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My first wash of the gutter channel on the barrel of the Veritate rims involved a microfibre towel and my little finger! I consoled myself that, given time, practice, ingenuity and this forum, I will find a better and faster method. It will happen!

She looks lovely, thanks for the pic! I know the wheels are a complete pain but they make such a difference to the stance of the car IMHO. My dealer ceramic coated our car as a no cost option. Unsure if I would have paid extra and I was a bit ungrateful when the Sales Manager explained it all to me. But they were right and it has made it easier to wash, the water beads brilliantly (as well as my Blackfire sealant and wax) but it will last longer than the traditional approach. Ours is the Autoglym Cerafuse coating. I haven't yet warped the toothbrushes or tried them on the car, having only washed her once since we took delivery. I have invested in some new Braun Wheel Woolies - the new ones have a 45deg angle. I absolutely hate washing the rims, any rims but especially the Veritate 19" ones. Anything that makes cleaning the inner barrel or reverse side of the spokes easier is money well spent. Enjoy your lovely new Superb.

Hi all anyone know where the code sticker is in a skoda octavia mk4.5 facelift 2024. I can't find it anywhere.

@Cairus any ideas? I've had issues with the infotainment systems in all my cars. The Leon would literally freeze up in the winter, the Octavia needs a reboot every few days, CarPlay randomly freezes with some kinda red/white flash thing, and the system in the BMW constantly stutters the audio coming out of the £1600 option HK system. Best solution? Phone mount and a bluetooth speaker.

Following. Nothing major as I check my nuts (and bolts) regularly, but still worth knowing. I'll ask around with my main dealer friends.

Sorry - read this last night and then got sidetracked. Please let me know if I've missed anyting. A FL Octavia vRS 230 does not have the VAQ diff. The easiest and most foolproof way to check is to confirm that the interior stitching is white, and that you have solid rear brake discs (which will be 272mm), rather than vented (310mm)? Did you get a good deal? How much did you pay, and what is the mileage? I'd normally avoid buying from Cinch as the majority of their stuff is part-ex/leasure return stock obtained from BCA and WBAC (their parent company). If it's a good deal, however, then that's a different story, provided you know what you're buying. An EPC light can mean a million things. In the simplest form, it means the car has detected a fault with the throttle, engine management or the electronic system. The first step is to see what DTCs have been thrown. I doubt it's the battery, given your description of events. My money would be on an ignition coil having an issue under load, a boost issue, or potentially a fuelling issue. At high RPM (above 5k) these cars can also suffer with oil pressure problems. Reading everything, it does potentially indicate a car that hasn't been cared for that well. Two cut tyres, one over-worn and one being the incorrect size... none of these are good things! The oil seperator is interesting though, as that's part of the PCV system that is a) known to be an issue and b) could be relevant to the EPC light. The boost pipe is also intersting, see my above point on a boost issue. I'm a bit confused about the first point on their list... leaking engine oil, so the water pump/therm housing was replaced? Eh? For context, these engines, along with many, many more, have a plastic housing on the thermostat/water pump. Over time, and many heat cycles, this housing becomes weak, cracks and leaks coolant. I think my car (a very tidy 2020 on 40k miles) may have this issue developing. Okay, sure, the housing is right next to the oil filter, etc, but there's no relation. I think the car had a coolant leak (hence the new pump) and an oil leak (hence the new VVT seals and timing cover). What would I do? That's a tricky one. I purchased my car as part of an agreement with a main SEAT/Skoda/CUPRA dealer as a replacement for a previous car they sold me with hidden crash damage. I wouldn't trust them as far as I could throw them, and checked everything myself, before having my mechanic tear the car apart too. Hell, I was sat on the forecourt running diagnostics and checking the specs list against the PR codes and VIN. It's good that you've done your research and checks. None of these issues are great, but they're also not terrible. Crap tyres, leaky shock, knackered water pump and some dinged body panels are par for the course on an eight year old Skoda. I would see what they say about the cause of the EPC light, and go from there.

I lubricated mine and manually operated until smooth. It was sticking at a certain point. Lasted another two years plus without any further problems. Alas old skoda is now a parts donor due to rust. Thats a fair list of repairs but nothing serious (mostly cosmetic). Tyres I havent heard of ?? See how they are when driving. They are Xload so will have stiffer side walls. Only thing that jumps out is shock absorber replaced due to leaking. They are normally done in pairs to keep suspension in balance and I would have replaced timing chain etc as they had the cover off but at 86k reckon wouldnt need doing. Alasdair

Good, I'm genuinely pleased for you that you're happy and satisfied with your choice; however, that is not true for everyone, and not everyone would be willing to make the sacrifices, or indeed in some cases be able to even consider a transition to an EV for a plethora of reasons. Some have already been mentioned, others not. I know that right now, the cost of diesel is hard to swallow but for most folk who actually own their cars, i.e. not on leases or company schemes etc, for the extra costs incurred in buying an EV and having a chargers installed (if they can) that the cost of doing so would fund the actual increased cost of the diesel for many tens of thousands of miles and years to come, so if their cars, like mine, are relatively modern and running perfectly OK, the switching over would have a negative effect on their finances at a time when there is the highest pressure of all time on them.

Many thanks again - Europarts say they have the part listed so am seeking confirmation its in stock and delivery. Not cheap as £80 plus delivery but beggars cannot be choosers they say! So far no reply from Twinauto but WW Spares say they cannot help me.

2 messages that I ignore, the update one that repeats even after the update and the 'oil change' message which is actually not due as the car was serviced for sale between schedules

Which model of Ring charger do you use? There looks to be plenty different ones to chose from.

Hey everyone, Just a heads-up for anyone planning to do a rear brake pad change on a Mark 4 Skoda Octavia (NX / 2020 onwards) using the ANCEL BD500 scanner. Despite ANCEL’s official marketing and compatibility charts claiming full "VAG group coverage" for Electronic Parking Brake (EPB) service mode, this tool does not work on the Mk4. ANCEL completely fails to mention in their product descriptions that the Mk4 Octavia uses the newer MQB Evo platform, which features SFD Protection (Vehicle Diagnostic Protection). Because the BD500 is a budget tool, it cannot unlock or bypass this security gateway. When you attempt to put the rear brakes into service mode, the tool simply fails or errors out because the car blocks the command. If you bought this tool specifically to do your rear brakes, you will either need to: Upgrade your tool: Use something like OBDeleven (with a Pro subscription for SFD unlock), VCDS, or ODIS. Do it mechanically: Remove the electronic parking brake motor from the back of the caliper (two T30 Torx screws) and manually wind the internal spindle back before compressing the piston. Don't find out the hard way when your car is already up on axle stands with the wheels off!

First wash today, good job I am retired and have time. Tried the bent toothbrushes and the didn’t work that well, ended up pushing a wet lump of paper towel round the channel behind the spokes to get it clean. Best implement remains the long brush from Lakeland (see photo of brush selection). The bent toothbrushes came from Asda, 25p for two. Read the instructions on the Autoglym can and remembered why I didn’t use it last time - I takes over an hour to cure! They did get treated with the Turtlewax ceramic spray that was used on the rest of the car.

Washed and treated with Turtlewax ceramic spray coating this afternoon, will see how it goes. Also got some turtle wax shampoo to complement it but didn’t use it today as I wanted to start from clean, bare paint.

I often get the pop up message saying to update the software,this generally happens around 10 mins into the journey,but nothing seems to happen,I don’t get completed messages & the nav system is still in the original,I tried updating the nav with a usb stick, but it doesn’t seem to work, my car is a 20 plate Karoq 1.5 tsi sportline & has the Columbus mib3 system

Mine 05/2025

Not surprised really just reminded of the change in battery performance once we have colder overnight temperatures. It got down to 3C, ie 276K, so battery was on the cool side. Energy efficiency took a while to climb from much over 3 miles per KWh.Had electric cars for near 2,000 days now and not one of them regretted transitioning to EV from ICE. A cold snap means one needs to recalibrate and tweak ones behaviour in a few areas. But the continual flow of economic advantageous, added to this month by the removal of VAT on home supply and therefore when home charging is ICE'ing on the cake. Also seeing the harm that added CO2 is doing to the planet going EV please me that I have stopped adding to that disastrous situation we are sadly leaving our offspring. When I see the reduction in range I start thinking about how much better the new version of the Scenic is, particularly the new 67 KWh LFP version with 220 hp. I could charge to 100% regularly rather than only 80% with my current NMC battery as well as having about 30 miles more range with a full battery, much cheaper as it is LFP tech and 50 hp more are all Scenics will have the 220 hp motor. Press release attached and the improvement is staggering and for less money. Not going back to ICE for a main car ever as far as I can see as EVs just have too many advantages and aspects like the reduced winter range, even with heat pumps on all out cars, minor inconvenience and charging up for little money, free or being paid to charge up, cheap servicing etc and the cars getting cheaper and cheap is holding nearly all the cards. if I needed to do silly miles in a day I would probably hire a Polestar or European Car of the Year Mercedes CLA. Previous European Car of the Years, 2024 and 2025, got both of these but will not be taking on a CLA but impressed by its long range if not its price even though down to £39k now. Press_release_-_2026_Scenic_prices_-_01092026.pdf

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Hi Alasdair, thanks for the insight! Would you say this is something to be concerned of, regarding further troubles down the line? Or once this is fixed should I be reassured do you reckon? Thanks !

Reckon all the bolts on my old 1.9tdi are similar but its 19 year old. Thats not good at all. You dont expect it on a 6 year old car unless its been parked in the sea. I assume the same bolt is used on other parts of car as well so may take them some time to find and recall them all. Alasdair

Thanks for the advice. To be fair the car is on 86k miles, doing about 15k miles per year for the last 3 years, so maybe the tires being shot makes more sense in hindsight. Cinch have finally given me the list of repairs and rectifications they made before selling the car. I’ll attach the list below. Do these fixes give cause for concern, or should I be happy that these have now been sorted before my ownership? I know the cooling system is a common fault from what Ive read. Thank you so much, I appreciate any insight you may have!

I get Kamiqs as a courtesy car each time my Karoq is serviced, and I definitely find the Kamiq is smaller and lower down. I need the Karoq for its boot size, and would not fit my holiday luggage in a Kamiq as easily as it goes in the Karoq. I can't really judge the performance and ride of the Kamiq as I only get the basic version, while my Karoq is the 2.0TSI 4x4 with DCC. Chris

The accelerating hard then stumble and limp mode but cleared when stopped and restarted does sound like what warrior said sticking actuator or if its variable vein turbo they may be carbon up. My old 1.9tdi used to do exactly the same thing. Slight blow off noise then down on power. Pull into layby and stop then start and back to normal. Slightly sticky actuator in my case. Alasdair

What mileage has this vehicle recorded? Your mention of it having had 'plenty of tyres' might possibly be of some concern. Check .gov website for recorded mileages at MOTs for past 5 years.

It's Highway, I believe, as Jaguar thinks they are American these days but my point is they openly admit that WLTP figures aren't really applicable to their cars' real-world performance. A bit more honesty with these things is good imho