Zen Cart Dependant Attribute (PHP, MySQL, E-Commerce)

Summary:
Another matrix to sort products. And a "universal exists in all"
I have a car part website, so I need a car selector.
CATEGORY - "steering wheels" (zen cart handles this)
MANUFACTURER - "Momo" (zen cart handles this)
CAR TYPE - "Ferrari 360 04-08" (I need this custom option)

I would like car type to actually have 3 sections..
CAR MAKE (mercedes-benz)
CAR MODEL (s500)
CAR YEAR SPAN (00-06)

So I could then have a category-esque type of tree when navigating by CAR TYPE. I could click on mercedes-benz, and I would only see models of mercedez-benz cars etc.. Basically CAR TYPE is like having your product exist in second category except that they dynamically interact.

The system would be similar to:
www.andysautosport.com
www.bodykits.com

I would like for this to be as dynamic and clean as possible. Compatible with my customized version of Zen Cart with Easy Populate / Google base exporter but also compatible with a generic zen cart installation, so I may upload this as a contribution to the zen cart community.


"Universal Exists in All Car Types"
The second thing that I would need is a universal product exists in all Car Types.. For instance, let's say a have a universal "air freshener" , this product can be used in any car, so I would like the products placed in the universal car type category to appear under all cars.

"sort order hack"
I need the sort property to actually sort based on sort order, this probably isn't a huge task, but I need a professional to take a look at this.