Buyer Beware! Don't part with your cash before checking this. 

You raise some very valid points here, not all dealers are good ones and honest. When We bought our 2007 Bailey senator we didn’t realise until 9 months later when we had it serviced that the whole back end ( island bed layout) was full of damp. I went around with a damp meter my Stanley 2 prong one so not a cheep one and it was showing what I’d expect for what was back in 2019 a 12 yr old van but in the back it wasn’t showing any worse than anywhere else, in fact, better overall. We discovered why at the service the following feb (2020) as it turned out they’d double boarded over the damp and so when we checked the previous May the wood board was pretty dry but over winter it had started coming through. Cost us a packet to get it all ripped out and re done. The dealer claimed he knew nothing about it but the repairer and my service guy said it was impossible for them not to know. We’ve since sold that privately and bought a motorhome, A 2015 Rollerteam so Italian made budget van but the build quality does seem better than caravans now a days. Thanks again for your vids. Keep em coming.

I have that damp meter also watched Atlantic caravans. When I got my new to me van I had checked it first. Great advice.

Hi Martin Great advice as usual, enjoying your vlogs, hopefully the bailey got sorted before it sold, if its on Ebay, probably not. Good luck with new van, looks fantastic, hope Angela is well. Conrad.

Great advice Martin.

Hi Martin. Good sound advice. Will have a look at the damp meater looks a good bit of kit. Enjoy the holiday

Hi Martin, great video and watch Atlantic caravans too 👍 not got that meter yet but does look a good one to be fair. I googled your old caravan from your video with the caravan addys. I see it’s sold now or they taken it off eBay. Take care young man 👍

Spot on video and advice pal.

Great video, nice one to have watched, just taken your advice and got the damp tester from Amazon, used your link to purchase it. Cheers

Hi Martin. Sound advice, mate. We keep ontop of our Swift Challenger 580 did a video on drop floor and also just done all the seals on the outside as well. Its a shame about your old van and how people can be so ruthless and sell something that needs work. 😢 Great video cheers Paul and Sarah

I bought the same Damp meter its brilliant easy to use,wouldnt be without it,your old van if someone is sellling this without fixing it,could you report them,i would have contacted the seller and asked them,as you went to the trouble of not selling the problem on privately?

Best test for damp after bit of rain. Long dry periods and even leaky caravans can pass damp test. One I looked at was similar bailey to yours, rear floor had visible water damage all around edges. Still passed damp test because it was late summer in a drought.

Thanks for getting back to me Martin It’s the usual back panel that wraps over onto roof and I couldn’t see any evidence of break in seal . Maybe I need to run a bead silicon over it nonetheless H

Hiya. If it's the one that's being sold from Chester they have mentioned the damp.

Great video as usual, I would say Stuart Longton are partly responsible, they have sold it on, likely at some profit, which has allowed it back into the market for unsuspecting buyers to purchase.

Good advice

Hi martin saw your van on ebay before you did this vlog, its ended so dont know if they have removed it or someone has bought it.Enjoy your new van, saw Deb and tony this weekend i reckon you,ll be seasonal on there next😜 hope angelas ok x

Good video and hope your old caravan has been repaired satisfactory otherwise some poor person will have issues. Regarding your damp meter please be aware that the pinless type that you have and recommending are not fully accurate. You must use the ones with tiny pins for accuracy. We have a 2022 Buccanner and we use a fully NCC approved mobile caravan service engineer. This years service showed 50% damp along awning rail inside both sides of the caravan with this type of meter but nothing with pinless. So to double check as obviously I was initially worried by this we took the caravan back to main dealers. They explained that in parts of the wall structures are aluminium strips for strength and securing fittings to and this will play havoc with this type of meter giving false readings. Hence all the van was checked with pin type and recorded around 5% which is acceptable. So I would definitely buy a pin type which I have now purchased just to keep eye on things.

Hi Martin, what setting did you use on your moisture detector, for inside the caravan.

Hi Martin, justordered that..one question is what setting did you use? ie wall. softwood.hardwood etc Thanks

We have just had our sterling repaired for damp( now Swift ). Evidently the sealant under and hidden by the awning rails ages and shrivels with age. So the moral is get it changed after 10 years old, as a matter of course because you can't check it visually.

We traded in our 2011 Bailey Unicorn Valencia in June 2023 and found ourselves to be in exactly the same position as you with regards damp in all 4 corners of the floor. We were offered an extremely low part ex price but decided to cut our losses and let it go. We purchased a brand new Bailey Pegasus grande se Brindisi 8ft wide. Its just had its 1st service and showed negligible readings on the damp meter. Tows great with our 2018 kuga st line x edition automatic . Take care Bernard and Elaine

Just bought a new van from Stewart Longton yesterday. Didn't get as much for my Sprite as I wanted but the new van was heavily discounted.

Hi I had similar experience from a 2009 bailey pageant limousin to a 2013 elddis affinity. The sale was agreed and the change over was about to happen. However I got a call from the dealer glossop caravans and they said there was a substantial amount of damp in the bailey, and to go ahead with the deal asked me to pay a further £2500 towards the cost of repair to the bailey, reluctantly I paid because we wanted the elddis. But after a few weeks it played on my mind as to whether it was repaired or not , I called the dealer and they told me they had sent it on to another dealer and that it was sold. The problem is I don't know if it was repaired, if it wasn't but sold on anyway then I feel I'd been charged £2500 for nothing. Something I'll never know

Hi Martin Good vlog and information but it’s made me have a think about our van. We have a 2011 Sterling Celebration ( Swift) and had it 7 years and serviced every year. Bought a damp meter a while ago and checking all over it’s fine except the wall board behind bathroom sink shows 30+ reading . The wall feels a bit spongy too . I can’t think where any damp is getting in as it’s a one piece back on van with no window and area above sink towards ceiling is fine as is under the sink. I took off the high brake light thinking water was maybe getting in there and sealed it even though there was no evidence of ingress. Any ideas/ thoughts Cheers Howard

Hi, what did you do to try and resolve the damp issues in your Bailey ? I have the same problem.

Great video . Would be great if you could show us doing a damp test on your caravan . Thanks, paul.