You’re arguing the opposite – that low mileage cars can also have done long trips, which is true. However, for a car to have high mileage it is highly likely to have done long trips because doing short trips doesn’t rack up the miles. So if you want a car that’s done long trips, you would be more likely to get one with a younger car that’s done more miles.

True, but on the flip side you could quite easily rack up lots of miles doing slow/short journeys.

There’s no guarantee either way. Mot history is a good start, you can see any change of use (sudden drop/increase in miles) and if there’s been a few advisories on a 5 year old then that would be a red flag for me.

Also consider how many miles before a cambelt change is due or how many miles since it was last done.

With most modern cars you’ll hit the age when a cambelt is due rather than mileage. For instance the ones I’m looking at have it due at 4 years old or 120k miles (I think) and there’s not many that have done that mileage.

Also, a higher mileage car will have been used for mostly long trips,

That’s not a guarantee now, especially since everyone is WFH and not commuting. My car has done 2500 miles since November and around 1800 of them were in 2 weeks going up to Scotland and back (and driving round in the day when there).

Silo on Apple TV is starting well, has a bit of a Westworld vibe to it.

Personally (and I’m currently looking for a car of this age – 18/19 plate) anything over 50-60k is a bit too much for me.

My current 2017 car (2.0tdi) has 53k on the clock.

However, condition is still more important than mileage.

The walled garden cafe in Applecross does some very nice food too!

I’m just back from a week in Torridon.

Don’t underestimate how big the full lollipop is.

I did the Ben Damph loop on Monday last week and it finished off a barely worn set of rear pads, the section along the loch was ‘moist’ to say the least!

You’ve got Applecross to Kenmore and vice versa, and the Ling Hut descent with a bit of ‘pick your own trail’ from near the top off the climb from Annat.

Oh, and that Annat climb, ye gods. Did it twice, second time not including the 2nd hikeabike to get to the very top, but it was brutal both times!

@ta11pau1 ( have I spelled that right)
I think you were this week with Fin and Rob….

Where did you stay?

Yes, I was! We stayed at the newly built Ben Damph Lodge – stunning place!

My new front brake is fine, I did finish off a set of the green pads in the rear after some Torridon bog snorkelling though, I got 300km out of them! This place eats pads for breakfast!

Couple from the Ben Damph loop today, the section along the loch was proper wet, finished off a set of brake pads!!

£970 for the 3 bike version!!!

Holy ****balls! 😲

It’s not a homage to an 80’s pop band. Instead, ‘tallpaul’ was taken when I joined (how vary dare you!) and hyphens etc weren’t allowed so my normal second choice of tallpaul_s wasn’t allowed, so ta11pau1 it was.

Oh, and my name is Paul and I’m very tall.

Don’t know where I learnt this limerick from, but:

There was a young man called Paul
Who was so extremely tall
When he got into bed
He stuck out his leg
And turned off the light in the hall!

I’ve had the e-scorpion since November 2019, pretty much zero issues. I’d go for the e-scorpion purely for that fact it folds up, doesn’t take up much space when folded. The only niggle really is that extending the central pole can be a bit stiff but tbf I’ve not done anything to it since I’ve owned it.

Oh and that’s a size XL Geometron with a 1350mm wheelbase on it.

First ride in Torridon today, did a short loop (17k/600m) to the Achnaschellach descent. It was much more techy than I thought it would be!! Great weather, tomorrow is looking very wet, but the 5 days of riding here mon-fri looks to be dry.

One of the cairns at the top of the Achnashellach descent. Great day for my first ride in Torridon!

If I was to move from the SE to Scotland, Aberfeldy/Pitlochry etc would be very very high on the list.

Tons of riding on the doorstep; gravel, full on enduro, or proper mountain stuff. Ready access to Perth, Edinburgh not that far away. Neither is the Cairngorms.

Dunkeld was a bit too touristy, it was full of yanks when I was there, and there’s not much there aside from the touristy stuff. Aberfeldy, even though it’s further off the A9, had more shops, a bigger supermarket, and felt a nicer to live.

Above everything, even having stayed in Cardrona in the Tweed valley they last few days, is just how friendly everyone is – almost everyone says hello passing by on the railway path, and it seems there’s a huge riding scene but a lot of people knows each other.

Honestly, if I can make it work, work-wise – I’ll be seriously considering Perthshire in a few years once I’ve got a house deposit together.

Had the same on one of mine too, this one was exchanged though, the other 2 I had didn’t have it as bad.

Cheers for the tour @singlespeedstu – my legs are in tatters now!

Cracking day, actually warm (which was an unexpected surprise!).

Fancy a ride over Golfie tomorrow?

@singlespeedstu Sounds good, have replied to your pm.

I want to ride gypsy glen too but it’s looking ok weather wise tomorrow and Wednesday so I can’t do that on Wednesday.

First day of 2 weeks in Scotland today, staying in the Tweed Valley for 3 days to start.

Started off with a nice wee warm up on Glentress blue; had sun, sleet, a biting wind… Yep I’m in Scotland! 🤣

Aye, I’ve had to do that before, but actually never come across 180 standard post mount weirdly

I’m fairly sure every current fork is 180 post mount as standard now, the revelations went from using the old 32mm stanchions to using the same 35mm stanchions as pikes.

I was going to say lighting but all the pictures on the website show the same purple background.

Just want somewhere dry to ride. Happy to drive a couple of hours from north Kent.

I don’t think anywhere is dry down here at the moment, you’ll be better off finding somewhere that’s rideable in the wet. Or, embrace the fact you’re going to get muddy.

Tbh it’s not too bad mud-wise at the moment, plenty of boggy sections on flatter ground but drier than I thought it would be.

The weather forecast has improved for next week above the border, at least. I mean, in that there’s no snow forecast at the moment. 🫤

Jeez, that’s proper ****ed, isn’t it!

Erm… Good luck!

Got the same email, they’re probably just sending them out to get people to download the order history before it disappears.

You’ll be glad to know the order history doesn’t have values on it, not sure if I want to see how many thousands I’ve spent with them! 🤣

Bore cap tool delivered, and caliper stripped down.

None of the seals were flipped over, but there was some debris in one of the bore cap threads, and possibly on one of the seals.

I got this out the thread. Not sure what it is, doesn’t look like aluminium.

Now, the threads are the opposite side of the o-ring to where the fluid is, so it shouldn’t have affected it. But, a couple of the pistons do have some light scoring, right in the area that would have never been exposed to anything but the seal. So I think there’s been a tiny bit of debris stick in the seal which has caused the leaking.

This would explain why I had about 150km trouble free km with the brake before they started having issues, either the debris found it’s way there after a while, or it was there to start and eventually scored the piston enough to start leaking. The scoring is visible but I can’t feel it all with my finger/fingernail, I’m not sure how much it would need to be scored to allow a leak. More likely the debris stuck in the seal allowed the leak.

Not sure if there’s more issues with early batches of brakes, my original pair were ordered early September.

Honestly though, it wouldn’t put me off.

This week in Scotland, the week before I go up there for a holiday… 21 degrees.

The week I go… Snow.

Yay. 🤣🤣🤣

Right, new front brake received, fitted, set up and bedded in within an hour.

It would have been earlier if the Evri driver had delivered to the right house! To be fair, the address on the label looks like 18 not 16 which is where I live, Wiggle need to improve their printer DPI! It’s the second time it’s happened – and I don’t get the delivery photo until the driver has finished his rounds… 😡

Anyhoo… The new lever is holding pressure. Thank god. And after bedding in and a few hard stops I can see not a drop nor bubble on any of the pistons. So, fingers crossed this brake is a good’un. I think my old brake is going to need a master cylinder rebuild too as it’s clearly not sealing in there, and that’s beyond my knowhow.

Currently rocking the ‘not quite finished’ look, if I can get out over the next 2 evenings and all is good I’ll cut the hose down and give it a bleed.

I’ve done it, haven’t ridden anything ‘really’ techy yet but all good so far. And it’s a massive help for bike control, lifting and placing the back wheel, bunny hops etc. Also no having to try and reposition my foot on the pedal if I end up riding on my heel or something. Although, I’ve not yet got to the point of being able to clip in straight away every time.

I still have my flats and will use them for rides where there’s either a lot of exposure and/or steep tight switchbacks.

Get a bike box, package it well, send via parcel force large parcel. Mine was about £65 including £750 of protection. Sold on eBay.

Just finished Beef. Started off really slow and almost gave up on it, but boy oh boy did that escalate quickly!! And that finale! Wow.

Great music choice too. 😎

Ignore the fluid level above btw, I’d forgotten I had the wheel out and had pumped out the pistons with the pads still in, with them fully pushed back in the level is fine.

I’ve taken them off to have a proper look and I can’t see any fluid but I’ll put some paper between the bleed block and pistons to see if there’s anything on it.

Nah, like I say my rear has been completely fine over the 200km I’ve done. Maybe it’s a cracked piston or something, I’ll check once I get the new brake and strip down the old one.

Get the proper hope bleed kit with the funnel that screws on, it’s the easiest way to do it.

And yeah the noise (hard to describe, more of a warble than a gobble) for me is the first sign of the start of contamination, before they get to the full on honking noise level.

My rear has been rock solid, just the front with the issues!

So, I think the master cylinder seals are shot on my front brake, as well as it leaking enough fluid to contaminate the disc. I can’t see any fluid coming out from the pistons, but the disc is definitely getting contaminated. And my lever is doing this:

If lever doing that was down to fluid escaping I’d have no brake fluid left!! I’m going to open up the master cylinder to see how much I have in there, it might even be the level is low enough that it’s trying to push air down the brake line?

Edit: fluid level is pretty damn low! But not low enough that it’s pushing air. That fluid has gone somewhere… And that somewhere is straight onto my brake disc!

Fingers crossed the new one is free from issues!

IXS carve Evo+ here, actually the carve 2.0 now (in a size bigger) and they’re fantastic. Burly enough for park days but also ok to use on big rides all day.

Plus there’s the matchmaker clamps and everything, it’s simpler to just get them sorted.

They’re phenomenal brakes when they’re working!! 😬🤣

I’d be giving up on them after another failure. Buy something more reliable for your holiday!

Nah, it’s (probably) one piston out of many, and I’ve had about 4 years combined flawless reliability from 2x sets of tech 3’s – I’d rather not have to get used to a new brake feel when I really just want to know what the brakes will do when I use them.

Tbh I sort of need to switch my tech 3’s on my hardtail to tech 4’s anyway, fingers crossed a combination of a new brake and/or replacing the seals in the current one (I think it’s only 1 or 2 pistons leaking, on the outside pistons too so I won’t need to remove them all) will get it sorted.

So, my front brake isn’t sorted.

Went out for an hour tonight, started hearing the tell tale ‘turkey gobble’ of the beginnings of disc contamination, and riding along on the flat, with a slight bit of pressure on the front brake (enough to only need a bit more pressure on the pedals to move at the same speed), the front brake lever is going literally to the bar, from it’s initial bite point of about 2-3inches from the bar, in less than 20 seconds.

That’s barely any brake pressure at all, for 20 seconds, and the lever is at the bar.

I probably don’t need to tell you that that’s not great when I’ve got 2 weeks riding in Scotland coming up in 6 days… 😫

I can also see the disc has the same contamination that it had before, I gave the bike a wash at the weekend and it was perfectly clean so I know it wasn’t contaminated from anywhere else. There’s no leakage from the lever and with the disc contamination it can only be coming from the caliper. Only one side, too. Same side as before.

I’m going to order a brand new front brake off Wiggle, and a bore cap tool from somewhere else – the new brake will be here Wednesday – I’ll get that fitted as it is to start, go for a ride that evening and then shorten th hose later if all good. I’ll then rebuild the faulty one with the seal kit I already bought!