Ford's models.
But if there is acompany providing only engines, it won't be listed as a maker...but once again this will be a matter to consider when we'll decide to put also the models.

Update: so far my "A" list counts 1040 different makers.
I'm still working on it, but don't forget this project...

Quote from: Paul Jaray on December 11, 2009, 08:28:18 PM
Update: so far my "A" list counts 1040 different makers.
I'm still working on it, but don't forget this project...

Don't worry, I'm waiting for the first stint of makes so to have in front of me what we are dealing with and find some good ideas.

were yo considering connecting this names archive to a pictures archive too?

I'm sure the list of makers will keep us busy, if we want to make it complete and if we find a way to divide them.
The final project, (the one that is already in my PC), will be a list of all the models for all the makers and all the pictures.
This second (and final) step will be released only if the first part will take off, and probably it will take place in a different place.
But, once the list is online, it's our, and we can decide how to improve it. A good idea could be to have 1 (or few) pics for each makers (when available) just to have an idea.

Here we are:
This is the link to a spreadsheet with the "A" list: http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0AjYlJSxUWho7dGpSemJLTkswOGwxaFJHbzNDTlJmRGc&hl=en

The underlined makes are the ones I suspect to be only assemblers but since I had not the time to check, they are included.
The red entries are the ones that are not in my papers, but are available in some sources online.
All the others are featured in some books and can be checked.

Here are still missing:
many specials and racers and all the latest makes, because they are not covered in any book.
many makes available in some lists, (list of kitcars, list of buggies etc) available online because I had not the time to check them.
many makes already featured here on AP, because I still have to list them,
some of my puzzles, cause you have to find them!
the red entries on the last part of thew list because they are still too much and I'm adding them one-by one (the other list was aleady mostly done)

What is an approximate percentage of non-production makes in this huge  :thumbsup: list?

All the short lived makers from the 1800 till the 1930 are almost all production models, but even there are a lot of makes intended for production but never completed.

Impressive list indeed. You also feature bus producers?

No bus-producers here unless they also build cars or bodies for cars.
But keep in mind that this list was born as an index for an archive, and this archive contains what's in my books, etc.

I mean Ukrainian Antorus, to be precise - did they ever build anything but buses? I can't say for sure that they never did, but I have never heard about that.

My little question: why some Russian manufacturers have "SU" mark (which should mean Soviet Union)  ???  ;)

Quote from: faksta on December 13, 2009, 11:40:21 AM
I mean Ukrainian Antorus, to be precise - did they ever build anything but buses? I can't say for sure that they never did, but I have never heard about that.

Antorus, you are right, should be one of the underlined ones.

Quote from: Arunas on December 13, 2009, 11:58:32 AM
My little question: why some Russian manufacturers have "SU" mark (which should mean Soviet Union)  ???  ;)

I have a problem here, the same of the former Jugoslavia.
In my index it was not so importand and I marked all of them with Jug or Urss, but now we have to fix them.

I started to fix them according to this:
http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sigla_automobilistica_internazionale#A

Antorus assembled a few thousand Lada cars between 2003-2005

Now I understand!
In my index, the assemblers are underlined, but when I copied to Google spreadsheet, they are normal.
There are few assemblers (like all the non Italian Alfa Romeo) that I kept only because I'm not sure they only assemble cars or they had original models:
here are the underlined ones:

Strange, that list lists 'SU' as 'Russia', not 'Soviet Union'  :-\

AKSAI TAGAZ
ALFA ROMEO MALESIA
ALFA ROMEO SOUTH AFRICA
ALFA ROMEO BRASILE
AMI
ANCHI
ANTORUS
ASIA AUTO
AUTOALLIANCE (1)
AUTOALLIANCE (2)
AVA (2)
AVTOTOR
AVTORUS
AYMESA

Aksai had its own car - Dozor in 1997-1999, if we don't count 1903-1904 Aksai 7hp (a licence built Oldsmobile Curved Dash) as an own model, although it was sold under its own name. And, by the way, TagAZ has a range of own developed vehicles as well.

Alfa Romeo Brazil had it's own alfa.  The Alfa Romeo Rio 2300
The Alfa Romeo 156 was assembled by GM in Malaysia.
South Africa is a little bit harder.  They were CKD kits that were assembled with some local content.  But some things were unique.  For instance, the GTV6 was available with the 3.0 V6 engine.  I do not know were you draw the line between an assembled car and an original model.

That's why this is the right place.
In few minutes you already fixed 2 bugs that I left for the future.
I have this makers in some catalogs of wolrd production, where the range is just few lines, that's why I did not omit them but wasn't sure about.
(and this cars are not in my index, but I just put them in when I knew that I was going to post it here).

I think I have established a connection between the makes I wrote about. Aksai, yet pre-Soviet maker, placed in Rostov-on-Don has been acquired in circa 1996 by Doninvest bank. Since 1996 they began to assemble Daewoo Espero and Nexia cars under the original Daewoo name. Also through 1997-1999 they've made a little Aksai Dozor 4x4 vehicle. Later (in around 1999) new premises have been set in Taganrog with the help of Daewoo - based on ex-Taganrog combine plant facilities. The new factory was called TagAZ (for Taganrog automobile plant). For a couple years they've assembled Daewoo Lanos, Nubira and Leganza under own make (Doninvest Assol, Doninvest Orion, Doninvest Condor accordingly). As far as I'm aware they didn't differ from their prototypes in any minor part, while the new names were applied to get some tax privileges. Since 2000, when the deal with Daewoo lead to nothing, TagAz began production of Citroen Berlingo under own name as well - Doninvest Orion-M. In 2001 the production of Huyndai Accent has started, later - Porter. Now TagAZ produces a line of licensed cars, but they have also made a couple prototypes, like  TagAZ Road Partner P400 (Ssang Yong Musso based restyled pickup) or a 5-door TagAZ Tager (Ssang Yong Korando with two more doors, the original Korando is sold under the same Tager name). In 2009 they've made their first car on their own - TagAZ C100 (now renamed into Vega).

Autoalliance are Ford-Mazda JV assembly plants.
While they make unique models (US: the US spec Mazda 6 and Ford Mustang, Thailand Ford Ranger/Mazda BT 50,...)  For me they are just assembly plants, and not 'car brands' on their own. 
However I do not know under which tag you will place for example the Ford Ranger from Thailand which is exported to many countries.  Ford (THA)?

Impressive!
I've just few lines and already you have the whole story.
Now, before we loose to much time on separate searches, I suggest to find a common ground as a start (how modify it, wich column to add, nazionalities issues, who should be in , who should be out) and in the meantime I'll keep on fixing the 'B' letter. It will take a lot of time and I'll post it when we will have an idea on what to do.
1) Informations
What should we have in our index? (what I once called categories..)
Is this enough or should we add an indicator for the sources, for the period, for the type of Companies?
2)Format
After #1 is clear, the well informed can tell us which should be the best layout (and porgram) to have it done.
3)Team
when we'll know what, and how, we can decide who will be doing what. Each one can have full access at the list, but we have to find some rules for the actual privilege of edit it, otherwise it will be a mess.

@75america

about Autoalliance (1), I wrote it before: they should be underlined in the list, because I find them in some catalogs as assemblers, but I do not know yet if they made specific models.
About Ford Thailand, it should be Autoalliance (2), but I don't know if they make also specifi models.

Before talking of each make, let's decide about the whole project.
I have it on my PC, complete and working, how would you like it?
The features I have are enough for me and I'm fine with that, which ones would you like?

Ford Everest is mainly Thai model, isn't it?

Couple of remarks:

1, Regarding AutoAlliance - Ford. There's nothing new under the sun - this problem came up when we worked on Autoindex. One of our clients came up with the term "design parent" to help with this problem. In this case Ford is the design parent and AutoAlliance is the plant. Our solution was to set up "groups" - Ford is a group, VW, is a group and list assembly plants separately, but link to the main group.

2, Excel table. I assume there are a lot more fields, than what is currently available in the spreadsheet. It would be nice to have a complete inventory - a list of fields and a short definition of what's available in that field. An Excel sheet like this can be imported to an SQL database right away.

I'm happy to help with my experience and advice if there's a need

Thank you Pal, I'm sure this issue has been already solved before, because it's what everyone that want to fill such a list has to face.
1) This solution sounds very good, and it's exactly the kind of categories that I'm willing to create as a start... (companies, individuals, etc...)
2) This file is a part of what I have, but what I have is an index for my archive, and not a list of all the makers as a project.

I realized that, having (for example) all the Beaulieu on an Excel file allows me to look for a car made in Pakistan without go through thousands of pages and the referece to all the pictures in all my archive allows me to look for a precise car wherever it is.
It took years to have all the material on this file, and that's why I'm a bit jealous about that: I don't wan't just to share it, I want to work with you for making something different: a list like there are hundreds online PLUS all the names that can be found only here.

The project is here, in this topic: I just shared a little piece of my work to see if can be used, and if it's interesting for someone.
I do not have the skills to make a database, using operators or anything like that, and that's why I started with excell: it's easy and it does exactly what I need: list, sort and collect.

What I'd see as required info:
-NAME
-YEARS
-ORIGINAL COUNTRY
-FULL COMPANY NAME(S) with related years if there is more than one name
- MAIN ACTIVITY (coachbuilder, production maker, etc)
- SIDE ACTIVITIES (concept cars (as with MAGNA), one-offs, etc)

Other info could be managed as Y/N options, like:
- copyrighted products: YES or NO
 --  if NO, list of the brands of the licensed cars, or notes on the collaborations
- LIST OF SUBSIDIARIES or RELATED COMPANIES perhaps with years, difficult to do, but would explain why certain cars are similar or share components (engines, chassis,...) with others. This should be used after a Y/N filter, and only makes with the Y answer would have this secondary list.
-...

I do think we have to start using a database program since the beginning, it nay be too late if we give a defined structure to the whole system, to adapt it.
Working on Excel should help a lot for now, just keep adding columns.

I agree, and that bring us back to the start:
-Names, we have them
-Years: some sources report different  years, sometime the company remain in business in another field, a racing car can have a long carreer, etc..
-Original Country, here we just have to find the right abbreviation and decide how to consider a make made in a place that no longer exists,
-Full names: many are there, other can be found
-Main activity: here is the classification I asked for from the beginning. (Company, Individuals, Racers, etc)

Is there a classification for all the names that are in that list? This can be our 'Main activity' field.
Once again:
Companies (Original Equipment Manufacturers, Assembly Plants, ....)
Racing Companies (and with the operators we will find the 'production' cars among them)
Coachbuilders-Designers-Tuners (who modifies the exterior of a car, who tune the engine and who develop a different body over a given chassis)
Schools
Individuals (homebuilt, specials, etc)
Engineering companies & automotive suppliers
Not-automotive companies

and the side activity could be:
Concept, one-offs, replicas, kit-cars, etc.

Is there anything that will not be included?

About the countries, we should use the one were the company started. Babylonians aren't called Iraqis nowadays.
Perhaps we could add something like URSS - now Kazakhstan or Italy - now Crotia (think about Istria which used to be Italian).

I'd make it depending on years, like I do in my folders. For example, if the Russian car was manufactured in, say, 1907, before the USSR has appeared, i feature it with [R] sign, Soviet cars - with [SU], modern ones - with [RUS]. If the manufacturer was active during several periods, I specify them all: [R, SU, RUS].

Soviet cars may not be specified as Russian, as well as on the opposite, we can't feature the car built in, say, Soviet Ukraine as Ukrainian IMO, as there was no such country during that period - it was a Soviet republic, while post 1991 cars would already carry Ukrainian sign. Of course, sometimes several countries of orgin can be applied for a single car. Korvensuu, first car built on Finnish territory, is most often reported to be a Finnish car, but in 1912-1913, when it was constructed, Finland was not a country, so according to my system it was a car built in Russian Empire [R]. If it became a company and remained car production after 1918, I would feature it as [R, SF]. Such cases can be found for more countries - Austro-Hungary, Germany, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, etc. etc.

I think it is the most logical way of presenting this information.

Agree.
The same goes with Bugatti, generally regarded as French, but founded in a territory conquered by Germany for two times.

Couple more thoughts:
1, We'd come to an agreement regarding the purpose of this whole excersize:
- will this be a separate, public website, the ultimate list?
- will this be a part of AutoPuzzles, like a standalone forum or a separate sub-section?
- will this be a separate, closed website, password protected, where only members by invitation can roam freely?

2, I agree that we'd need to define what's in the database, but first we need to have some sort of a mission statement defining the purpose of this list.
- If this is just a plain A-Z list, then we need category/categories, name, country, years active
- If this is to be the ultimate resource, the biggest encyclopedia, then it may be wise to extend the scope a bit to add a description field, a sources field and we may even think about adding a whole section to individual models by a company. So it will eventually be more complex, but a lot more useful.

3, Regarding the database structure, even if we just go for a simple A-Z list,
- then the years active column should be separated for SOP/EOP - start of production production and end of production. If end of production is blank, then the company is till active
- there'd be two country column: one, which refers to the name of the country when it was active and the other, refers to the name of the country today.

Very good questions.
1- Ultra told me how to make a site on my own, because I had not the slightest idea and I'm thinking about it.
If this project will remain here, I'll share all the makers and the sources and Autopuzzles will have the most comprehensive list of makers.
If we'd like to add models, technical data and pictures, I'd rather make it in a different website, like a twin of AP, one with the misteries and one with the answers\sources. 
  In no way this project (here on Autopuzzles or in another website) will be closed or password protected, because I'll share all I have with everyone just for the pleasure of it.
I posted a part of the list just to see if the subject is interesting for all of you, if you want to work on it and if you find it stimulating.
If you like the idea, we can fill this list and leave it here, if you like it very much and want to make something bigger, like the biggest encyclopedia, then I'll follow Ultra's advice and make a brand new site. We can make a poll and vote if we want just a list or the whole encyclopedia.

2-If we want just the list, we have to find the categories and fix the dates-nationalities.
   if we decide for the whole encyclopedia, we have to start from the makers in the same way and then add the models.

3-SEO-EOP is fine but: some companies are just silent, and it's hard to know if they are closed or still in business. Some makers are reported in all the sources as active in the 30s or 80s, with no further detail, that's why in my list I put the 2 dates when they are known and just an indicative one when they are not. The not-automotive companies dates are irrelevant but it is useful to know the year when the prototype was built.

At least those who are directly involved should get a password protected entry to keep the project safe from hi-jackers or other undeserved visitors

Better keep the years of activity into two separated fields, not just say 1950 - 1990.
With two different fields (or Excel's cells) then it would be easier to work on them trough a proper database.
Like, if I'm looking for something I believe was from the sixties, a proper query to the database would look for all the makers active during the 1960:1969 period.

Please, vote the idea you'd like to realize, even if you won't work for that.
In the meantime here is what we already decided and what is still to be fixed:

Make:
DONE: We agreed that we need some categories.
There will be assemblers only when they had specific models but a Mercedes-Benz from Tuscaloosa won't be different from a German MB.
When a make changed name during its life: if the company will still be the same (like Ferrari-SEFAC) there won't be a specific (SEFAC) entry in the main column but it will be reported in the 'Full name' one. When the company keep making cars under the new name (like A.L.F.A. then Alfa Romeo) we will have both names listed.
TO DO: which categories fit them all?
Years:
DONE: 2 different fields: a year for the beginning and one for the end
TO DO: about the companies that keep working under the same name but no more in the car-making field?
about companies that built a car but are not in the automotive field as a main business?
about the individuals?
about racing cars?
about the obscure makes with indicative years (like in the 80s)?
shall we add a new column for these with an indicative year?
Naz
TO DO: pu in the same place all the different nationalities a make had during its activity, fixing the wrong abbreviations.
Full name
DONE: the full name of the company plus the place, plus all the different names that the same company had (Ferrari-SEFAC) but not the name of the different, following company, we can make a cross reference for that in another column.
TO DO: shall we add the years when the same company changed name?
story  
TO DO: few lines where we report: merges, companies, later development of the company and so on

Make:
What I thought is if we don't list assemblers, how do we specify production years for each model? The original model might have been discontinued, but at some plants all over the world it still might have been produced for local markets. Should we specify the original car's years of production or make a combined period for all the assemblers (including the years in which the car was not produced at the main plant)? Listing assemblers might have helped with that, although it will be quite difficult to find them all.

Years:
For racing cars, as well as for production ones, I'd specify years in which they were constructed, if you don't want to go deep into all the modifications they underwent during their lifes. Otherwise, we will need to think deeper about it.

Full name:
I think adding years of the company being known under one or another name would be very useful.

Story:
And don't forget the perons behind the start of the company.

P.S. PJ, did you receive an e-mail? Will such a way of development be convenient now?

I voted for the second option, but i don't think a different website is necessary at the beginning...it's a long way...

btw, I agree both with PJ and faksta, and I'd add this:
YEARS: when we don't know the period when a maker was active we could simply enter the first year of the suspected decade (like 1930) in RED, and so eventually for the end of its life.
About individuals, we could only the year when the car/project was finished, perhaps in a different color as well like BLUE, without a end of life year. It should still allow a query to find it.

MAKE: as faksta pointed out some cars were officially discontinued by the parent company but still sold elsewhere by its local subsidiaries, think about the Golf mk1.
I think should be mentioned on the notes/page about the specific model.
In case a company disappeared and one or more of its cars were still made, probably the name changed, and if not, it should be mentioned on the notes. You could still buy some Rovers after they went out of business, but the company was dead, while some cars are still built by in China, but under a different name.



If you don't mind, I'd focus myself on the structure of the database, from a technical point of view. That's very important so that we start dividing the info we have (PJ, actually :)) since the beginning and perhaps add something else.
It isn't different from what we were discussing until now, I just want to have a specific look at the structure.
Answering right now the questions we could have and that would lead to us browsing the archive would make such archive much more...browsable...  :lmao:
The point behind this already lead to the two columns for the first and last year of activity, for example.
At this point, if someone has some ideas, even the most obvious, about what you are asking yourself before of browsing such a sort of index or reference, post them here, it will be highly appreciated  ;)

@faksta:
this first step is about Makes and not Models.
If Roves as a make ended up in 2005, in the Rover Line we will have Active: 1904 Out of business: 2005.
Then, in the subfolder, (sub-whatever) with the models we will have for example Rover XX:  after 200X available under the XXXX make.
Then, as TIJ suggested, we can specify in the notes of the model the further career of it.
We can also lists assemblers if their activity may be relevant for our project.
If the MAKE is taken over by another, we will have a line for each and the reference in the 'Story' column.
About the racing cars, I do agree with you.
About full names, we can do it.
About the story, I have something similar in my index: a reference to all the people involved in a way or another in the development of that model. Many personalities are involved in many project, but not officially: I'm thinking about Porsche in a lot of projects, or Murray, and so on.

@TIJ (hope you don't mind the abbreviation)

it seems that you saw my index!
You suggested more or less what I did:  I put an indicative year for the suspected decade and about the designer, in the list of models, I have the year of that model, in the list of makes, an indicative year for my queries.

I received your email, faksta, and I'll add those makes right away.
For further makes, I think it's better to focus on the structure, as TIJ suggests and on the references\categories.

The new updates comes from faksta and are the green ones.
The red ones comes from the net.
All the others can be found on other sources such as books, magazines, etc.

This index should eventually be the ultimate way to solve all puzzles. :lmao:

In that list (A only) I did not list 40\50 makes that are: some of my current puzzles and some of my possibly future puzzles.
And I put a couple puzzles of mine in it as well, but it's up to you to find out which ones!  ;)

That's it, the key is to find a good way to look into it.
Queries, I remember how much I hated them...

I was considering designing this list with what I believe could be a useful feature.

I'm pretty sure all of us have a picture archive on their computer(s) and hard disk(s).
On the other transferring those images on the list would be just overkill if not for the huge amount of images and gigabytes.

So what I was considering is to design the list so that downloading it to your computer, and obviously using the right program, you could link the list to your images archive, so that when you do a query and got one or more results, you can also look at them, both if you were looking for a company or for a specific model.
It would require also to adopt the right scheme for the images archive as well so that the two system can talk to each other, but I suppose that shouldn't be a problem.
I'm not really sure about this, but maybe the "list" (or rather, the database made with the list) could even modify the images archive so that it complies to its (database's) rules.

could it be interesting? I say yes, but what about you?
could it be easy to do? that I don't know, we'll see...

As I told before, I'm not really into technical matters, when we talk about PC: i just know what allows me to survuve  ;D.
Your idea seems great, but it will be useful only for who already have a lot of pics.
I'd love this feature on my index and I'll be very happy if you manage to do that.
In ther meantime I'm working on the 'B' part of the list.

If you mean uploading all those pictures on the future site (or AP section, whatever), some copyright isues will occur, as always  :-\

If we collect pictures from the net or from old books, it will be more or less what we have here or in other sites. When\if there will be some copyrights claims, we can remove the pic and leave the link: important is to have all the info ready to use, if we can't post a pic from a book, we can post the reference to that book and who is really interested can buy it, if available, or can receive a scanned page from a generous friend  ;).

No, no pictures or so would be uploaded. Maybe just one or a few images per each model, just to recognize it, but that's not what i was talking about.
Actually, what I meant is exactly the contrary.
You download the list, and link it to your archive, so that when you make a query in the list, and you have your result(s), you can also look directly at the related images YOU have in YOUR computer.

I think this could be helpful. I'm considering this because I was thinking about what I would I do if I have such a list (completed that is, both all makes and all models).
I'd use it to search for something, but when we look for something we like to have pics of it too. Even more if we are trying to find something we can't remember or that we have to confront with something else.

That's why I made that joke saying it would be the perfect way to solve every puzzle.
In my (at the moment) virtual project, you should be capable to find the exact name (given it already is featured in the list) of whatever car just recognizing some characteristics of the car you're looking at.
Like time (even a large period like a decade or even more), the country of origin, the kind of vehicle (coupe, coachbuilded, cabriolet, sedan etc etc) and so on.
Surely you'd still have to know what that you're looking at and how to browse and interrogate the list.

How's it coming Paul?

Thanks for asking, Ultra.
I'm proceeding with my work as usual, now I'm working on the 'B', but this project is for you all: if you think it may be useful (like it is for me), help me find a way to make it manageable, if it's not, well, I'll keep on updating my list for myself.
Like I said from the beginning, what I have is fine for me and I can use it as I need. If someone is interested in it, I'll share my work, but you have to tell me how you want it and how are you (we) going to use it, then.
I don't know which features you may like (I think TIJ's project is very interesting) and what you'll be looking for from that index, that's why I suggest to focus on the layout of the Maker list and the categories. I don't know much about technical issues, that's why I've been using a simple excel file for years.

I'm not working much on this thing at the moment as this is a busy period for me, but I didn't forget it!

Paul,

I've picked up a working java script that should allow for the sorting of the table by any of the column headers. Not a pure "search" function, I know, but I'm working on embedding a google search gadget into the pages, as well.

Can you send me the password for the unprotected version of the spreadsheet. Cutting and pasting the protected version is taking me forever.

Thanks!

PM sent!  ;)

I'm almost done with the 'B' letter but I'm not going to add it to the 'A' part, because I had something different in my mind.
The 'A' part was just a sample, to let you know what I was talking about.
I'd like to post the complete list, but after we decide how to use this list.
I don't want just a list, with everything mixed up, but a list that we can use: someone is looking for all the selfbuilt russian cars? Go to that list and sort it by nationality and then look for the "personalities" category.

I'm making a sum of all what we already discussed here, so that you don't need to read back all the previous pages:

Here's the sample:

http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0AjYlJSxUWho7dGpSemJLTkswOGwxaFJHbzNDTlJmRGc&hl=en
The underlined makes are the ones I suspect to be only assemblers but since I had not the time to check, they are included.
The red entries are the ones that are not in my papers, but are available in some sources online.
The green lines are some updates I received from our AP's member
All the others are featured in some books and can be checked

Here are the issues we already found out:

• Do you plan to add different trademarks of the same builder as different entries (for example, Ferrari and Dino or Chrysler and Imperial)
  Yes.
• What about numerous assembly factories - they often made some modifications to the models they've produced under license to adjust the car for the local market (numerous Fiat factories all over the world...).
  They will be included when they have specific models for theyr countries in theyr line-up.(Fiat Regatta Coupe)
• Renderings are OK only if followed by serious plan and a founded business. Otherwise you won't be able to recognize between someone with good computer skills and some actual automotive skills.
  I agree, no free-lance sketches, but serious plans. (but we can always decide for a further category to include them all).
• If a company is divided into different companies (Stile Bertone & Carrozzeria Bertone)?
  I don't think it will be of any use to go too deep on each make, remember that there are thousands and thousands!
  In my list, for example, Giugiaro is reported as a designer when I listed many Bertone's or Ghia's cars made by him and as a coachbuilder with Italdesign.
  Bertone is listed only one time, with the car he designed and with the concepts he made.
• what about a structure like this:
  1 - makes, here you list all makes, from companies like Fiat to a small business like BXR Motors. Evrything is listed here, individuals and heavily modified race cars as well (not all the Porsche 956 were the same after they reached each team...)
     -- each item in this list has its own tags, as much as it is required, like:
          --- McLaren is a racing car comany, but also a production car company, an exotic maker, etc etc
          --- ItalDesign is a coachbuilder, but also an engineering company, and a design (or concept car) company
  That is good, and that tags are exactly what are we going to find!
• About the countries, we should use the one were the company started. Babylonians aren't called Iraqis nowadays.
  Perhaps we could add something like URSS - now Kazakhstan or Italy - now Crotia
  We can make both nationalities and we can do that also for the companies which changed nationality during their life.(see faksta's reply#69)
• then the years active column should be separated for SOP/EOP - start of production production and end of production. If end of production is blank, then the company is till active
  Perfect!
• Something rather different: Many infos on the internet (and in books and other publications) cannot be controlled or checked. It would be nice if the list could get some foot note system.
  My idea include also a "reliability indicator", that is: together with each make, we can add the sources where we can get these info (books, magazines, websites)
• You also feature bus producers?
  No bus-producers here unless they also build cars or bodies for cars

we will add a column to that list with the tags.
Now let's find them:
(these tags have to be related to the manufacturer and not to the models!):

• Production Car Company (companies making cars for the market in one, more than one exemplar or even as a project for a future production: here should be all the manufacturers of passenger cars, kit-cars, replicas, buggies, 3-wheelers, neoclassics,etc. When a group of people form a brand to create a vehicle to sell )
• Racing Car Company (companies which build racing cars only, or mainly. Not self made specials or passenger cars used in race )
• Individuals (just men, or women, who built their own car, alone or in small groups of entusiasts, for personal use or for race) 
• Schools\Institutes: schools, university and colleges which developed a vehicle as a class project.

We still have to find a commong ground for:
Coachbuilders\Designers\Engineers\Stylists\Tuners\Design studios    and
Companies like: chemicals industries (BASF, MARBON, BAYER), food industries (Outspan, Cadbury...), magazines, (Popular Mechanics, Quattroruote...),Engineering companies (Magna, Valmet, EDAG, Webasto, ASC)

I can't find a manufacturer\name that can't be included in one of these.

Perhaps we can list the manufacturer and the coachbuilder, and denote "collaboration" (a project developed by the coachbuilder and the manufacturer), "customer car" (a one-off built for a wealthy individual), "coachbuilder promotional" (built by the coachbuilder to showcase their abilities and/or secure work from the manufacturer) or Coachbuilder / Limited Edition (a short run of cars built for a seller, such as an Arnolt-Bristol).

But that will affect the models, I'm still thinking at the makers.

A Pininfarina-built Testarossa will be a model under the Ferrari make and under the Pininfarina make as a collaboration
A Pininfarina-built 375MM Berlinetta built for Mr. Rossellini will be under the Ferrari Make and under Pininfarina make as a one-off
A Pininfarina-built Pinin will be under the Ferrari Make and under Pininfarina as a show car.
A Pininfarina-built 400 Superamerica Cabriolet will be under the Ferrari Make and also under Pininfarina as a Coachbuilt\Limited edition car.

We will use the cross references to list all this cars, like I already did in my index: I have all the Fiat togheter, but I can sort them by coachbuilders (Allemano, etc...) but I can also list all the Allemano cars (not only Fiat, but also Lancia, etc...)...

The question is, according to what you wrote, which tags are we going to use for Pininfarina, as a Brand\Maker\Designer?

I know that it seems complicated, but it's not.
I'm not too good to explain, but the system works, I already have it.
When I made my list of manufacturers, there was no need to be too accurate in this division, because I have also all the model listed:
I divided all the manufacturers into generic categories (Racing Cars, Production Cars, Coachbuilt Cars, etc) but I also have all the model listed:
if I look in my 'Ferrari' string, in the Manufacturer's list, there is only the 'Production Cars' tag, but in my model's list I have 'Production Car-Race Car-Coachbuilt-Prototype-Limited Production' tags associated to every single model, when appropriate.
If I have to look for a racing car company, I'll search into the manufacturing list, and I know that Ferrari won't be there and if I look for a racing Model, I'll look into the Model list and I'll have all the models that I tagged with 'Racing Car'.

great to see you're managing to put all the ideas into a sensed form!

About the sources, we could add a column where we enter all the reliable sources about that specific make.
What's a reliable source? Generally books are more reliable than websites, but you often find many mistakes on books as well, and often websites are very usefull with not so known info in them.
Regardless, it's common sense that can make the difference. Reading something on a small website isn't that reliable unless the writer provides itself some reason to at least trust him. the same goes for books. generally you can trust books as there is much more work, efforts and even a bit of authority in order to get your work printed. Still, we all recognize a well written book and even more an important book. Often many recent books are written after what you can find yourself on Wikipedia or other not so hidden websites, and even without checking the info.

So...it's up to you to trust or not something. Many people write after what companies' founders told them, but can you trust them?
In the end, among the best sources are companies websites. the problem is probably 90% of automotive companies were dead before internet was conceived. Books from the nineties tend to be good, and so prior to that. Recent books should be from good authors with some sort of good sources quoted in the books themselves (like renowned archives, workers or ex-workers from some companies, etc).
Something you'll know I suppose  :D

When there is something about a make that we aren't sure of though, and that we can't find any sort of baking, the solution could be using something like a red colored background for its line (as we are now working in Excel), or add a "verified" or "no sources" attribute in a new column, so that only verified info could browsed during a search.

When the same manufacturer is reported in different books it can be a sign that piece of info is reliable, but I noticed that sometimes, some books are written using info taken from other books, often with the same words!
That is why I call that column an 'indicator' of reliability: if a maker (like '162 GLASSFIBRE') is reported in one source only and that source is often mistaken, we can consider that entry not very reliable...
In my vision of the final project, for each car\makers I will add if we need more info about or more pictures.
The story of some makers are well documented (De Lorean-Tucker-Bricklin) and pictures or info are not missing. Even in these cases, the real experts know something that we may not know (the different prototypes made by Giugiaro, the Tucker Convertible, etc) and only they can add something new.
For all the obscure ones, it's open to everyone who have some info or pictures, and each one can help with his material.
About the sources online they can be the most reliable at all or just fakes: some cars are not in any books, but on the net you can see pictures of them, ads and see them on the road. The selfbuilt cars are not reported on many books, but online you can find websites with their story.
Sometimes there is just a guy writing: "that's my dad's selfbuilt car", plus the pictures. I want to put them in, but the reader have to know that it's not a verified source.

Just in case you want to know, 162 Glassfibre is not a mistake.
I found out that in many other sources this is simply called: "One Six Two Engineering" and the identity is confirmed by the model range, that matches with the one reported in "A-Z" book.

1 year later:
the index is growing, now I've refined it till the 'M' letter: 12000 makers so far and still counting.

Wow, that's really impressive, Paul Jaray! And the 'M' is only the 13th letter, so 13 more to go....

Paul,

What you are doing is the dream of many people. I think Histomobile is trying to do something like that ob to a certain point, I believe I myself try to do that and there are many people doing that in their own. I know a guy who is making "a matrix" of everything vehicle related for Holland alone and he mentioned to me he was well over 1000 entries.

Unbelievable!!  :o
Hope your back-up from time to time...

Incredible numbers, indeed! :) :thumbsup: I hope it will be realized for public some time later ;) In fact, the entire idea to have a great list lead me to establishing www.allcarindex.com. The main objective is to have a free and pictured(!) index of production makers, concept cars and Soviet self-built cars. I am sure Autopuzzles is a place where I have found and I can find people willing to develop the idea and this is what makes this place so special. Than You all! I hope to get help of you or advices for my project in the future and I would be pleased to contribute (only if the time permits me for this) for this project of the century, PJ and other guys are working on. Best luck!

Paul, that is an incredible project - congratulations and keep at it - it has to be done.
I thought your Italian coachbuilders feature was excellent and I'm looking to do something similar in the future.
I'd gladly give you a hand if you need any help.

I myself have a database of manufacturers since 1940.
This includes all the major/minor makers plus the one-offs.
It does not include commercial vehicles or single-seat racing cars.

The fields are - Make, Years of Production, Manufacturer name, town, country, (owner/designer), Cross reference to other makes, Production numbers, Remarks (inc. type of car produced), Reference (to magazine or book article) and whether an image is available.
There are currently 7,280 makes listed plus 12,300 photos/images

Secondly I also have a database of sports racing cars from 1940.
Same parameters with 1,900 makes. Photos/images are included in the main database.

Thirdly I have a small database of Formula Junior single seaters.
More or less the same parameters with 355 makes and 350 photos/images currently.

You have probably realised by now that my main interest is in sports racing cars (post WWII) and I'm working on on an encyclopedic publication covering this field.
I'm also very keen on the coachbuilders aspect but haven't had the time to start that yet.

I'm sure many others are working on various aspects of motoring from veteran to today's concept cars.

Wonderful - keep up the good work.

Quote from: DynaMike on December 07, 2010, 09:12:20 AM
Wow, that's really impressive, Paul Jaray! And the 'M' is only the 13th letter, so 13 more to go....

...yep, but I'll have to slow down now.

Quote from: DeAutogids on December 07, 2010, 10:00:09 AM
Paul,

What you are doing is the dream of many people. I think Histomobile is trying to do something like that ob to a certain point, I believe I myself try to do that and there are many people doing that in their own. I know a guy who is making "a matrix" of everything vehicle related for Holland alone and he mentioned to me he was well over 1000 entries.

I started when I was a kid and never stopped...I still have to put dozens of books in it...

Quote from: Allemano on December 07, 2010, 10:01:20 AM
Unbelievable!!  :o
Hope your back-up from time to time...

well, it's just an excel file, but I have several copies of it and of all my pics

Quote from: Arunas on December 07, 2010, 10:13:44 AM
Incredible numbers, indeed! :) :thumbsup: I hope it will be realized for public some time later ;) In fact, the entire idea to have a great list lead me to establishing www.allcarindex.com. The main objective is to have a free and pictured(!) index of production makers, concept cars and Soviet self-built cars. I am sure Autopuzzles is a place where I have found and I can find people willing to develop the idea and this is what makes this place so special. Than You all! I hope to get help of you or advices for my project in the future and I would be pleased to contribute (only if the time permits me for this) for this project of the century, PJ and other guys are working on. Best luck!

I like your site very much and if I ever will make my own, it won't be too different!

Quote from: woodinsight on December 07, 2010, 10:53:12 AM
Paul, that is an incredible project - congratulations and keep at it - it has to be done.
I thought your Italian coachbuilders feature was excellent and I'm looking to do something similar in the future.
I'd gladly give you a hand if you need any help.

I myself have a database of manufacturers since 1940.
This includes all the major/minor makers plus the one-offs.
It does not include commercial vehicles or single-seat racing cars.

The fields are - Make, Years of Production, Manufacturer name, town, country, (owner/designer), Cross reference to other makes, Production numbers, Remarks (inc. type of car produced), Reference (to magazine or book article) and whether an image is available.
There are currently 7,280 makes listed plus 12,300 photos/images

Secondly I also have a database of sports racing cars from 1940.
Same parameters with 1,900 makes. Photos/images are included in the main database.

Thirdly I have a small database of Formula Junior single seaters.
More or less the same parameters with 355 makes and 350 photos/images currently.

You have probably realised by now that my main interest is in sports racing cars (post WWII) and I'm working on on an encyclopedic publication covering this field.
I'm also very keen on the coachbuilders aspect but haven't had the time to start that yet.

I'm sure many others are working on various aspects of motoring from veteran to today's concept cars.

Wonderful - keep up the good work.

Looks VERY interesting!
As soon as you make it pubblic or your enciclopedia is ready I have to have it!
Have you got a website?
Your databases seem to be organized like mine, the only difference is that I have them all togheter, I can sort them into different categories and I listed also each model.

Like you my databases are on Excel and yes I have a website - www.sima-int.com - but it's got nothing to do with cars!

I was a long time member of the Guild of Motoring Writers in the UK and was editor of several automotive industry magazines in the 1970s.

However I have been working mainly in the maritime field for the last thirty years.
"woodinsight" was the name of a newsletter I did on the analysis and forecasting of the yacht market over 30 metres, so now you know where the name came from.

It's only in the last two years that I have renewed my interest in the automobile field and am now devoting my time to this.
I intend to further develop my existing databases to include more detail on the individual cars but as you know this takes time.

I started as a kid too, but I still am.

Time for an update.
A friend of mine helped me to convert the old Excel file in Access and I'm working on 'Letter P'.
I will be considerably slower now, but the work is always in progress.
When times will come, I'll be glad to have the help of anyone has a list, and some of you already gave it to me.
12800 makers and counting.

Quote from: Paul Jaray on November 05, 2011, 08:47:28 AM
Time for an update.
A friend of mine helped me to convert the old Excel file in Access and I'm working on 'Letter P'.
I will be considerably slower now, but the work is always in progress.
When times will come, I'll be glad to have the help of anyone has a list, and some of you already gave it to me.
12800 makers and counting.

My greatest respect! Keep up a good work, PJ!

Quote from: Paul Jaray on November 05, 2011, 08:47:28 AM
Time for an update.
A friend of mine helped me to convert the old Excel file in Access and I'm working on 'Letter P'.
I will be considerably slower now, but the work is always in progress.
When times will come, I'll be glad to have the help of anyone has a list, and some of you already gave it to me.
12800 makers and counting.

I'm keeping my list of makes up to date every day.
Makers (inc. one-offs) from 1940 to date currently over 8,000.....
I haven't considered including makers prior to WW II, the task would be time consuming for me at the moment - but you never know!

Another update:
15020 makers
91700 models
about 50 books in there (including encyclopedias and huge volumes)...

Time for another update:
15820 makers
97620 models
more than 60 books and 400 magazines.

 :thumbsup:

That is more than simply impressive, that is, dare I say, one of the largest databases in the world?

Thank you but far from that.
There are hundreds of makers out there that are simply not in any of my books but they do exist.
I'm working on a way to ...include... them in my list and probably you will all be invited in this project soon... ;)

Time of coming out.
I have a database with 6500 entries (brands) of small car producers (only road cars) after 1943.
My definition of small is a production of less then 100.000 cars per year (in ALL the years after 1943).
That leaves out Porsche (D) and Jaguar (GB).
They must have build at least one driveable car/prototype and had a plan to sell their car(s).
Latest entry: Classic and Sports Replicars (ZA)

Very interesting...I've noticed that many of us are working on a similar project. I already received some samples of lists by some other members and here and there you can always find new names.
Who else is working on a list like that?
I know for sure 10 of us: one of brazilian cars, 5 like mine with all there is to list, 2 about coachbuilders, one about racers and one about off-roaders).
It will be great if we can join our efforts and the result can be quite interesting.
I'll be happy to help anyone who'll need more info.
I'm sure no one will just give away his loved work just like that, but I have an idea on how we can help each other.

Quote from: Paul Jaray on November 26, 2013, 09:12:24 AM
Very interesting...I've noticed that many of us are working on a similar project. I already received some samples of lists by some other members and here and there you can always find new names.
Who else is working on a list like that?
I know for sure 10 of us: one of brazilian cars, 5 like mine with all there is to list, 2 about coachbuilders, one about racers and one about off-roaders).
It will be great if we can join our efforts and the result can be quite interesting.
I'll be happy to help anyone who'll need more info.
I'm sure no one will just give away his loved work just like that, but I have an idea on how we can help each other.

That's an interesting topic... the purpose of a complete list looks to be a common feature of the AP members...  :D
In fact I think that the first "list" we have in common is AutoPuzzles itself... and maybe we can at first work on AP to obtain a full list of the cars we saw on AP...
It's not an easy work, and the first problem is the classification criteria...
I gave (and still give) my little contribution with the Ferrari, Maserati and Lamborghini AP Museums... but it was something I started by myself, and maybe if we discuss a common working method we can tidy up all the AP car database...
It's just an idea...  :)

Quote from: Iluvatar on November 29, 2013, 12:21:59 PM

Quote from: Paul Jaray on November 26, 2013, 09:12:24 AM
Very interesting...I've noticed that many of us are working on a similar project. I already received some samples of lists by some other members and here and there you can always find new names.
Who else is working on a list like that?
I know for sure 10 of us: one of brazilian cars, 5 like mine with all there is to list, 2 about coachbuilders, one about racers and one about off-roaders).
It will be great if we can join our efforts and the result can be quite interesting.
I'll be happy to help anyone who'll need more info.
I'm sure no one will just give away his loved work just like that, but I have an idea on how we can help each other.

That's an interesting topic... the purpose of a complete list looks to be a common feature of the AP members...  :D
In fact I think that the first "list" we have in common is AutoPuzzles itself... and maybe we can at first work on AP to obtain a full list of the cars we saw on AP...
It's not an easy work, and the first problem is the classification criteria...
I gave (and still give) my little contribution with the Ferrari, Maserati and Lamborghini AP Museums... but it was something I started by myself, and maybe if we discuss a common working method we can tidy up all the AP car database...
It's just an idea...  :)

In another place here in this site, I proposed a project. It was a book about Autopuzzles. Something to prepare before the 10years anniversary.
I have a precise idea in mind: it can't be a real book for several issues, 1st of all it will be too big and it will contain a lot of pictures with unknow copyright. It can be an ebook or a pdf and it can contain also small pics...who cares, they are all here! The book will be divided in some interesting sections (selfmade-custombuilt-eigenbaus, coachbuilt, flying cars, university projects, etc...) but the real interesting feature will be at the end: all the cars featured here will be sorted according to diferent parameters: there will be a list in alphabetical order, a list by country, a list of 'based' cars (just think at all the Mini-based, Jaguar-based, Fiat-based, and so on) and so on.
Once you have the original list ready, you can sort it as you prefer according to the 'tag' you like and have your book ready as you like it.
I started myslef and I'm going to complete this list for my own use since there were no volunteers in such a gigantic task.
It is bigger than you may think...just to give you an idea, once I started I listed (with all those tags) less that 1000 cars and a total of 41 pages...in the meantime the numbers of pages increased of more than 50 and the pages are around 1000!
It means I'm definetly too slow for it and probably a combined action will bring some results.

Quote from: Paul Jaray on November 30, 2013, 11:47:14 AM
It means I'm definetly too slow for it and probably a combined action will bring some results.

What about planning an equipe work?

Actually the task is quite easy, or at least it is the way I'm developing it.
I start from the last puzzle of the last page of a given year and proceed backwards towards the 1st. In case one of the old ones is updated along the process, it will be encountered at the end and won't be missed.

Here's a sample:
You have here in each column:
Maker-Model-Cross reference-year-tag about the builder-tag about the car-....

There are then several columns that I'll use to sort the lists at the end: one for the mechanicals (and I can list all the mini-based, VW-based and so on), one about the wheels (3-wheelers, 6-wheelers, etc) and a couple more for a lot of different tags (advertising car, kit car, rendering, replica, amphibious, etc etc.)

Keep in mind that this is what I decided for my project, once I decided to proceed alone for myself: I put there what I need for my other project (the neverending list).
If I'm no longer alone on that, we can decide together what is interesting and what is not, which tags are to be used and which ones are not.

I do not know if it can be done, but it might be an idea to add tags to solved puzzles, to create an easy way to search everything... in a more useful way then the search function that can be mislead by tiping errors or just missing words...
Do you know if it's possible?

There's a way, but I'm afraid it's quite long...you have to add them one by one at each puzzle.
This is what I'm doing in my new project but you have to chose your tags first and once again that is the hard part.
In a search you sometimes look for 3-wheelers or mini-based, etc...and those are easy tags. But when you look for a car made by an University, or a selfbuilt car or a car from Taiwan, you are looking for the maker of it.
I'm giving tags to models (3-wheeler, mini-based, etc) and one to makers (made by an university, selfbuilt, etc...): this is the only way, I think.

Quote from: Paul Jaray on March 02, 2014, 05:36:52 AM
There's a way, but I'm afraid it's quite long...you have to add them one by one at each puzzle.
This is what I'm doing in my new project but you have to chose your tags first and once again that is the hard part.
In a search you sometimes look for 3-wheelers or mini-based, etc...and those are easy tags. But when you look for a car made by an University, or a selfbuilt car or a car from Taiwan, you are looking for the maker of it.
I'm giving tags to models (3-wheeler, mini-based, etc) and one to makers (made by an university, selfbuilt, etc...): this is the only way, I think.

Yes, to add tags to every old puzzle it's long... but if new puzzle will have a tag function the classification of future puzzle will be easier, and at the same time we can add tags to previous puzzles...

http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?topic=135761.0

This is the only part I understand:
http://mods.simplemachines.org/index.php?mod=579

seems to be quite simple and very useful!

Quote from: Paul Jaray on March 03, 2014, 02:43:23 PM
This is the only part I understand:
http://mods.simplemachines.org/index.php?mod=579

seems to be quite simple and very useful!

:thumbsup:

Quote from: Paul Jaray on June 04, 2013, 05:40:39 PM
Time for another update:
15820 makers
97620 models
more than 60 books and 400 magazines.

19012 makers
110050 models
more than 60 books and 1000 magazines

Quote from: Paul Jaray on August 16, 2015, 06:19:02 PM

Quote from: Paul Jaray on June 04, 2013, 05:40:39 PM
Time for another update:
15820 makers
97620 models
more than 60 books and 400 magazines.

19012 makers
110050 models
more than 60 books and 1000 magazines

20620 makers
115330 models
more than 70 books and 1300 magazines

Congratulations Paul!!