Well the drum came off, and as always it was a surprise, in fact the surprise was nothing, there was nothing wrong in there!!! Actually what I thought was one problem which caused all those symptoms, turned out to be several problems which incidentally looked like they were related. As far as the handbrake went, the cable had rusted inside the outer casing and had snapped right before it went into the drum, so in fact although when I was pulling the lever I felt some resistance, it wasn?t pulling the shoes, it was the force of the outer case ballooning up. As for the Brakes, the problem was as far as I can see due to severe neglect of the car. I am not sure, but this is what I think happened. At some point in the past, the master cylinder had gone and one of the circuits had failed. I could check this because little oil was reaching the cylinder. I thought it might be just the piping, but I checked at the master and it wasn?t much coming out of there either. The vacuum assist was working and seal was fine as no hissing could be heard. Anyhow, the owner had obviously carried on using the car with this fault and somehow the back cylinder seized up due to rust (because the circuit had failed and they weren?t moving), then the neglect continued and rust developed on the pipes just after the flexible bit (when the pipe comes from the front, there is a section of flexible tubing so that the pipe can sit on the rear axle before it goes into the drum). Somehow from this, air was being sucked into the system but oil was no leaking out. Because the car is not loosing oil, but every time you de-air the system, it comes back. I don?t think it?s the master, because air is trapped only before one of the rear cylinders (the wheel that was not braking). Anyhow, what I thought would be a simple fix, has turned out to be major repair due to some persons neglect of the car. It is amazing how many people think a car is just a `machine? and don?t realise it almost has a life if its own and if you don?t take care of it, it will die. In this case a simple neglect of a faulty cylinder which cost 10 quid, damaged the entire system. Anyhow now I am faced with a complete new brake system, including a master cylinder, real cylinders, and new piping, plus the handbrake cable. So there you go. pink fluffy dice happens, but that?s life!!!

lol, fair enough, I wouldn't be surprised if the insurance contract was drafted so narrowly that you had to get both events, in that order, before it woudl pay out.

Oh and Blue, no, he doesn't know quite how bad the deal is. If he'd shopped around, for the amount of money he's paid, he could have had a new shape Vectra 3.2 on an 02 plate with 12k on the clock.

mileage is not completely independent of the condition of the car. some parts are clearly used more as the mileage rises. For example bearings (which wear and become loose), steering mechanism (loose track end rods..), and several parts of this type whose wear and tear is not related to `how' you drive the car. On the other hand, some parts are related to how you drive the car, these include driveshaft (if you are a nutter and accelerate with spinning wheels round a corner, then bye bye CV joints), clutch, gear box (the screeching noise when you change gear in a haste and which rounds up 1 mm of the ill-fated gear) and other such parts. Therefore if you want to get a high mileage car, always check that in addition to it having had the service (cam belt is crucial) that it was not driven by a nutter. I have three AXs, one of them is a J reg which has done 140K and one of them is a H reg which has done 70K. the H reg one has better suspension (dampers in better shape), steering feels much better and the car rattles much less and its all due to the low mileage, although the car is older (both are 1.4 5 door). on the other hand the H reg used to be owned by a `boy racer' and so some parts of the car are knackered. the clutch slips, the CV joints are gone, the gearbox is about to go, the engine is completely abused (mainly due to `take offs' at traffic lights) and other problems of this sort. The J reg on the other hand was owned by a father of two who had passed his hormonal overdrive period, and so even though it has done twice the mileage, it is still on the original clutch and it feels perfect, the shafts don?t knock about and the gearbox is as smooth as a Galaxy milk chocolate bar. But because of the high mileage, the wheel bearing are slack, the steering knocks a notch, dampers are about to meet their after life and the car rattles much more. So in the end, mileage is neither completely independent nor completely the only factor on how good a car is. It depends on

1) who the driver was (this is more important as far I am concerned, than if the service book is up to scratch, you can always replace a battery that was supposed to have been replaced, but if you end up with an abused engine, you have had it)

2) servicing - specially oil change, belt change..

3) how did the mileage come about (motorway miles are less damaging than city miles obviously. my J reg AX has a lot of miles because it was used to travel from Oldham to London regularly.

4) sometimes when you test drive a car which you have not driven before its difficult to say anything about it based on how it feels, because you don't know how it is `supposed' to feel. (like first time you test drive a diesel car..). the best way I have found is to test drive at least two cars of the same model you are interested, and this given you a very good idea of the feeling of the car you are about to buy relative to how its supposed to feel.

Oops, 143 bhp not 145, my mistake. Yes, it'll be easier to get a 1996 model for £6k, but I found several for less than that on a national search on the Autotrader site, some 1995, some 1996, entering "tds" as a keyword when searching for 525's. As for quality, just give it a thorough inspection as per HJ's How To Buy & Sell Cars (BTW, thanks for all the tips HJ!)and do a HPI and you should be fine. I had the slower version, the TD, which I got in November for £3900 and sold for £4100 in March.