fiestaturbo.com

[AdrianFRST]

It's only taken 11 and a bit years but here's the latest evolution in the fiestaturbo.com story. So much to say but I'll try and keep it brief for now:

NEW SITE!: http://www.fiestaturbo.com

• I've been working on the new site on and off since 2001, I've restarted from scratch three times. The latest one I started in December 2009.
• This is a completely bespoke backend written from scratch, it doesn't use an existing product like Wordpress.
• Only the basic site is live, additional features will be added soon - there's a whole flickr like gallery system I've written which is currently powering the show galleries but will be for forum users too.
• It's still WIP so some things don't work, or don't look right yet.

The site has expanded to cover all Fiesta models, the mk3 is knocking on a bit so it needs to move with the times. [EDIT] I did plan to change the name from fiestaturbo to fiestamods but this didn't go down too well - see below.

New camera

It should be pretty obvious from the homepage of the new site what I've been doing with this, and all the photos have the EXIF info underneath, so if you're interested you can see what kit I'm using.

New enthusiasm

Now I'm a homeowner with a garage I'm itching to get another project car, almost certainly a Mk7 Fiesta. I had a budget to get started but I kinda burnt through all that buying camera gear, so this won't happen for a while, probably when the new site is fully up and running and has got a bit of exposure. As you can see I was at Ford Fair, and will be at Trax too, so the main site will not be lacking in content.

So, quite a bit of news and I'm only just getting started really!

Adrian.

[Chris 2i]

Looks alright, name change is stupid though. You've taken an established name and destroyed it to start over, I don't really understand the logic behind this.

[Chris 2i]

It's also lucky I havent had the event shelter branded or got on with the fiestaturbo.com mugs either yet isn't it?

[knuckles]

I also agree that changing such a well know established name to something like that will be a final nail in the coffin on this forum.

I certainly for one won't be putting a fiestamods sticker in my car window.
Rather put a ripspeed one on

Sorry for my harshness but that's how strong I feel about the name.

[Tygress]

I Totally Agree With Chris... Why Change The Name?, It's So Well Known?!

[Tweek]

As with above. I did feel it rather inevitable that this site's name would change when the "revamp" comes along. Although, as already stated, Fiestamods? Sounds like a club for 17yr olds in Halfords car parks

On the flip side though, the new site looks fantastic, it's just that name...

[Mustoe91]

I've only been on this site for 2 years or so but so many people I know my age know the name fiesta turbo, I just don't see why it should be changed ?

Why change something that's not broken ?

[Tweek]

The "turbo" name would still work. There's a few Zetec Turbo projects coming along, combine that with a new site and our work continuing to make the show stands more presentable will be a great force to lure in higher profiled cars

[xr2i_babe]

i also have to agree with everyone else and say that i disagree with the name change! it will be going from a well known site to just another fiesta site, i really think the name should stay the same!

[- Danny Boy -]

I agree with everyone else. I thought the name was a joke...

FT is such an established name, it's well known and respectable.

The new site looks nice, but the name... big no.

[AdrianFRST]

Blimey, didn't expect this reaction!

Not a problem at all - I've changed it back.

(You might need to hard refresh or clear your cache, I'm using some techniques to speed things up which means things aren't automatically refreshed).

The people have spoken, so it stays as FT. My thinking was the "turbo" in the name alienated non-turbo owners (people have told me this in the past). Obviously that's not the case.

I can't run both versions of the site on the same domain at the moment, so it'll stay on that domain until I work out how best to upload it without breaking anything.

Now I've rectified that little faux pax, what do you think of the new version?

[Smo]

Nice photos, Ade!

So are you intending to stick with fiestaturbo.com now? Obviously only a very small percentage of users own a Fiesta RS Turbo, but it is what it is, almost a well known brand these days!

Glad the enthusiasm's back and look forward to your new project

Edit: You've answered part of that now!

[jayrs]

new layout does look alright i gotta say.
wheres the rest of the fordfair stuff thought? like pt2.

surprised theres not a pic of the complete club stand though, i know your trying to come away from 'fiestaturbo' but the centre bit of the stand was made up of mk3s, and a lot of FRST's too, the guys doing the stand done a cracking job though, wayne, chris etc

agree with the name change, fiestamods.com doesnt sound right.

EDIT, nice to see the name change isn't going ahead, i know the forum needs something, but i dont think a name change is the thing mate

i dont think you have anything to worry about though ade, xrtwo.com has many fiestas on there, ok, mainly mk1 and 2's, but there not all 'xr2's' theres std ones, zetec, turbos, rwd, super sports etc, and many other models, some not even fords, so i think with some added plugging of the site in the right places, were pull in more people.

[- Danny Boy -]

I think people will be glad to hear it's staying.

On the photography side of it, awesome pics! Love a bit of wide open aperture to get a shallow depth of field! Works so well with car pictures

[Chris 2i]

Thanks Ade, it's the right decision in my opinion. I think a descriptive section on the main site explaining its not just for turbo owners will be sufficient.

When I first joined I had an XR2i, the name didn't put me off. I joined because of the users knowledge and the plethora of information available. If you look at a lot of the more active newer members you'll see a similar story.

Wayne (Tweek) and I have worked hard to arrange the shows and raise funds for new equipment, we are happy to speak to you about our plans for this, and would be happy to hear of any ideas you may have.

[dontpannic]

Like that a lot Ade, well laid out. Not sure on the 'search results' when you click on the menu items but I'm sure once it's more heavily populated it will make more sense. I'm guessing that works on tags?

What is running behind it, Wordpress?


Sent from my Casio FX-83GTPLUS

[AdrianFRST]

wheres the rest of the fordfair stuff thought? like pt2.

surprised theres not a pic of the complete club stand though

More posts to come. Another 200+ photos from Ford Fair. I needed to get something up ASAP to show Future Publishing, part of the media requirements. Now that's done I can knuckle down and upload the other pics. I've processed them, they just need the titles and descriptions doing.

[Chris 2i]

Just finished looking at the site and I do like the layout of the ford fair article. I'll take a more in depth look next time I'm on a pc.

EDIT: have I missed something? What's the deal with future publishing?

[jayrs]

wheres the rest of the fordfair stuff thought? like pt2.

surprised theres not a pic of the complete club stand though

More posts to come. Another 200+ photos from Ford Fair. I needed to get something up ASAP to show Future Publishing, part of the media requirements. Now that's done I can knuckle down and upload the other pics. I've processed them, they just need the titles and descriptions doing.

ah right cool, fair play fella, ill wait for it

[AdrianFRST]

Thanks Ade, it's the right decision in my opinion. I think a descriptive section on the main site explaining its not just for turbo owners will be sufficient.

I'm hoping that tons of photos of non mk3/3.5s will help too. On the current site I think every photo is a mk3/3.5.

Wayne (Tweek) and I have worked hard to arrange the shows and raise funds for new equipment, we are happy to speak to you about our plans for this, and would be happy to hear of any ideas you may have.

Even though I've not been involved with this I really appreciated the work you guys have done. I'd love to hear of any plans and I'll do my best to help out.

Like that a lot Ade, well laid out. Not sure on the 'search results' when you click on the menu items but I'm sure once it's more heavily populated it will make more sense. I'm guessing that works on tags?

What you're seeing there is actually a form of 404 page - it runs a search if the URL doesn't match any content from the database. There's hardly any content up yet and the section index pages are not done yet.

What is running behind it, Wordpress?

Nope, 100% bespoke written from scratch, which partially explains why it took so long. The benefit of this besides teaching me a lot, is that I can make it do anything I want. There's some very clever stuff which I'll detail later!

[knuckles]

New site looks nice and fresh. Modern looking indeed.
very impressed with the graphics etc...

Fiestaturbo.com is no longer a mk3 based site. It clearly has evolved into a community for all fiesta's. The name change would of been like rebranding coca cola. But on a slightly smaller scale.

Lastly ade...
Without sounding harsh or mean here , but you attended ford fair but didn't pop over to speak to the ppl that make this stand happen or the ppl that attend year in year out with their cars to represent the site.
I for one would of like to of seen you & catch up since I haven't seen you since I collected the recaro fiesta from you all them years ago.

[AdrianFRST]

Just finished looking at the site and I do like the layout of the ford fair article. I'll take a more in depth look next time I'm on a pc.

I had to rush out the HTML/CSS code a bit just to get the site up, but I'll be redoing it soon and making it work great on phone / iPads etc. If you're lucky enough to have an iPad3 or Retina Macbook Pro then you'll get retina images - even the show photos (ie. 2280x1520 rather than 1140x760)

[Chris 2i]

Wayne (Tweek) and I have worked hard to arrange the shows and raise funds for new equipment, we are happy to speak to you about our plans for this, and would be happy to hear of any ideas you may have.

Even though I've not been involved with this I really appreciated the work you guys have done. I'd love to hear of any plans and I'll do my best to help out.

Thanks, we are also keen to see ft re-expand so itll be good to bounce some ideas around. I'll send you a PM about it soon enough

[AdrianFRST]

Lastly ade...
Without sounding harsh or mean here , but you attended ford fair but didn't pop over to speak to the ppl that make this stand happen or the ppl that attend year in year out with their cars to represent the site.
I for one would of like to of seen you & catch up since I haven't seen you since I collected the recaro fiesta from you all them years ago.

Yes, I need to apologise for that. I wanted to keep the fact I was there under wraps so I could spring a double surprise (new site and the resuming of show pics) but thinking about it on the way home from the point of view of you guys I realised it was a bit of a dick move not to come over.

I'll be at Trax so will say hello then.

[Tweek]

The FT stand was abandoned for Trax due to lack of interest We're over on Max's stand at FUCCK, "Fernhurst Uber Cool Car Klub" I believe

It WILL be back next year though.

[Michael!]

new site looks awesome!

i agree with keeping the fiestaturbo.com name, ive never owned a fiesta turbo in my life, probably never will

but i still feel welcome (mostly) on the site and still come on everyday to see all sorts of different project threads.

[Ollie]

Looks great! Photo's look amazing too, are they enhanced/edited or as they came from the camera?

Just one thing, you've got fiestaturbo.com twice in the © bit at the bottom.

[AdrianFRST]

Looks great! Photo's look amazing too, are they enhanced/edited or as they came from the camera?

Just one thing, you've got fiestaturbo.com twice in the © bit at the bottom.

Footer fixed, good spot!

Most of the photos are just converted RAWs with a slight contrast and saturation bump (slight as in 10 on a scale of 0-100).

You'll notice some have blue sky and some dark. On the day it was pretty much just overcast white so on some I've done tinted exposure adjustments just to rectify the washed out sky - some of these I tinted blue.

[Ollie]

Nice.

Looking at those pictures I think I need to invest in some better lenses.

[Excursion]

Excellent! The new site looks great.

I am all for a name change. I think people tend to associate FT with old cars like the mk3, but times have changed and it would be good to attract a user base who are doing new things to the newer models, as you say. To put it into perspective, my Girlfriend's brother has just passed his test and he hadn't even seen a Mk3 before mine, and he calls my project the 'vintage Fiesta'! It's not a sustainable goal for a Website to appeal to an ever dwindling enthusiast base, especially given that the heyday for FT was back in the late '90's and early 2000's. Those days are obviously long gone!

The site needs new technology in addition to the well known CVH, Zetec etc. and it would be nice to see people go through that whole learning process we did with the Mk3 all those years ago. I'm also thinking back to when I was driving around in an XR2i and starting to modify it, I would have been put off visiting a site with associations with an old model e.g. xr2.com.

Having said the above, the 1.3 Turbo 'Fox' engine is due in the Mk7 Fiesta any time, so the fiestaturbo.com name would still be relevant. Also Ade, hopefully your Mk7 project will attract new members.

[Tweek]

At the weekend I got asked by 2 people about getting them some FT stickers for their cars, neither of which were turbos, or mk3s

[Michael!]

To add to what Wayne said.


A lot of fiesta owners near me ask about my key ring and where to get them?

[Excursion]

At the weekend I got asked by 2 people about getting them some FT stickers for their cars, neither of which were turbos, or mk3s

But bear in mind, a lot of retards are currently going through a phase of putting meaningless stickers on things, especially cars

[Tweek]

I can't diagree with that, but these weren't retards

[Excursion]

:lol: I can't diagree with that, but these weren't retards