Splitting up Mechanicals section ?

[Mforcer]

At what point does an engine stop and the rest of the mechanicals start?

Incorrectly categorised topics are far, far,far worse than an overcrowded category when it comes to searching for material. I am sure Admin doesn't want the extra hassle of moving more topics.

[adamb]

At what point does an engine stop and the rest of the mechanicals start?

We can use the factory manuals as a guide

[oscar]

At what point does an engine stop and the rest of the mechanicals start?

That's a cinch. Flywheel

We can use the factory manuals as a guide

Definitely! All jobs are fairly well sectioned.

[koan]

That's a cinch. Flywheel

What about A/C compressor and power steering pump? Both bolted on the engine but connect to other systems.

Seems all too difficult to me, and what do we do with all the old posts?

Topic names that reflect content and staying on topic is what's required.

koan

[Casey]

What about A/C compressor and power steering pump? Both bolted on the engine but connect to other systems.

Is the windshield gasket an interior or exterior part?  It has surfaces on both sides.  I'd think of it as exterior but it protects the interior, and a discussion about it could come from "why is my interior getting all wet".

There's always going to be some amount of crossover any time you divide things.  Doesn't mean that trying to organize is bad.

What really bugs me is the search box - it doesn't seem to find much of anything, even when I *know* I'm searching for a word I've seen in a post in the past.  Maybe it doesn't have the posts from before the upgrade indexed...maybe there's a utility that's part of the forum software to reindex posts...  You can go to google and put "site:forum.w116.org blah blah" into their search box and get better results, but that's not straightforward and I doubt as many people think to do that as try the search box.  Google's stance is that if search is good enough, you don't need organization at all.   I think some middle ground is pleasant.

[koan]

I always have trouble with the search facility, don't know if its somethig to do with not matching substrings or plurals but a lot of the time I don't find what I'm looking for and I'm certain its there.

koan

[oscar]

That's a cinch. Flywheel

What about A/C compressor and power steering pump? Both bolted on the engine but connect to other systems.

I'm more sold on the wiki idea now more than ever, rather than splitting mechanicals. Let the posts and threads flow then the relevance within a thread can be translated/rewritten for the wiki and ancillaries like those you've mentioned would be under their respective titles in the wiki. 

Regarding old posts and threads, I suppose it's up to original posters or volunteers to "drag and drop" or rewrite for the wiki.  A lot of work but when I first read about the wiki idea my first thought about my better contributions would be that I'd have to rewrite and reorganise them anyway to sift through the banter or irrelevant parts.  I'm now thinking a DIY thread is really the foundation of a good wiki entry.  It'll hold all sorts of info, ideas and exchanges, mistakes and corrections but when complete and job done, someone then grabs the relevant bits to make a succinct informative wiki.  Like I said I'm happy to help and will start on my own stuff when I make the leap to learn wiki speak.

The wiki should vastly improve search capabilities too I'd imagine and raptelan, I only recently learnt about the ability to do "site:forum.w116.org blah blah" style google searches on another forum but haven't used it on the org yet but will have to try.

[Casey]

I'm more sold on the wiki idea now more than ever, rather than splitting mechanicals. Let the posts and threads flow then the relevance within a thread can be translated/rewritten for the wiki and ancillaries like those you've mentioned would be under their respective titles in the wiki. 

I think the wiki is a much better idea for a long-term encyclopedia-like information repository, versus a forum which is mainly intended as a means of group communication.  It would be nice to see it expand...  Unfortunately it doesn't have the social element to it, so new pages should get corresponding new forum posts advertising them, etc. so they actually get noticed.

[Nutz]

Simple;

General
Petrol
Diesel

It's obnoxious sifting through all the diesel threads..... almost as bad as all the egomaniac thread titles started with 'Raptelan' this, 'Raptelan' that

[Casey]

It's obnoxious sifting through all the diesel threads..... almost as bad as all the egomaniac thread titles started with 'Raptelan' this, 'Raptelan' that

It's not egomaniacal - I just want to share what's going on with my cars, as I enjoy keeping up with others doing the exact same thing.  It's what a forum environment is nice for - not all just reading how-to's, but seeing what others are doing and sharing things on a personal level.  I am trying to keep things more on-topic rather than drifting all over the place so much.  Lots of other people have threads for their cars, including you!  And I enjoy yours, so why criticize mine?

[Big_Richard]

not every post is going to interest everyone, sometimes no one at all - ive posted my fair share of lemon topics 

when "showing unread posts since last visit" simply look at the ones that interest you, then mark all as read. if you keep it under control all is good.

The forum is no longer a small niche community with few posters, its time to move with the times.