To C8 Orange Tube Owners

Hi All,
What started with a curiosity to try to find what year my daughters
Orange Tube C8 was made has turned into part time hobby.
First thing I found was that Celestron's records don't extend back to the
earlier C8s.
Then I found someone who knew what the purchase date of his C8 was, a
1984 with a SN in the 800,000 range. My daughter's is in the 254,000.
Several years later I found a 1973 with a known purchase date, SN 4936
2. I thought once I found an older scope, I could extrapolate and come
up with an approximate year. Did not work!
So now I am cruising the net and bugging people. I apologize, but if I
may bug you, what I have started is a database consisting of:
Serial Number:
Serial Number Location: Fork Base, Secondary Mirror, Someplace else?
Purchase Year: If Known
Forks: Sandcast or Diecast
Paint: Orange Peel, Smooth, Matte Burnt Orange, White
Miscellaneous: Optics Enhanced Optics, Special Coatings, Starbright
Label Celestron Pacific, Celestron International
Secondary Mirror 3 or 4 screws
AC Plug Round, Oval, Side or Underneath
Anything else that may pinpoint it to an particular year.
If, in a couple of years, I can get enough numbers, a pattern might start
to make sense.
Please feel free to completely ignore me.
Thanks,
Roy