Roverman wrote:I've bought some ebay bargains in the past looking under bx16 bx19 etc, as you say the general search for citroen bx wont find it.
scarecrow wrote:Best way is to search for Citroen then narrow it down by model, etc...
Ok, lets have a go at mastering eBay search commands.
By entering different expressions in the search box gives one different results. This is quite useful for refining a search in ways not catered for by the tick boxes. Text entered is not case sensitive.The Basic Search
1) citroen will return items with citroen in the listing title. (Unless of course extra / alternative boxes are ticked).
Conditional Searches
2) citroen bx will return items with citroen AND bx in any order. (And a few more listings that they feel like including).
3) citroen +bx will return items with both citroen AND bx in any order. (It is similar to example 2 as a space before a command is consider AND).
4) citroen -haynes will return items with citroen, but NOT haynes. (Note space before the minus command).
4) "citroen bx" will return items with citroen bx in that EXACT order. (It is similar to citroen+bx (note no spaces)).
5) (citroen,bx) will return items with citroen OR bx.
Combination Searches
6) citroen bx -haynes will behave as search 2), but NOT including haynes.
7) citroen +(red,green,blue) will return items with citroen red OR citroen green OR citroen blue. (Note the space before the command. Saves doing three separate searches).
Useful searches
(citroen,citreon) +(bx,bx14) will return items matching the following in any order:citroen AND bx; citroen AND bx14; citreon AND bx; citreon AND bx14.
(It won't catch BX19, but will catch BX 19).
To take the above further, just add extra conditions:
9) (citron,citroen,citreon) +(bx,bx14,bx16,bx17,bx19) will return items matching the following in any order:
citron AND bx; citron AND bx14; citron AND bx16; citron AND bx17; citron AND bx19; citroen AND bx; citroen AND bx14; citroen AND bx16; citroen AND bx17; citroen AND bx19; citreon AND bx; citreon AND bx14; citreon AND bx16; citreon AND bx17; citreon AND bx19.
(Example 9 also shows how to account for sellers with "fat fingers"
)The Wildcard *
It isn't necessary to go mad with the bx part of the search string to cover all variants. Use of a wildcard (an asterisk) will allow anything on the end of a word.
10) (citron,citroen,citreon) +(bx*) will return items matching the following in any order:
citron AND anything starting with bx; citroen AND anything starting with bx; citreon AND anything starting with bx.
As you can see, using eBay search commands give you extra power beyond that of just ticking the boxes to refine your search. Try it out for yourself. Once you have the search string sussed you can save it for future ease. Right, I'm off to hide now for a bit...
I've spent many happy hours creating custom search parameters, saving them into my EBay profile - only to find that EBay have had a tidy up and lost the lot!
Among other things I got some 'personal massagers' and contact details for an escort agency promotion!! 
