The Final List

[Paul Jaray]

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.

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.

[Paul Jaray]

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

[pnegyesi]

Antorus assembled a few thousand Lada cars between 2003-2005

[Paul Jaray]

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:

[faksta]

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

[Paul Jaray]

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

[faksta]

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.

[75america]

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.

[Paul Jaray]

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).

[faksta]

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).

[75america]

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)?

[Paul Jaray]

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.

[Paul Jaray]

@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?

[faksta]

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

[pnegyesi]

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

[Paul Jaray]

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.

[TheItalianJunkyard]

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.

[Paul Jaray]

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?

[TheItalianJunkyard]

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).

[faksta]

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.

[TheItalianJunkyard]

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

[pnegyesi]

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.

[Paul Jaray]

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.

[Allemano]

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

[TheItalianJunkyard]

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.