Yet Another S30Z Register?

[GongZ]

This topic has been started in response to Gavin's "Early Girl Bingo - With Photos" topic (http://www.viczcar.com/forum/topic/13773-early-girl-bingo-with-photos/page-1) and his stated intention to use that information to create a register of 'early girls', then extend it to other S30Z's.

 

Firstly I would like to acknowledge the efforts of Mr Camouflage and his fellow members of the WA Z Register in the creation of the “Australian and New Zealand Internet S30 Z Register”. I have registered my car there and used the list many times for research and general interest purposes.

 

I would love to see a register on this site as Gavin has mentioned. I have started this discussion to, hopefully, gather ideas to help it succeed.

 

There are numerous other S30Z registers to be found on the internet, such as -

the Australian and New Zealand Internet S30 Z Register mentioned above - http://wazregister.com/index.php?title=View_ANZIS30_Register_Cars

The Internet Z Car Club - http://www.zhome.com/IZCC/ZRegisters/VintageZ.htm

The Classic Z Register (UK) - http://www.s30.org/

The Fairlady Z S30S - S30 L Car Register (Japan) - http://www.fairlady-z-s30s-s30l-register.com/index.html

 

Problems with existing registers

• They fail to attract entries – the “Fairlady Z S30S - S30 L Car Register” - has, at this time, six cars
• They are not maintained – The Classic Z Register (UK based) - does not appear to have had any activity since about 2011
• They contain errors – like a 260Z with a 1971 build date, or an early 240Z with too many zeros in the chassis number (eg. HS30-0000555)
• Some cars are duplicated – probably the most common reason being a new owner making a new entry rather than the existing entry being updated
• Entries have insufficient information – eg. the chassis number alone is neither useful or verifiable
• Ambiguous information – eg. the register contains separate fields for original paint and current paint but does not distinguish original versus current status of the interior colour, transmission or differential

Some suggestions to counter these issues

• A well written 'marketing blurb' to encourage owners to register their cars and keep the details up to date
• Examples of cars with the desired details and photographs displayed
• Strong recommendation that entries are accompanied by photos of the build plate, the compliance plate and the firewall chassis number (possibly qualifying the car for a 'verified' status?)
• A field to record the relevant club memberships (including user name for internet clubs' like AusZcar) that an owner may wish to disclose
• An email address for the owner if she/he wants to have it shown
• Fields for 'original' and 'current' details for interior colour, transmission and differential
• Database fields to show the date a car was added to the register and when its details were last edited/checked by the owner

Comments please?

Edited September 7, 2015 by GongZ

[locklock]

I suggest make one registry solely for RHD S30Z. So i don't feel left out

[24 Dat]

Firstly i think its a great idea from the get go, and well done to Gav for the original thread and to GongZ for starting this one up,

 

I have 3 cars on the WA and the Zhome registers and have seen the duplicates and incorrect entries etc on these, which throw the whole register out, but agree totally with the fantastic efforts Mr Camouflage and his fellow members of the WA Z Register in the creation of the “Australian and New Zealand Internet S30 Z Register”

 

Having a photographic record along with a written, known history of each of the cars would be paramount to this register for its success

 

My suggestions to add to the "Some suggestions to counter these issues"

 

Initially to keep it to the first 1000 RHD HS30 cars to sort out, and fine turn the register, and how the cars are logged and maintained to see if it is a viable and workable register.

 

There are way more sub 1000 cars already on the earlier thread than i thought were about, so its a great starting point for those who have already listed cars to come on board to the register.

 

Only the current owner (and obviously administrators when required) have the ability to change and add to the cars details, photographs etc.

 

In the case of the historic Rally cars and known lost cars, possibly whoever wants to supply the details???

 

I also have photographs of 3 other sub 500 HS30 cars which should be able to be added to the register. The owners are not users of this forum and wouldn't list there car or details of it here, but these cars should at least be able to be added,(nothing wrong with posting a photo) and if owner of the car ever wishes to come on board or wants it removed then they take control of the listing.

 

I am sure this thread will get a lot of interest so i hope it all works out well

[GongZ]

Thanks for the reply Dave (24Dat).

 

I agree that restricting it to the first 1,000 cars to begin with (for the reasons you have given) would be a good idea.

[PB260Z]

Sounds like a good idea.

Would like to see the ability to "hide" some details for security reasons.

[gav240z]

There are numerous other S30Z registers to be found on the internet.

 

Problems with existing registers

• They fail to attract entries
• They are not maintained
• They contain errors
• Some cars are duplicated
• Entries have insufficient information
• Ambiguous information

Some suggestions to counter these issues

• A well written 'marketing blurb' to encourage owners to register their cars and keep the details up to date
• Examples of cars with the desired details and photographs displayed
• Strong recommendation that entries are accompanied by photos of the build plate, the compliance plate and the firewall chassis number (possibly qualifying the car for a 'verified' status?)
• A field to record the relevant club memberships (including user name for internet clubs' like AusZcar) that an owner may wish to disclose
• An email address for the owner if she/he wants to have it shown
• Fields for 'original' and 'current' details for interior colour, transmission and differential
• Database fields to show the date a car was added to the register and when its details were last edited/checked by the owner

Comments please?

 

So... where do I being.

 

1. A lot of problems with existing registries in particular Zhome.com is that Carl Beck seems to only know basic HTML and therefore most of his site is just static pages of HTML content, with no database behind it. This makes updating and maintaining something like this much harder as he has to go in and manually update these HTML pages. Other registers are unfortunately not where the traffic is or members are actively posting which makes them harder to find and use.

 

2. Maintenance is important, this current software allows for wiki-like edits meaning you can track the history of an entry and changes over time. Users could enter new details, but require approval for edits etc.. Site moderators could make sure the edits and entries are of a certain level / standard.

 

3. I am hoping errors can be reduced by making certain fields drop down lists (eg: original colour selection), checkboxes for auto vs manual transmission, and validation of field entries like engine numbers to make sure they are entered in a certain format. Of course nothing is perfect so that's where moderators would come in to help maintain the details in an accurate matter.

 

4. The duplication issue should be less of a problem because moderators would ensure there is not an existing entry plus you can edit existing entries and update owner details etc.. The entries would be ordered by chassis number so it should be easy to double-check.

 

5. This is tricky, but the idea of verification of ownership is a good idea, perhaps uploading a photo of the car and it's ID plate would be a good idea? We could have a 'verified' entry vs non-verified for cars we know of but can't be 100% sure still exist etc..

 

6. I do think the idea of 'private' records is something to consider also. Some members might want to share the info for the betterment of understanding S30z's as a complete picture but only want site admins to be able to view the information. So having some sort of flag that determines who can see the info would be a good idea.

 

 

I suggest make one registry solely for RHD S30Z. So i don't feel left out

Yes I think focusing on HS30's to begin with might be a good idea, once I've ironed out all those issue I can look at adding other prefix's and suffix's for other markets and models after the 240z. 

 

Having a photographic record along with a written, known history of each of the cars would be paramount to this register for its success

 

My suggestions to add to the "Some suggestions to counter these issues"

 

Initially to keep it to the first 1000 RHD HS30 cars to sort out, and fine turn the register, and how the cars are logged and maintained to see if it is a viable and workable register.

 

There are way more sub 1000 cars already on the earlier thread than i thought were about, so its a great starting point for those who have already listed cars to come on board to the register.

 

Only the current owner (and obviously administrators when required) have the ability to change and add to the cars details, photographs etc.

 

In the case of the historic Rally cars and known lost cars, possibly whoever wants to supply the details???

 

I also have photographs of 3 other sub 500 HS30 cars which should be able to be added to the register. The owners are not users of this forum and wouldn't list there car or details of it here, but these cars should at least be able to be added,(nothing wrong with posting a photo) and if owner of the car ever wishes to come on board or wants it removed then they take control of the listing.

 

I am sure this thread will get a lot of interest so i hope it all works out well

So I agree with all those points and think I sort of mentioned the same above before reading your entire post. I think having the option for a 'private' listing is a great way to get best of both world's.

 

Like you said there are far more early 240z's still knocking about than I had imagined, much less of the first 100 than I thought though. And many are under the knife, very few are really restored to original shape or have matching numbers etc.. Possibly the most interesting thing I've learnt is that a few of the first VIN # (HS30) cars were sent to South Pacific Island's initially for sale / promo which is pretty cool as it shows Nissan was really trying in every market. Something Alan has been trying to hammer home to Carl Beck for years haha.

 

HS30 00016 = Norfolk Island, then New Zealand and finally in Australia.

HS30 00012 = Papua New Guinea and then it finally made it's way here.

 

Where else did Nissan send them, hopefully such a registry can help shine a light on these questions and give us a more complete picture of the S30z story.

 

Will post photos of what I've put together so far...

[gav240z]

So the software get's me about 90% of the way there, but there will need to be some custom scripting to get the final 10% sorted and really make it work the way we want it to. Which means I'll need to look up how to 'hook' into the software.

 

Attaching some screenshots to show the fields so far and how they work / look.

[andyk_79]

I like the Wiki style update idea with mod approval rather than trying the minefield of only the current owner can update the record - especially if a member logs their car, then sells it and is only an occasional user of the site.

 

One other idea might be an ownership/location history table to track the cars over time - if in 10 years time someone wants to look at the known history of a Z they've bought for example.

 

More a behavioural thing but if/when this gets up and running it would be good if we can heavily encourage members to use it for any that own one - I know for me personally inertia/laziness has meant my car is not on the Z register at the WA site even though there's a sticky topic recommending members go do this ! Not sure how this could be achieved without putting people off - maybe something similar to the member status flag around whether a donating member or not?

[gav240z]

I just got this working, it's not nearly finished. But gives you an idea of what I've got so far and perhaps what can be done.

http://www.viczcar.com/ip-content/register.html

#150's details.
http://www.viczcar.com/ip-content/register.html/_/hs30/150-r2

 

Things to figure out.

 

1. How to make certain fields private only (admin / mods can view but not anybody else)

2. Improve the way we categorise 240z, 260z, 2+2 etc..

3. Images

4. Title field I'd prefer HS30 00150 to 150 (which it shows currently)

5. URL structure (I'd like for HS30-00150 to appear in the URL) as this will be immensely helpful for Searches on Google by VIN # for owners new or old.

[gav240z]

Moved to Website Feedback and Club Discussions as I thought it was more appropriate.

[GongZ]

It looks very good to me so far Gavin.

 

The only thing that irks me is the way you seem to want to show the chassis number as 3 or 150. I prefer to see the full format chassis ID of HS30-00003 or HS30-00150.

 

This becomes more of an issue when you eventually get to cars like mine (HS30-103724) when you realise that large groups of numbers were skipped = my car is not chassis number 103,724. 

 

*Edit - sheesh Gavin - you must have been typing at the same time - you beat me to it!

Edited September 8, 2015 by GongZ

[24 Dat]

Not sure if it my computer but here is a screen shot of what I'm seeing at the moment when I go to the register

[George]

I see that as well Dave.

[gav240z]

Yeah I'm not sure if I have to truncate the length of certain fields so the overview table fits within the screen. I am still learning how all of this works and how to manipulate the way it's displayed.

 

@Gonz - agree, I wanted to make the chassis number's the title and much more readable. However I think some people may enter the chassis number incorrectly in terms of 0000s for example I often have to remember that HS30 00150 has 2 zero's before the 150, otherwise someone could write HS30 000150 which would be different and mess up the order.

 

I was also thinking of longterm if I want to include PS30, S30, HS30, HLS30 and all the suffixes etc..

 

I need to see what is an isn't possible in terms of how data is validated. To that point it would be good to know what was the highest chassis number and how many digits it had, same with engine numbers so I can account for that and make sure we restrict the fields to only contain X amount of numbers etc..

 

So yeah, lots of work to do still.

[24 Dat]

I was also thinking of longterm if I want to include PS30, S30, HS30, HLS30 and all the suffixes etc..

your typing while I am and I think they will definitely need to be added longterm,

 

With regards to S130's not sure if different suffix from 2 seaters (there are a few on this forum) to 2+2's and the 2+2's were sold as slick tops and T Tops in Aust

 

But great work so far

[GongZ]

You might need an instruction next to the chassis number field like -

"Your car will have either 5 or 6 digits as its chassis number - please make sure you enter them correctly" 

 

This is one of the reasons why I suggested that photos of build plates, compliance plates and firewall chassis numbers would be highly desirable when adding a car. The administrators could use these to check the numbers.

 

As I'm sure you know - inaccurate chassis numbers is the most disruptive error in the WA register - the order of the cars is all over the place as a result.

[gav240z]

I like the Wiki style update idea with mod approval rather than trying the minefield of only the current owner can update the record - especially if a member logs their car, then sells it and is only an occasional user of the site.

 

One other idea might be an ownership/location history table to track the cars over time - if in 10 years time someone wants to look at the known history of a Z they've bought for example.

 

More a behavioural thing but if/when this gets up and running it would be good if we can heavily encourage members to use it for any that own one - I know for me personally inertia/laziness has meant my car is not on the Z register at the WA site even though there's a sticky topic recommending members go do this ! Not sure how this could be achieved without putting people off - maybe something similar to the member status flag around whether a donating member or not?

 

So a few points to address here:

 

1. The wiki-style allows you to see version history and compare different versions against each other. This would be 1 way to track previous owners, although I'm not sure if this information would become limited to admins / moderators. I think this can be configured but will need to look.

 

2. In terms of encouraging members to use it, for some time people have been requesting a private forum. Perhaps in order to get access to the private forum you need to include your vehicles details in the register? Proof of ownership of cars etc..? Not sure how people feel about this, but... I will explain privacy stuff below.

 

You might need an instruction next to the chassis number field like -

"Your car will have either 5 or 6 digits as its chassis number - please make sure you enter them correctly" 

 

This is one of the reasons why I suggested that photos of build plates, compliance plates and firewall chassis numbers would be highly desirable when adding a car. The administrators could use these to check the numbers.

 

As I'm sure you know - inaccurate chassis numbers is the most disruptive error in the WA register - the order of the cars is all over the place as a result.

 

I just modified this field and tried to use some custom RegEx (regular expressions a.k.a pattern matching) to validate this field but it's giving me grief will need to review this, but you can see that the title field now shows the full HS30-XXXXX instead of just the number. Advantage is that it also appears in the URL also.

 

So I'm pretty sure I can get around the inaccurate entries by providing the right kind of validation. I do like the idea of asking for ID plate and chassis number photos though. Just to be sure we are getting accurate data. However this might be an issue with verifying cars that were 'written off'. As the data may not be available. I guess we can live with this inaccuracy though and if someone can prove otherwise we can change a cars status from deceased back to active.

 

 

Sounds like a good idea.

Would like to see the ability to "hide" some details for security reasons.

 

So looking at the options out of the box.

 

1. You can provide certain fields that would be filled in but never displayed publicly. These would be accessible to the site admin (me) or maybe moderators but nobody else. Unfortunately I don't think it allows for individual listings to select what data to show / hide. Although I'm sure with some custom scripting it could be made as a more granular permission.

 

2. The other option is that users could submit the details and moderators can "hide" the entire listing. So they could share the data with the register but it would never be public information that users can view directly. It could still be useful for determining patterns for cars (like what colours were used at certain build numbers) and cross referencing engine numbers or other details. So this way an owner could share the info, but not have it displayed.

 

I'm curious what fields we want to show/hide and what fields people would want to be private?

 

I just added a profile photo field, but will need to format the way it's displayed so shows the image, not the URL to it. Will have to override some functions here.

https://www.invisionpower.com/support/guides/_/advanced-and-developers/ipcontent/creating-database-fields-r161

[PB260Z]

I'm curious what fields we want to show/hide and what fields people would want to be private?

Hi Gav

 

I would suggest hiding (or option to) the following

- Owners Name (or Surname)

- Suburb

 

Basically anything that would assist in finding the garaged address of a vehicle

 

Cheers

 

PB

Edited September 8, 2015 by PB260Z

[24 Dat]

http://www.viczcar.com/ip-content/register.html

I just tried this link again this morning and it looks totally different to yesterday so what ever you've done has fixed it, i all like how you can click on a car (ie yours and 004) and then a new window comes up with a great description of the car, history etc.

Also could the Factory colour also have added current colour? My #183 was originally 918 but i now guards red all done by previous owner

Edited September 8, 2015 by 24 Dat

[24 Dat]

Basically anything that would assist in finding the garaged address of a vehicle

you all might want to watch this video i am not sure if the photos posted on this forum could be traced in the manner shown in the video Gav you might be able to tell us?

https://www.youtube.com/embed/xvZF-yP_ceU?feature=player_detailpage

[gav240z]

you all might want to watch this video i am not sure if the photos posted on this forum could be traced in the manner shown in the video Gav you might be able to tell us?

https://www.youtube.com/embed/xvZF-yP_ceU?feature=player_detailpage

 

Yes what he describes in that video is possible, if you have configured your iPhone or Android phone to capture the GPS co-ordinates when you take a photo. So if you wanted to send photos of your car or upload them to the registry it would make sense to disable this setting.

 

http://osxdaily.com/2015/06/17/view-exif-data-photos-mac-os-x/

 

I just checked a lot of my photos of HS30 00150 and because I upload them to Picasa first, Google creates derivative copies of the image and these are what are shown and shared on the site, so looking into those files gives no such information. So to protect yourself you can disable these settings on your phone, you can also make a copy of the original image (so it doesn't contain the exif information) and that way you won't be giving out that information.

 

The current upload feature for the register appears to make a copy anyway so there is no meta data included with the image I uploaded.

 

Let me know if you detectives can find any information in this image that shouldn't be there?

http://www.viczcar.com/forum/uploads/71a98c3ae791c6f3dfd4fe713650fe20.jpg

[neRok]

I think you're going about this all wrong. I get that you're all excited to use the new forum software, but it isn't the right tool for the job. You should never have to compromise on the way you store the data, just to fit in with the underlying system.

I am willing to whip something much more suitable up, and I already have an idea for the underlying database structure (it's quite a simple project at heart). I propose pre-filling the database with 'empty cars', which information then gets added to as it is found. Owners aren't stored on the car, as that's a bad design decision. Instead, owners are linked to cars, which makes tracking new and past owners easy. There would be a little 'description' field, but not for storing 'history' to the extent proposed now. Instead, historic events of the car would be stored in a list, by date. Don't worry if this sounds confusing, it will be a piece of piss to use in function. And sorting out the various privacy concerns will be beyond easy with the system I have in mind (which will use some very popular open source software).

I just need some guidance on the actual vehicle and engine numbers. Someone mentioned the numbers aren't linear, but were produced in blocks. Does anyone know the full range of numbers, and driveline combos etc, to get this info pre-filled? There is no need to limit this to Australian cars, as if the number ranges are known, it's a piece of piss to put them in. Think big! This can be THE z-car register. Also - do it once, do it right!

 

Does Nissan have this sort of old info on file (build info, original sales info, etc)? Anyone got contacts

Regarding existing registers, if people can get me a copy of the underlying data, whether it be a database, spreadsheet or html files, I can get it cleaned up and merged in.

Edited September 9, 2015 by neRok

[24 Dat]

 

 

Let me know if you detectives can find any information in this image that shouldn't be there?

http://www.viczcar.com/forum/uploads/71a98c3ae791c6f3dfd4fe713650fe20.jpg

this is all i could get

[gav240z]

this is all i could get

 

Weird that it shows lat / lon co-ordinates but they must be for the web-server because it's reporting Seattle in the US of A and that photo was taken by the previous owner in South Australia.

 

@neRok - will get back to you later.

[PB260Z]

Another thought.

 

Original and Current transmission.