[Mike Gray]

We're thinking about reorganising the technical section - but we want to know what you think before we do it!

We are considering breaking down the technical section into the following sub-forums

• Starting a car
• Brakes
• Batteries
• Clutch
• Electrical / Sensors
• Engine
• Gearbox
• Heating / Cooling
• Lights
• Dashboard
• Tires
• What’s that noise?
• Other Problems

We would go through and move every existing thread into one of those topics. Nothing would be lost, but things would hopefully be a bit tidier.

However, we want to know a few things from you guys first:

- What have we missed - do these categories work?
- Would it impact on how you use / how much you view the technical section?

[Santa]

Too many categories for a start. Tires?

Personally, as someone who logs on pretty much every day, I just go to 'what's new'.

I think that there would be many cases where people wouldn't know where to post. For example, an electrical fault in the engine, or brake lights not working.

If you want to divide it up, why not separate the major manufacturer groups - Ford, Vauxhall, Honda, Nissan, Mercedes etc etc.

[Mike Gray]

Originally Posted by Santa

Too many categories for a start. Tires?

Personally, as someone who logs on pretty much every day, I just go to 'what's new'.

This is just the kind of thing we want to know - so it wouldn't really impact you... take on board what you say about too many categories.

[Hometune]

Batteries
Lights
Electrical
Dashboard
Non starting
Heating

Likewise:

Starting a car
battery
engine

These could all be in the same groups which as you can see overlap. The problem is that most people asking for help really do not have a clue where the fault may be so expecting them to know which group may just be a step too far!

[smudger]

A lot of folk cant even post their questions in the correct "Technical Help" thread, let alone select a category out of that list. :confused:

[Rolebama]

I think if you are going to break up the Section, then I feel that Diesel could be a seperate sub-section. I noticed on other Forums that having the sections broken up in this way does help to a degree with diagnoses, as so few posters give relevant details of their vehicles.
Like Santa, though, I too use the 'What's New' button.

[Trainman]

I think too many subsections will make things complicated. Have a look at this site that I cannot fathom anymore. It is not cars by the way... http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/ I think just leaving it as "Technical Questions" is enough.

[tommytwotanks]

maybe you could list it like a haynes manual

engine
clutch
gearbox
suspension
brakes
bodywork
electrical
anything else

i assume the mods read all the new posts, so if they are posted in the wrong topic they can move them, much better then some of the comments from some users

[Alek Smart]

As a previous reader and a new poster I would concur with the "Too Many Groups" comments,However,Petrol vs Diesel and perhaps using Manufacturers to sub-group could be worth a punt...particularly if you own a Zastava ?

[samm0]

Mike,

As a newbie to this forum (and therefore no experience of historical post content), I'll relate my experience in trying to locate a similar issue to the one I currently have from previous threads.
I searched on "Mondeo mk3" and had 8 pages of matches returned - other searches trying to narrow the results weren't really better.
Taking into consideration the above, and other comments here, my feeling would also be to just categorise by manufacturer and fuel; the search string could then be more concisely focused to problem specifics - and hopefully not be 'too complex' for people when posting new questions to the subcategories!

Whilst typing: anyone have feedback to my post yesterday?

Cheers

[specman]

Update

Great idea, It would make problems much easier ti find an answer to, rather than searching throught the existing forums.
I think categories you are suggesting are fine, I dont think there are too many, however you should consider adding "steering"

[smudger]

As mentioned earlier, breaking it down to Petrol/Diesel vehicles, could be tried out as a trial period, then take it from there.That way we are not causing too much confusion, just a thought.

[iant3745]

That would be fine by me.

[Motman]

An MOT section might be useful for any MOT related questions or advice.

[Snowball]

If ths Technical Section is split into sub-forums, I think tommytwotanks's suggestion (post #8) is the most ideal. Also, if posters were requested to start any new thread with the make and model of their car (example: Ford Mondeo - ), and the threads were automatically arranged alphabetically under the make and model of vehicle, searching for any previous useful info would be much easier.