All,
Over the past few days, I've been methodically merging all of the US import cars in my personal database, along with the individual records of US cars here on the forum, and mapping them against the 1,528 cars imported into the US.
I am nearly done with this stage of the work, and I am finding that between my detailed database (which predates this forum's records by about 6-7 years) of cars from the 500Ecstasy era, together with 12 years worth of US cars here on this database, I have detailed records on approximately 800 of the 1,528 cars.
There are also FOR SALE records of around 30-40 cars in the US here on the forum, which do not have VINs attached to the listings. These are mainly Craigslist listings where the VIN was not provided, or the seller was unresponsive to inquiries about the VIN, or the ad was quickly pulled.
It's probably safe to say that half of these 30-40 cars are already recorded in existing threads here on the forum, and we just don't know it yet. The others are probably net-new cars that we don't otherwise have records for.
Eventually, what I would like to do is to trace the VIN of every car in the US, and find out its status (i.e. whether it has been registered and/or tested in recent years, or if its records just stop in time, indicating that the car was probably wrecked or is just sitting. I have record among the 800 cars of probably 100 or so that are wrecked/salvage/auction/parted out cars.
Anyway, this is the closest that I have come to actually reconciling my own personal records along with the forum's records. We can definitely say that threads and/or detailed information exists on well over one-half of the US cars made, and that it has passed through the hands of this forum. Also note that nearly 100% of this information is "organic," meaning that it has come up through public venues such as eBay, BaT, auctions, and so forth. I am sure there are quite a few members here (particularly long-term members) who own cars where the VINs were never recorded anywhere or posted here on the forum. Newer owners who bought cars that have threads here, of course, are going to have some history to them.
Anyway, I thought you guys would be interested. I have estimated for a long time that probably 70% of E500Es are still in existence after all of these years. The number may even be higher than that !!
Over the past few days, I've been methodically merging all of the US import cars in my personal database, along with the individual records of US cars here on the forum, and mapping them against the 1,528 cars imported into the US.
I am nearly done with this stage of the work, and I am finding that between my detailed database (which predates this forum's records by about 6-7 years) of cars from the 500Ecstasy era, together with 12 years worth of US cars here on this database, I have detailed records on approximately 800 of the 1,528 cars.
There are also FOR SALE records of around 30-40 cars in the US here on the forum, which do not have VINs attached to the listings. These are mainly Craigslist listings where the VIN was not provided, or the seller was unresponsive to inquiries about the VIN, or the ad was quickly pulled.
It's probably safe to say that half of these 30-40 cars are already recorded in existing threads here on the forum, and we just don't know it yet. The others are probably net-new cars that we don't otherwise have records for.
Eventually, what I would like to do is to trace the VIN of every car in the US, and find out its status (i.e. whether it has been registered and/or tested in recent years, or if its records just stop in time, indicating that the car was probably wrecked or is just sitting. I have record among the 800 cars of probably 100 or so that are wrecked/salvage/auction/parted out cars.
Anyway, this is the closest that I have come to actually reconciling my own personal records along with the forum's records. We can definitely say that threads and/or detailed information exists on well over one-half of the US cars made, and that it has passed through the hands of this forum. Also note that nearly 100% of this information is "organic," meaning that it has come up through public venues such as eBay, BaT, auctions, and so forth. I am sure there are quite a few members here (particularly long-term members) who own cars where the VINs were never recorded anywhere or posted here on the forum. Newer owners who bought cars that have threads here, of course, are going to have some history to them.
Anyway, I thought you guys would be interested. I have estimated for a long time that probably 70% of E500Es are still in existence after all of these years. The number may even be higher than that !!
