My car's been having a bit of a rest the last week or so, working from home, nights driving rail replacement buses. I get to keep the minibus at home as the job is local to me in Ashford. But, today we're off to the local indie garage to get the heater control valve changed. no summer's nearly...

Did nothing with my car today, it had. day off while I got my bus engine in place under the bus ready to lift it in tomorrow.

It was intereesting to see the mpg on a long motorway run. I wonder how the sticky rear brake affected the mpg? :)

Could be a split diaphragm in the servo.

A lengthy trip today in my TDV84.4, Ashford via London to Grantham and back. 350-odd miles, average speed of 47 mph, mpg 30.4. Not bad at all. At one stage the average speed was 57 mph an 34,6 mpg! The sticky brake problem is temporarily fixed, a good quirt with WD40-ish stuff and working the...

Drivers side rear brake caliper sticking, now sorted! The worst bit is trying to get the car raised! I drove the back wheel onto a block of 4x4 (wood), chock front wheels, raised suspension, big bus jack under rear jacking point, small jack under back axle to clear wheel off the ground. Found...

I'm just about to tackle unsticking the sticky driver side rear brake caliper. sometimes it sticks, sometimes it doesn't. I found Rimmer Bros do a vey good video on how to do it. I find their videos very matter-of-fact, not over-produced like some of the stuff on youtube.

ISTR doing one on my last long-term car, it was not an easy job. I had to give up and take it to a garage.

What I do with bus airbags is to put them in plac with the bus jacked up, use a tyre inflator to inflate the bag. It will soon take its right shape. the tyre inflator, giving about 90 psi inflates it in a few seconds. Or if you must fole them to shape first, it can be a pig of a job trying to...

How difficult/easy is it to do front suspension arms? ISTR trying on my old car and couldn't get access to a ball joint under the stub axle. My"new" car needs them replacing, indi garage wants about £1k to do them.

My "bargain basement" 4.4TDV8 has had a couple of days off, just a local shopping trip and a visit to the dentist today. Next thing to fix is the saloon heater valve unit, drivers side is still blowing cold, passenger side hot. Still rebuilding my bus engine, bus batteries were left to go flat...

I think my S reg P38 had a bottle jack, but my 52 reg L322 had the nasty scissors jack, as have the others that I've had. I do't have the physical strength to operate the scissors jack; last time I tried the thing started to give way. It's simply not fit for purpose on such a heavy car. Once...

Been using my "new" 60 reg TDV8 for the commute to work this week, night work, so traffic is light but the roadworks do as well! On Wednesday morning at about 0130 coming down the A249 from sittingbourne to the M20, police had closed the road to to a serious RTC. I diverted round some back lanes...

Surely the grinding sound is the ABS working?

Yes I intend to, I had a similar problem on my previous Vogue.