How to change default sort to a custom field?

Unfortunately there is no default ordering by field.

default ordering by field

A must-have, IMHO. (was already mentioned and requested in other topics)

Related topic

Default Ordering - manual order and by custom field - respective section parameters

dlbass93 default sort to the Year/Model field, so that the cars are listed from oldest to newest by car age, and not the age of the post.

Possible workaround (in your particular case)

If you don´t need core dates for any other purpose, you might use the date&time field to override one of the core dates. Than use this with custom output format to show the year only.

Just had a quick look onto your site... Then you have to store the "Model" as a separate field.

Derrik,

an option would be the date & time field with the override option for the creation date as pepperstreet mentioned above.

If you don't show the field in intro and full view, you will not need a customized template.

I would even remove the year from your year/model field and leave it as model (you indicate the year in your title already). The other advantage is that you can sort by model now...

You can change the sort label also to something better ...

A must-have, IMHO

Agree. It is in the list for Cobalt 9.

Sorry for not responding for a week. I am going to attempt to do this. Thanks!

I wound up doing it by sorting by title, and having Cobalt set the title to Year Model Market ProductionNumber. Works like a charm, and it was easy :D