TRS needs direction. Suggestions?

[97BlackBetty]

Well, this is a pretty tough subject. Like you said in your opening lines, you are just an enthusiast. Because of you and your site, and the members who were part of the site when I first found it, and those who continue to bring new ideas and projects to the site, I am an enthusiast. I love the Ranger and I am looking at picking up a second one because of the enthusiasts on this site.

One suggestion I have for the site pertains to new members. I don’t know how difficult it would be, but if there would be a way to send them a welcoming Private Message that contains links to the FAQ page, and our technical library, I think it would help to cut out a lot of the, what size tires can I fit, what axles do I have, how do I identify my gear ratio type questions. I know I for one have not been responding to some of the more frequently asked questions because I could use the search feature and find their answers in 5 seconds.

I would like to see more improvements in TRS Fab and Offroad. I think that there are ties that we have had with small manufacturers in the past that would be beneficial to that portion of the site. Everyone is looking for a manufacturer for bumpers and sliders, BBPFab I would think would be an excellent manufacturer to start relations with. He builds top notch protection and he is in Ohio. I would like to see some of Dave’s from ThreatMotorSports stuff on the page as well. I am interested in a prerunner build and would love to see his stuff.

Test drives I have some questions on. I can go on Car&Driver, Road and Track, etc. and read their reviews on the Ranger. I can get their fuel economy reports and acceleration and braking times and distances. Would we really be able to offer more? Perhaps teaming up with manufacturers and building a new Ranger would be beneficial to the site. Ford sends a new Ranger to be modified and we throw on all the bells and whistles that the aftermarket industry is offering. And that’s how we Grade the vehicle and test the products. It wouldn’t necessarily have to be a 4x4. We could do a street truck one year, a prerunner the following, and a 4x4 the next. That takes time and money though, and may not be feasible. Most of the manufacturers would expect you to show up to all of their events to advertise the product.

I would definitely like to see a product review section. Might it fall under TRS or TRS Fab and Offroad, that I don’t know. How would it be organized in a way that is easy to use and what would the grading scale be based on?

A huge change that I have liked is the hiding of The Tailgate (Garage). I think it has made our home page much more presentable, and frankly I like the fact that I don’t have to see it. There are members whom I have not seen post in any of the other forums since The Tailgate became hidden.

It is very nice to have Rumble Goat Racing on the front page with their victory. Would it be possible to get a hold of other teams, in various sports, where we give them a section to update and advertise themselves? It gives us the web wheelers the chance to see what people who actually use their Rangers for their intended purpose are doing. Keep up on current motor sports events, and gives us a team to stand behind and support. It also provides an outlet for the professionals to voice their opinions on the products and manufacturers they use. It would bring it right down to, this model Ranger is using these parts from this manufacturer and here is the story on its real world abuse.

One more quick thought, with the number of people doing SAS, why can we not contact a manufacturer to build a kit, and sell it through the site. We could have the R&D, the installation, and the first hand experience with a brand new product on our site. I think it would be a huge success.

 

[Insanejughead]

Wow! There's a lot more replies with great information than I thought would happen. Jim, you really have some awesome people collaborating together within this webspace that you've setup for us common folk who share a common love.



My idea is brought up from 4x4Fun for suggesting particular badges to be issued out. I would like to recommend that those badges/icons be given out only by a select few moderators and prime supporters of this site. Jim Oaks, Jspafford, BobbyWalter, MAKG, and MutantPony I think are great examples of who could be bestowed with that right to issue specialty icons relating to what particular area a certain member excels in.


Another idea that actually just popped in my head would be a listing of bolt and nut sizes for each year ranger as it came stock. This would be something that EVERYBODY could participate in and I know it would be useful to the majority of people who want to quickly glance to see what tools they might need to tackle a certain job. (I.e. gas tank strap nuts for a '97, bolt size for an engine mount on an '04, which bolts are hex and which are torx heads...) The list could be endless with small tidbits submitted my anyone who knows the ins and outs of each particular job involved.

I can see that going further than say, my Haynes manual, could ever think of.


What do you say about that Jim?

 

[kcm1582]

i agree with a lot of what has been said here already. publicity is the key to expanding the site. getting published in some magazines or on tv would help a lot. professional help will make that easier but people can spend millions on marketing and advertisements. i would love to see the tech library reorganized and expanded right now it seems a bit crowded which makes some things a little hard to find.

 

[Will]

It's been close to 12 years since a TTB RBV was built. They weren't that popular for serious offroading when they were being made. I used to be able to get axle shafts and things that are getting harder to scrounge now. I put my truck back together with worn out parts--go through the pile and find the least ugly spindle. Makes it hard to think developing these is a good idea. I think the ship has sailed on them. If we can start getting new parts, it's a different story.

I think we should expand our focus onto newer Rangers. We're going to have 10 years of SOHC 4.0s by the time it's said and done. We already have 12 years if SLA Rangers we've been badmouthing. How many people have we sent somewhere else because we claimed the SLA was a turd for an offroad truck? It's what we have now. I don't think putting Dana 60s into a 20 year-old Ranger is cutting edge. I think we need a modern, forward looking website. We need to get excited about the new Ranger, whatever it is--we need to be the first to get those things modified.

 

[Jim Oaks]

When I got up this morning and checked the forum at 6:30, I was surprised to see so many responses to this. There are some interesting ideas floating around.

I agree that we need more manufacturer support. I've seen several aftermarket products for the Ranger become no longer available over the last year or two.

I also agree that there needs to be more emphasis on the newer Rangers. For some time now I've had a thread in GD looking for known problems with the newer Rangers to see what type of information we need to start putting together.

I like the ideas about putting FAQ links in to the welcome message for people joining the forum. I need to figure out where those messages are in the forum software.

I like the idea of reviewing products and giving them away to members. Question is, do we let anyone who buys a product review it here and settle for that, or appoint a person at TRS to try and get items for review and give them to people?

I know there needs to be some aftermarket bumpers for Rangers. I have a few designs to start offering over at TRS Fab & Off-Road. I had a friend of mine do some test welds for me so I can see his work. He can do stick, mig, or tig for me and has a big garage to work in. When the weather warms up I'm going to drag my trailer out of the back yard and head to Cleveland to buy some tubing so we can finally start doing this. Finding a welder with a building to weld the pieces together for me has been an issue in the past. I need to get my hands on a 98-up Ranger though to get the measurements off of to design the front bumper mounts.

One of the things The Ranger Station needs is people. If I had to handle everything I wouldn't be able to do it. I'd like to see someone that did nothing but handle product reviews. Moderators being responsible for maintaining an updated FAQ's thread for specific forums.

We need some start to finish project trucks to work on.

We need videos. We need some tech videos.

I've even thought of putting a publication out there in print. Taking our Premium Memberships and turning them in to a print subscription. Have a section in the publication for Rangers, Bronco II's, Explorers and Mazda B-Series. The thought came to me when I saw a site that would print up magazines for you at the rate of $0.20 cents a page. If we printed 10 pages it would cost $2.00 per mag. We could print the magazine 4-times a year as a quarterly publication. The subscription might have to go up from $10.00 to $12.00 to cover postage. I don't know. I know it seems costly for such few pages. The problem is that I don't want to get stuck doing all the work, so the idea will probably never evolve. Just a thought. The other problem then becomes the on-line magazine. Do we get rid of it, or do we just do double the work to have seperate articles in each?

Keep the ideas coming. Don't be afraid to take an idea and step forward to help carry it out.

 

[OilPatch197]

Buyout RPS.

 

[Jim Oaks]

Buyout RPS.

funny

 

[Beanmachine7000]

I think letting anybody do a review is a good idea, because everyone has opinions, but have several certain people you know you can trust to give an unbiased opinion, like an Experts Review or something... Have the Expert Review easier to get to than just the general product reviews or something, because I know some people just don't like certain products for some reason...
I think more manufacturer support would be great... I wish some Ford guys would get on here... Talk about what's going on with upcoming models and stuff, maybe we could even express our opinions...
I think giving people special "Tech Badges" is good, but only if you know a certain amount of info about it... Maybe, a certain test, or a certain mod that looks at your posts and can tell if you are right or just spitting out misinformation...
I really like the TRS magazine idea, it could be simple with a featured project for each section...

 

[rjppunk]

We should have a consumer reports like section where we can do reviews on rangers and ranger related parts. A review by TRS itself, and a section where people can post their experiences and reviews also.With many people posting asking if a certain brand of part or accessory is any good, that would be perfect. Test drives would be an excellent idea too.

Otherwise, I think this site is rockin' and rollin'. Would be nice to pick up sponsors though. Ford could benefit from donating a new ranger every year for a testdrive or two...

I like that idea, you could have a review done by a mod on trs then open a poll for user opinions. Its the same way video games are rated on sites like www.gamespot.com

 

[Roadkill]

Jim,

On the idea of the print magazine. I think it is a good idea. Maybe start out as a semi-annual thing first to see what the response is as well as to work out the inevitable bugs that will pop up. No one wants to be stuck with a bunch of bad magazines that cannot be sent out.

Second thought, on the print versus online magazine issues. Do what most of the print trade magazines do that I subscribe to. Offer some online only articles. This helps attract more people to the site (potentially, if we hand out older magazines for free, the users that have them that is) and provide some market penetration and exposure for TRS.

Maybe provide a selection of banners for premium members to choose from. For example, the stars and stripes is great for patriotic Americans. Not so for patriotic Canadians. Since this site is predominantly US/Canadian then perchance a Canadian flag themed banner for us Canucks would be good. After all TRS has become an International site and should try to reflect some diversity.

Not sure if we have an area yet in FAQ's or not, but, how about trying to get together a listing of the 4wd and off-road advocacy groups? For example, in Ontario one of the main ones is OF4WD, also called Northern Lights, Ontario Federation of 4 Wheel Drive Enthusiasts. I've been a member there for years and they do wonders for trying to get trails opened and get us access.

Just some thoughts.

 

[Mechanickid]

I agree That we need to start looking forward to the newer rangers but at the same time don't leave the older rangers behind. I think someone mentioned before that some of the products for the ranger have been cut from production in the last 1-2 years.

 

[mjonesjr]

My suggestions are below. I will help in any way I can to get any of the below up and going.

- I think the site needs to go toward newer Explorers as well. There is a lot of modifications being done to the new body styles. If the site is going to include Explorers in the title, then it needs to lean toward all Explorers.


- I would like to see TRS vendors setup to sell here. I know of 2-3 RBV vendors that are not here, but are on other RBV sites.

- A vendor give-a-way would be great as well. Most RBV vendors are willing to donate items to give away. Make it a quarterly give-a-way to only PAID members.

- I also think there needs to be Tech moderator who manages the tech page and the tech contribution section in the forums. When someone writes something in the tech contribution section, then this person will go through, edit, host the pictures on TRS's server and then post it in the proper place in the tech section. Too much good information gets left in the contribution section and should be put into the tech section.

- As far as new members go, set the site up so that a new member can't post in any other forum until they post in the New Member section and they read the FAQ's.

 

[Jim Oaks]

Maybe provide a selection of banners for premium members to choose from. For example, the stars and stripes is great for patriotic Americans. Not so for patriotic Canadians. Since this site is predominantly US/Canadian then perchance a Canadian flag themed banner for us Canucks would be good. After all TRS has become an International site and should try to reflect some diversity.

Maybe it's time to retire that banner for a new neutral banner.

I think the site needs to go toward newer Explorers as well. There is a lot of modifications being done to the new body styles. If the site is going to include Explorers in the title, then it needs to lean toward all Explorers.

The problem here is getting the information. I don't own an Explorer. We have very few members who do. I would be more than happy to host the information if we had people to submit it.

As far as RBV vendors goes, I'm guessing you're talking about people who build stuff in their garages at home. I get in to conflicts with these people because they come in to the forum to peddle their creations and want to use the website as a marketing tool to make money from. People think that because they're an enthusiast making parts for similar enthusiasts that they can just peddle their stuff for free. I end up feeling like I'm working for them because I'm offering them the service for free and they're collecting the profit. Tell them their not allowed to sell commercially or that they have to pay to be a vendor and they run off crying about how I'm only interested in making money and what a mean terrible person I am. I don't know if there is any RBV backyard vendors out there right now that hasn't already annoyed me and badmouthed TRS.

Metalmacguyver is an approved vendor here. He approached me to see if he could sell his diff covers. He paid a small fee and got permission to sell and his add is stickied. He is a contributing member. He didn't come in to the forum solely for the purpose of marketing a product without even asking first.

I've offered to let dave@threat do some advertising here in exchange for some tech write-up using his product. Our site is lacking in prerunner tech and dave is more than qualified to fill some of that void. In exchange it would provide some advertising for his business.

 

[mjonesjr]

When I say vendors, I mean people who represent products manufactured by companies for Rangers. They more than likely wont compete with TRS Fab & Offroad because they don't sell the same items that TRS F&O does.

I agree that if you are a vendor, you should pay a small fee to be a vendor.

The vendors I am thinking of represent the newer Rangers & Explorers quite well.

 

[Will]

mjones=tech editor

I enjoyed working with the magazine but the software aspects of it kicked my butt. I was constantly frustrated by Frontpage and my FTP program. I also had the ability to edit the tech pages but everytime I made a correction in there I screwed up the place. I was also overwhelmed by it and I had issues with some of the legal aspects of what was there.

I would be content to contribute an article here or there to a magazine. I have an idea for a running serial. I think as far as RBVs go I'm a spent force. I did articles on everything I did during my own buildup. I would be willing to edit those to update them but I don't know what else to talk about on an old Ranger. I want new things, not regurgitating the same stuff we've been doing for ten years.

The things that are interesting me now are:

1. The guy who wants to put a FWD motor/transaxle in the rear of a Ranger. That would be a kick ass build. Lift the tonneau and there a gleaming, detailed high tech V6 or better V8--twin cams, VVT etc. and the suspension struts and stuff.

2. I also want to build a Ranger RV--to replace the bed with an RV body that you can swap on and off. Something that could go on an old or new Ranger, 2wd or 4x4. Possible a trailer version as well.

3. We need to get a sustainable annual meet going again. It doesn't have to be spectacular but this place really took a dive in its core member loyalty when we stopped having annual get togethers.