Help A Hoon – AutoTempest Needs Your Help

Autotempest

I look at a lot of car ads – I mean really a lot – every week. And my go-to tool of the trade for finding the gold among the old has been for some time now AutoTempest, the web site that lets you search for a particular make and model across multiple sales sites and not just in your own back yard. One thing that I lamented about AutoTempest however, was that while it provided access to all the major players in the car classified arena, it didn’t give you the ads from the enthusiast forums – where the really good stuff sometimes lies.
 
Well, I was talking with my buddy Court over at AutoTempest about this very thing, and he said dry your tears my friend because we’re planning on offering up searches of enthusiast forums. Because yeah, that would be cool. And here’s where YOU all come in, AutoTempest would like your help in offering up the specific marque forums, or specialty classified providers, that you think would be of value in such an engine. That means places like SwedeSpeed, BimmerForums, and  – oh my god – the VW Vortex, although those guys are crazy. Also, sites like OldRide.com and any other multi-marque classic advertiser will be much appreciated. 
 

Please provide your links in the comments section below and I’ll get them to the AutoTempest team. We’ll also be keeping tabs on their progress, and will let you know when they’re ready to share the new tool with the world. Oh, and you Hoons will get the first chance to do so when they are. Bonus! AutoTempest is an awesome tool for anyone looking to buy a car, determine values on the ones you already own, or just to stoke your automotive dreams, the least we could do is to help ’em make it even better.

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40 responses to “Help A Hoon – AutoTempest Needs Your Help”

  1. OA5599 Avatar
    OA5599

    Be sure the Hooniverse Marketplace is represented in the search results.

  2. Scandinavian Flick Avatar
    Scandinavian Flick

    I've been using AutoTempest a lot since it was mentioned here as well. It really is an incredibly useful tool. I'll happily help out with some of the ones I can think of. Unfortunately one of my personal favorites, TurboBricks has their classifieds set to private, so it won't work for searching…
    GTO Forums:
    1) http://www.ls1gto.com/forums (NOTE: at the bottom of the page on this site is a MASSIVE list of the associated forums on the same network of forum sites!)
    2) http://www.gtoforum.com/forum-index.php
    3) http://www.newagegto.com/forums/
    BMW Forums:
    1) http://forum.e46fanatics.com/
    2) http://www.e90post.com/forums/
    3) http://www.e30tech.com/forum/
    RX7 Forums:
    1) http://www.rx7club.com/
    2) http://www.nopistons.com/
    Volvo Forums:
    1) http://www.brickboard.com/CLASSADS/
    2) http://brickspeed.net/forum/index.php
    Edit: Hopefully fixed Intense Debate's shitfucking of my formatting…
    I'll try to add more as I think of them.

    1. FuzzyPlushroom Avatar
      FuzzyPlushroom

      TB is going to open their classifieds to Google, or so sayeth Dana. Plus one for Brickspeed, though!

  3. jeepjeff Avatar
    jeepjeff

    I love AutoTempest, it's great for searching for those vehicles where you expect 5-50 to be for sale in the entire country (Alas: that seems to include all of the 1970s AMC compacts, so that's what I use it for these days). I'm still surprised at how well they're doing with the CL aggregation (unless CL has let up on that arms race a bit).
    Anyway, to answer the question: JeepForum.com has a pretty decent For-Sale section. It's mostly TJs and Grand Cherokees, but there's a few YJs and a smattering of older, rarer Jeeps. (I don't know how often it's updated, just that it's there and has a decent number of recent postings. I own the Jeep I want. 😉

  4. Rust-MyEnemy Avatar

    Well, those of you who, like me, are into less, er, obvious cars, or indeed less desirable ones; and who live in or near England, could do worse than visiting <a href="http://www.Autoshite.com” target=”_blank”>www.Autoshite.com and looking on their message board. All kinds of miserable old rubbish ends up for sale on there. It's great!

    1. mr. mzs zsm msz esq Avatar
      mr. mzs zsm msz esq

      What a great site, thanks!

  5. Alff Avatar

    alfabb.com, the alfa and omega of the online Alfa community.

      1. Tim Odell Avatar
        Tim Odell

        Sorry, you got caught in the spam filters (dropping a bunch of links does that)
        Things should be better going forward.

        1. CABEZAGRANDE Avatar
          CABEZAGRANDE

          No worries, thanks for the response. Figured that's what it was with all the links 🙂

  6. Preludacris Avatar
    1. jeepjeff Avatar
      jeepjeff

      Somehow, I hadn't noticed the For Sale section of Pirate 4×4… That is exactly as entertaining as I would have expected. Probably should be off limits for the CL Crapshoot.

      1. Scandinavian Flick Avatar
        Scandinavian Flick

        Given the sheer amount of sub sections on that forum, one can't be blamed for their scroll finger getting exhausted before reaching the classified section…

        1. jeepjeff Avatar
          jeepjeff

          Yes, but it also means there's always more magic to discover at Pirate 4×4. I love lurking there, because it's a level of wackiness that I don't think I actually want to attain, but it's there, it's glorious, it's wonderfully uncouth and thanks to the huge numbers of sections, there seems to be more magic to discover all the time.
          Hey, you could try to sell your BMW there! This guy managed to sell his X5: http://www.pirate4x4.com/forum/vehicles-trailers-

          1. Scandinavian Flick Avatar
            Scandinavian Flick

            Hey! That's not an BM…. oh, hey… kidney grille. Whaddaya know…

    1. danleym Avatar
      danleym

      Beat me to it!

  7. acarr260 Avatar
    acarr260

    My favorite auto classifieds site is http://www.racingjunk.com

  8. Synchromesh Avatar
    Synchromesh

    Nasioc.com and miata.net. Subaru and Miata!

  9. M44Power Avatar
    M44Power

    jeepsunlimited.com (All Jeeps)
    nagca.com (Grand Cherokees need love too… they just gotta pay for it)
    bmw2002faq.com

    1. pj134 Avatar
      pj134

      I saw a lifted WJ this morning and was very tempted.

      1. M44Power Avatar
        M44Power

        As someone who just bought a ZJ, I approve. A WJ was my second choice (I don't like the round/bulbuous front-end treatment, but the flat floor and 4.7L V8 sounded nice…).

  10. facelvega Avatar
    facelvega

    The search method of Autotempest makes it hard to use for the rare, odd cars that I want to search, because it insists on very specific model names in the search that the sellers may not have listed in the same way. A few variations on the text of the search can easily find examples that won't show up with a Autotempest search.
    Also, I'm mostly only interested in Craigslist ads, so I just use searchtempest, The last two cars I bought were from craigslist ads, and in both cases I used searchtempest to find the listings, not craigslist's own interface and not Autotempest. I'll probably be buying another car in the next month or two, and I expect it will go the same way.
    But here's an idea for Autotempest: an option to list only the oddball cars in a given radius and price bracket. I usually dredge through craigslist directly for hours on end to find out what weirdness is available, and if a search engine could cut the say 200 most common vehicles from that search, I would use that engine several times a week and probably buy a vehicle that way. I don't need to sift through hundreds of tahoes and camrys to find that someone has listed a Comanche Eliminator, but I probably won't think to search for the Comanche every time either. Or a turbo Saabaru. Or a Peugeot 505, etc.

    1. skitter Avatar
      skitter

      An obscurity engine would be both
      1. brilliant, and
      2. send SEOs into the fetal position.

      1. jeepjeff Avatar
        jeepjeff

        It isn't necessarily that difficult. It's a culling problem. CL provides RSS feeds. If you just parse the RSS feed, and identify the entries that have common words in the titles, you'll be able to build a DB of common makes/marques. You may need to do some uniqueness testing (ie, pull the actual add and check for identical ads between two entries). Then you just return the stuff you cannot identify as common.
        Also, anything that makes SEO consultants curl up and wet themselves has to be a good thing.

    2. AutoTempest Avatar

      Totally understand why a lot of people prefer SearchTempest to look for cars over AutoTempest. That said, tons of people prefer using AutoTempest, so luckily we've got both so we can appeal to as many people as possible!
      Hmm… looking specifically for weird cars is an interesting idea. Not exactly sure how that could be pulled off, but it's definitely something to keep in mind. Right now, we're focused on a few other features (like this forum search and a mobile site), but it's something I'll definitely keep in mind for the future!

      1. jeepjeff Avatar
        jeepjeff

        The oddball search could be an "I'm feeling lucky" button.

        1. pj134 Avatar
          pj134

          If I hit their 'I'm Feeling Lucky" and got this:
          <img src="http://assets.hemmings.com/uimage/7582144-620-0.jpg&quot; width=500>
          I would ball up in the fetal position for several weeks before starting an AutoTempest religion. <a href="http://www.hemmings.com/classifieds/dealer/detomaso/unspecified/1237015.html” target=”_blank”>http://www.hemmings.com/classifieds/dealer/detomaso/unspecified/1237015.html

    3. AutoTempest Avatar

      Also, if you do want to search odd cars on AutoTempest and we don't have them in the drop downs, just leave it on Any Make/Any Model and just use the keywords to search!

  11. AutoTempest Avatar

    Thanks for all the suggestions folks! Keep em coming!

  12. lost_and_found Avatar
    lost_and_found

    This is where I found my Land Rover Disco. I'm not sure I'm doing anyone any favors.
    http://www.expeditionportal.com/forum/forums/96-F
    Also: http://www.discoweb.org

  13. LTDScott Avatar

    Here are the model specific forums I frequent.
    E30:
    r3vlimited.com
    e30tech.com
    bimmerforums.com
    Mustang:
    corral.net
    foureyepride.com
    stangnet.com
    Mazda3/Mazdaspeed
    mazdaspeedforums.org
    mazdas247.com
    msprotege.com

  14. danleym Avatar
    danleym

    It's possible I missed this one somewhere up above and it's already posted, but in case it isn't:
    http://coloradok5.com/forums/
    Great website for all things old chevy truck/blazer/suburban.

  15. Fred Avatar
    Fred

    For Mopars with fins: http://www.forwardlook.net/forums/category-view.a….
    They have a general "For Sale" forum and an Ebay/Craigslist forum.

  16. The Kid Avatar
    The Kid

    http://www.galantvr4.org
    I lived on this forum for a while during my second stint of VR-4 ownership, before selling the car through its Cars For Sale page. You can imagine that people interested in such an obscure, twenty-something vehicle also post other interesting rides in the used car listings.