MacGregorSailors.com

Golf clubs! Don't want no stinking golf clubs! I have been searching for a 19 or an X at a great price for a while now and so sick of golf clubs popping up.

the deals are out there. Where are you located?

You do tell Google what you don't want to find, right? When too much noise shows up in my searches, I append a filter to the end of the search, such as -golf. So in your case, a search might look like: sale macgregor boat 19 -golf

That minus sign can work wonders.

~Rich

I've seen a couple on craigslist in SE Alaska and Kijiji.ca (Canadian Craigslist) in the Yukon and Alberta (looking for a new hunting jet boat) and if there are a half dozen MacGregors within a days drive of me...theres gotta be hundreds out there elsewhere. Also check Yachtworld.com (where i found ours) boattrader.com/ca etc.

check http://www.sailboatlistings.com also several on EBAY

Rich's trick works very well. Another trick with searching eBay is if you want something very specific, put it in parentheses... eBay will find only that word (or phrase). For example, I use this one when searching for MG parts for my 1952 MG TD:

(mg td, mgtd, mg-td, t-series)

There's gagillions of MG parts on eBay and this really narrows it down. Note that it searches for the phrase "mg td", with the space, and won't get an item where the "mg" and the "td" are separated by more than one space.

It also works with Rich's trick - you can 'negate' a list of items using parentheses, separating each item by a comma. So, for Mac's if you want to really narrow it down, try this search that I use for my Mac 26X:

macgregor (sail, sailboat, boat, yacht, 26x, 26m) -(karaoke, oldies, scots, scottish, scotland, jimmie, Sidewinder, novel, golf, kinley, seventies, 70s, 70's)

You think you got problems: am looking for golf clubs and sailboats keep popping up.

Will that work on google also or only Ebay.?

Great thread! I've learned some nifty search techniques thanks to Rich and Kevin.

raycarlson wrote:Will that work on google also or only Ebay.?

With Google you need to use quotes instead of parentheses. So, to search for MacGregor 26x's for sale, you might search for the following with the phrase 'for sale' in quotes:

Macgregor "for sale" 26X

The (-) sign does work with Google, but you must specify each omission separately, like this:

Macgregor "for sale" 26X -26M - V21 -V22 -V25 -venture -26S

Now, there are additional tricks for Google. For example, if you want to search a particular domain (website) for a string you can use the "site:" command...

site:macgregorsailors.com "golf clubs"

This command is particularly useful when a site has a forum but the search tool within the forum is functionally inadequate (i.e. it sucks ).

Thanks for the search tips. I didn't know about -golf. I will use it with lots of my other searches too like "scooter -mobility -push" I am amazed at the number of adds that misspell Macgregor or don't even mention brand.

A couple other tips when using Google..

You can specify a particular filetype if you are looking for it... so, for example, let's say you're looking for a Mac manual in Adobe PDF format...

macgregor owner's manual filetype:pdf

Also, if you're looking for numbers within a range you can use a double ellipse between the numbers to denote the range... so, to look for Mac 26X boats for sale within a particular price range, try this:

"Macgregor 26X" "for sale" $500..$7000

You can use that same string with an open-ended string if you want to search above a certain range... so, if you're looking for all Mac 26X boats over $500 (i.e. eliminating real junkers), then try this:

Macgregor 26X -golf "for sale" $500..

To search below a certain range you can't use the ellipses backwards (i.e. "..$5000") to get under a range, but you can use zero as the base, so that "$0..$5000" will get everything below $5000.

The "+" sign means that the term must be found. Terms listed without either the plus or minus punctuation are interpreted as "or".

Macgregor 26x will find any reference to Macgregor OR 26x in a website. +Macgregor +26x will find sites that have both terms. +"Macgregor 26x" will look for the work Macgregor and the word 26x separated by a space.

If you are looking in Canada try "Kijiji." When you get in there you can search by a whole province at a time if you want. In Canada Kijiji is a lot bigger then Craigslist up here:) I hope this helps. I always check every month or so for at least the western provinces and last time there was at least 6 to 10 but still pretty pricey considering its winter. When I was looking for mine I found quite a few in Washington below B.C. but I found mine on Kijiji in B.C.

Thanks for the search tips guys


Golf clubs vs boats!

First world problems!!