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A long, long time ago, I floated the idea of combing past catalogues (such as AIM and NAMC) for details of previously recorded variations which are currently missing from Nick’s excellent online catalogue.
Unfortunately numerous objections were raised (principally about which edition of the catalogues to use and the fact that few forum members would have access to such ancient paper documentation), plus no one volunteered to help me with the mammoth task. (The proposal was to split the work up into blocks each containing five model numbers, with each block being reviewed by a different member.)

Having recently reflected on matters, i still feel that we are continuously in danger of reinventing the wheel. Time and time again, a ‘new’ variation is found to have been catalogued by a previous generation of collectors. It therefore makes sense to look at what has gone before and to see whether we can learn from it.
My proposal is therefore, if there is enough support, to ask Nick to create a new area called ‘Missing, Catalogued 1–75 RW Variations’. (N.B. If anyone’s interested, they can run an SF section in parallel.) Every week, I would add a model (i.e. 1a, 1b, 1c etc., rather than 1, 2, 3) and members would be free to add previously documented variations missing from Nick’s catalogue, indicating the source. This would have the advantage of spreading the load amongst all interested members, and would enable us to include collectors’ magazines and journals such as AIM, U.K. Matchbox, and MICA to name but a few.
The added variations could then be debated (some of them are obviously erroneous) in the same thread, allowing us to arrive at a list of what can be assumed to be genuinely missing variations.
Such a thread would also serve as a first port of call for any member on discovering an uncatalogued variation.
Although I'm not 100% certain about this, it would also be logical to incorporate relevant information from the “Missing Variations” thread (which doesn’t yet seem to have been revived on the new Forum) for completeness, since these are variations which logically ought to exist but which haven’t yet been found. However, these would need to be properly flagged as being merely hypothetical rather than previously catalogued variations.

Any comments?

I fully agree with this 'overall' idea and what Nick has achieved so far and what individual collectors have found and recorded so far in their own collections, is a step in this direction.

Sharing the load between members is a good idea, providing a format can be devised and addheard to, the way a model is identified and catalogued will have to be set 'in stone', my way of identifying something will differ from another member.

The overall coding system will have to be based on Nick's initial system because so many members are used to it and most of the time it works, my own coding system shares very little with it, but as long as I can keep my system seperate from Nick's, but use 'The Nick Code', (can we make this an official heading or term---'TNC'--) when on the forum, it should work, yes it means collectors have extra work now remembering two code systems for their collections, but I tend to be renumbering a lot of models anyway, because of more variations being discovered.

There will always be problems with colours and shades of colours...the #44a Silver Cloud comes with three distinct shades of grey plastic wheels, how do we describe these...dark grey, medium grey and light grey is how I describe them in my collection, but unless another member has all three shades, how is he to know what shade wheels he actually has.

Terms such as...base, baseplate or base/chassis...which one is more suitable.

The strip is on the left side of the body, is that the 'near-side' or the 'off-side' of the car, does everybody know this terminology!

There will be many other instances for confusion or incorrectly described details.

I am all for getting as much information on our models onto the forum, (or a site connected to the forum) for other collectors to benefit from, but I know some collectors hold back on the amount of info they are willing to release, and I guess most of us have done it at some time or other, for reasons only each one of us can explain and that on its own may hide certain models that we may be aware of, but cannot enjoy.

Phew! I hope I haven't put any one off, but this is an important issue and of great benefit to us now and future collectors and from my point of view, this is the first time I have seen this idea mentioned on this particular forum and because it comes from "Idris", to me, it will always be an "Idris" inspired idea, so what is the next step in moving this on, we will need a page to be designed that has columns and sections for all possible points of interest, so a new version of the 'TNC', (The Nick Code) page, could be devised, (with his permission and blessing of course!) and details of a model added to all the sections.

Now if for example we concentrate on the one model first, all the details on Nick's codes site can be accepted as fact, so they can be added to the new page, but there will have to be extra sections for the previously unknown variations owned by members and somehow they will have to be inserted into the already used sections in what we think is the correct order, how this will be done on the screen on our computers, I don't know, this is what has to be tried and experimented with, as soon as a variations listing is published as complete, other models turn up and need to added.

I would certainly like to be involved in this project, but it will need a lot of time and dedication, the first I don't have, the second I do have! but the fact that I am a member of this wonderful forum, means I am automatically involved and only a few clicks away from being able to assist in any way I can.

I better give this a rest and let someone else have a go!

Regards,
GHOSTHUNTER.

Good idea, and Kwakers already knows of a number of variations catalogued in the early 1970s which Stannard ignored and perhaps havent yet appeared here!

I'm all for it, Most of the variations noted by Harold Colpits have already been included in my site but I don't have a problem with adding MICA or anyone else.

I think it's an excellent idea too. On the old forum there was the "Suspected Missing Variations" thread but many possible variations were also added as topics in their own right in the rw and sf categories. I know some of these would have been added to the variation tables already and Martin is working on the archives but in order to incorporate these into the new Missing category for discussion, how could these be checked methodically and raised on the Missing category if necessary, is it a case of waiting for the archive first to see how best we can use it? There's also the possible variations that have been raised on this forum to consider.

As for the format, I have to add these variations to my site using HTML so there is no equivalent we can use.
an example of the 75a code 10
<TR>
<TD ALIGN="left" BGCOLOR="#FFFBF0">code 10
<!--Cell at 11 row, 1 column-->
</TD>
<TD ALIGN="left" BGCOLOR="#FFFBF0">white & peach body, silver & red trim
<!--Cell at 11 row, 2 column-->
</TD>
<TD ALIGN="left" BGCOLOR="#FFFBF0">9 x 20 silver plastic
<!--Cell at 11 row, 3 column-->
</TD>
<TD ALIGN="left" BGCOLOR="#FFFBF0">black
<!--Cell at 11 row, 4 column-->
</TD>
<TD ALIGN="left" BGCOLOR="#FFFBF0">clear plastic
<!--Cell at 11 row, 5 column-->
</TD>
<TD ALIGN="left" BGCOLOR="#FFFBF0">type 1
<!--Cell at 11 row, 6 column-->
</TD>
</TR>

To quote Manuel,

"QUE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yikes! if Nick has to type stuff like that for every model, no wonder it's taking a long time!

I don't personally know of an alternative way, I am not that 'computer savvy' I never have had to do any 'HTML-ing' and I don't intend to. Its only something I would be prepaired to learn in an official capacity, like Nick is.

Ghosty.

HTML is fairly easy to learn, I taught myself by pulling other peoples website apart, But it can have you tearing your hair out at times because missing a silly little thing like a > or a " and half of the page will disappear.

Talking of Manuel........have you ever had a moustache Nick?

I would love to hear you trying to put on a spanish accent with that cockney twang you have!!