Leaderboard

The fiesta isn’t electric, what did I miss? Thieves steal stuff… in other news the world is round, the pope is catholic and bears xxxx in the woods.

You can pick up Electric MINI,s for much cheapness. There are loads of the things about. (Just not the Level 3 which i really think they are not building.) Vauxhall Corsa Electrics 3 years old low mileage are under £14,000 and some had the RRP @ £34,000 and more 3 years ago. New ones can be got for much less than the 'Asking Prices' you see about. BMW, Mercedes, VW, JLR can not first register the higher emission ICE in the EU or the UK unless they get lt's of electrified vehicles Registered and on the roads. Their cars or Partners EV.s. Because of the Fleet Average Co2 & getting fined on every vehicle sold if they fail to meet the right number. BMW, Daimler Benz & VW deserve the problem because they are behind the Diesel scandal so chickens came home to roost. They need to punt EV,s even at a loss to sell the high cost ICE vehicles.

I feel your pain Dooge! My commute is 3-4 km in one direction in week days with a diesel and longer journeys in weekends. Front grill covers were usually used for diesel cars in colder countries in the past, or hand made ones made from cardboard 😂 Something similar to this one should do the job better than under bonnet insulation https://www.kopacek.com/skoda/octavia-iii/octavia-iii-winter-grille-cover-in-great-oem-design-ki-r-glossy-black

This popped upon my phone from the Briskoda members youtube channel/

So had it at a few shows since. Local cars and coffee which was actually busy I just didn't bother taking a pic of it until I was ready to leave. Sat idling for 20 minutes in a queue to get into it. Got a free T shirt though. Another show in Knockbridge today which was a big one. And that all was fine. Even got a little placard for going in. And then instead of heading home I went into dundalk and it started running poor. Parked it, looked it over, Cleaned the carb, new plugs, etc etc. Got it going again, for about 5 minutes. Died just off the motorway coasted into the big car park and there it sat. No spark. Lucky I had gotten an AA membership for retrorides and... Got it home luckily. 99% it's the coil gone again. Absolutely 0 spark. Think all of my working on the car earlier made no difference, all it did was let the coil cool off and let it work for a bit more.

We had some pretty dense mist and a lovely sunset on the way home earlier - so pleased we took the scenic route 👍

@Graham Butcher i think you’ll find we all got confused by the fiesta comment. If you’d just said something like wouldn’t thieves target large numbers of parked up EV regularly left overnight we might have got your point.

I wait, with the car. People are not WAITING near me. Their car is charging, they are working, shopping, visiting, today the kids are at a dance event, they plugged in PHEV,s and EV,s THEY GO HOME, they check the App, see if the car is charged and go back. They are driven back to where the plugged in the car and bogged off leaving others maybe needing a charger. That is not just a Fast Charger, greedy barstewards plug in and charge and lock in and drive away and might or might come back that day. This is where no Time Limit, or tariff, or they set the timer to not charge too long, but still hog the bay and charger and get no penalty because no wardens. The Hospital Car park has NHS cars plugged in ready, fully charged for tomorrow, others sitting in parking bays. As does Social work, Planning, Roads, Printing and other council cars. There are people off walking. Some plug in just because, because there is a charger. If you never use half or even a quarter of the range you do not need to plug in for an hour for 7 kWh, or less on a 11 kW or onto a 22 kW charger when you get only 7 or 11 onboard charging. Yes people have to pay attention if the car is charging still and will have the energy in for the journey they are doing, but nobody except me and a few others that are charging addicts are at charging hubs waiting on Fast chargers. @Graham Butcher Later when cooler & maybe once the rain passes i will go charge for an hour for free. Charge 2 phones, and a chrome book and post on here and save my self £3. Spend it at Tesco on the way home, maybe have 4 kWh from them for free. Well from some of your taxes maybe. I will take a picture of the cars charging with nobody around waiting on them.

Did you read what you wrote? quote Just as thinking need to wait hours for cars to recharge. 😂 Then as your closing sentence, you said Anywhere over 4 hours of typical dwell time is perfect for slow charging. So you do agree that slow charging, which is what you implied, was good enough for people, does indeed involve waiting hours for the car to recharge. 🤣🤣🤣

Off to ASDA for £1 damp traps, or packs of them. one in the car and one in the boot from next week. Well while in stock, and before next weeks drop in temperature and all the condensation threads on Briskoda start. There are dozens from the past decade just search. See the Getting ready for winter Pinned in the General Automotive chat . Prepping for winter. My car is damp, my windows ice up inside, water runs out my doors. my fuel filler flap freezes. This is a Central European Car Manufacturer issue ongoing. Odd that where weather can be more extreme than in the UK the VW Group are pretty hopeless with winter conditions. UK winter is moister though. Not enough cold or dry cold long enough. Well location, location, location, because the UK is quite long.

Have I glossed over the issue? Point is it’s indeed a problem need solving, it need to be solved in such a way so that everyone can contribute to the renewable energy transition. I laid out the reason why EV are critical part of the transition, how smart public slow charging can help both consumer and grid. Credit where credit is due, you didn’t mention rapid charging and same model of re-energise the vehicle is a must. Also you recognised cost benefit of able to charge at home. Let me re-iterate, I totally understand there is a have/have not gap that need addressing. And need a top-down strategy for this fast. Unfortunately this kind of “levelling the playing field” is something uk government is very bad at…….

I had a run early up to the hills and back to deliver some newspapers. 8*oC and calm & misty, 12*oC coming back. I will see next week as a comparison with the efficiency. Maybe as much as 10 degrees cooler in a wees time. Sorry camera must have had condensation on. Lots of campers about and getting up, nobody on the roads other than wildlife. Living and dead, lots of dead hedgehogs. 3.6 mile / kWh up & 4.6 coming back. 38 mile round trip.

The coolant getting up to temp in a TSI and then the engine oil is hardly going to be speeded up with insulation under the bonnet. (Noisy diesels not speeded up either, but maybe less noisy.) In countries where it is much colder than -5*oC in the south of the UK or anyplace in the UK there are people that put Grill / Radiator covers on. But then they might have -20*oC or lower all day and night and not cold at start up and later on a lovely warm day.

If it ain't broke, don't fix it. There's no guarantee the new components wouldn't fail prematurely. If you start replacing components "just in case", where does it end?

You just can't see the wood for the trees, can you, you completely missed the point. Not everyone can have the ability to charge at home for the reasons I keep pointing out but somehow, you totally ignore and gloss over. The market for EV's is luke warm at best and people extolling the virtues of charging at home and how wonderful the world of Tesla's is not going to convince people to cast off their ICE in favour of EVs, when firstly they cannot afford the better class of EV's and Tesla, Polestars etc they are looking at the more budget price end of the market, people do not have the money to splash in this cost of living crisis, and nor do many people have the ablity to charge at home. I suggest that most people who can, either have seen the cost benefits and already made the transition, or are considering doing so. When you consider you can still buy a ICE mini for £22,935 and the equivalent in EV mode, the price jumps up to £32,550 many people will see the EV as being unnecessarily expensive, plus they also see the problems that they will have charging at home and public charges could well mean they will actually cost more to run than the ICE version. Now, it might be difficult for you to understand, but try and see it this way, if people could buy the EV at the same or very close to the same price as the ICE model, that would remove objection number 1. People are used to having to go to a garage for fuel, so if they could go to a public charging point and could charge at similar price to filling an ICE car, that removes obstacle number 2, not being able to charge at home for the reasons I've mentioned many times before. If some can get a home charger installed, then they might well be laughing all the way to the bank. To achieve that there needs to be plenty of charging points close to home. They would then be getting the benefits of a nice new car, without incurring a massive price lift in either buying or running and they also be able to feel good about themselves doing their bit for the planet. Winner winner, chicken dinner. Now do you see the point and understand the logic??

Bumper off to finally fix the damaged lip. Got a small fibreglass repair kit from halfords and set about fixing it. Not too hard actually. Kit had a lot more stuff than I needed so I have lots spare for the vRSDI. Only trouble I had was the resin set VERY quick. The way it was setting it was turning into jelly in the cup, so I ended up dumping that out in a lump and making more. Did 2 layers, Seems to have set very hard. Looks bad, but the patches are behind the bumper and the bottom of the splitter can't be seen. Gave it a clean waiting for the resin to set. Gave the intercooler and the spotlamps a good clean since I had access. Also tightened up the intercooler for hopefully the last time. Gave it a good polish too. All together. I'll just paint it on the car. Everything behind the bumper is fixed so no point taking it off again.

No, there are no reliable DSG gearboxes, basic slushboxes are reliable, SOME manuals are reliable but most Tiptronic or DSG type flappy paddle gearboxes are overly complex and rely too heavily on sophisticated electronics and computerisation. They're the solution to a problem nobody was having.

just looking thru' some interesting thoughts here then this question jumped i to my head would you be ok sitting in an EV whilst it was charging ... to not fear a flame moment ?

You get 24 hour road tests, pre covid weekend road tests were common. You can hire EV,s cheap enough, get Car Club EV,s etc. Most Rapid chargers in Scotland had no covers / canopies until hubs were built that do have them, then often with solar canopies. Muppets even face charger screens where they get cooked by the sun through the hottest hours of the day because they are not bright enough to consider the brightness of the sun and how a little shade helps or some cover just to keep a touch screen & RFDI area dry. Bleached out screens are common.

You dont have to take the bumper to change the surround .

Good article but would like the temperatures in Kelvin rather than Fahrenheit.

The point about gas v bev vehicles in that report that I found to be very interesting was a comment made in the comments section quoted below, which as I pointed in a much earlier post ties in very nicely with my own finding when I was working with buses where the rear-engined buses from other depots were having engine fires where the identical buses that I was looking after did not suffer from any fires. The difference I discovered between them, when the bus company asked to go and have a look at what was happening at these other depots. What I discovered was that they were all due to a general lack of keeping the engines clean. The engines were horizontal beneath the floor and mounted at the rear to keep prop shafts etc as short as possible. Oil would get spilled when doing maintenance, jubilee clips would work loose or even break if over tightened and oil could slowly seep out and sit in small puddles on the engine castings and this would get overheated, and catch fire and as the engine covers that formed the flooring above the engine was made from wood this would also catch fire and then the whole of the rear end of the bus would be destroyed in the fire. The alternator, the starter motor was also located on the top of the horizontal mounted engine and to make my life easier as the auto electrical engineer for the garage, I would take the bus to the high pressure cleaner before driving it over inspection pits, so the mechanics could get to work on the mechanicals while I did all the electrical work. As a result, the engines on the buses and coaches never had this build up of oil on them to overheat and burst into fire. These other garages then started to implement the regular engine washes, which they hadn't done before because they had to remove the covers and the washing splashed the bus seats etc. But the Buses also had a thorough cleaning by a team of cleaners, so the splashing didn't matter anyway once the service had been completed, and prior to the final road test and sign off by myself. Brett Bellmores December 29, 2022 at 6:15 am ” Less than 2 percent start in the fuel tank or lines.” “Most fires originate within the vehicle, such as a broken fuel line coming into contact with an overheated engine.” This is a common misunderstanding of what goes on in a car fire. Car fires are normally initiated by a large OIL leak, not a fuel leak. (Diesel cars can be an exception here.) Ignition of fuel typically happens after the oil starts the fire, if it happens at all. (Remember, the fuel is usually stored at the opposite end of the vehicle from the engine, on purpose.) The ignition temperature of gasoline is way above its boiling point; (535F vs 158F for summer gas.) If you leak gasoline onto a hot surface, the exhaust manifold, say, evaporation keeps it from igniting unless an ignition source (Open flame, sparks.) is already present. By contrast, the ignition temperature of oil is roughly the same as its boiling point: Oil spilled on a hot surface will ignite before it boils away. So almost all “car-B-q’s” start as oil fires, not fuel fires. And most of them stay that way.

I couldn’t agree more, they are not all “sh!ts” BUT dealerships need to be dealt with by being assertive, otherwise in the majority they will try to wriggle out of things they think they can get away with. You can tell a dealer to deal with a warranty repair or replacement without being rude, but you have to be direct. Id love to live in your fairytale land where dealerships do exactly what you expect, unfortunately most of us live in the real world mate.

A lot of people won’t go EV due to downtime. I couldn’t make it work with a 400v car due to my business travel, so I am limited to the highest speed chargers and some hope when working. Getting people out of ice is the goal here, hence when I said hybrid I kept it range extender electric drive only. BEV vs FCEV is the secondary debate of what is best vs good and the answer won’t be the same for everyone. Time does matter. But once a pumped hydro or h2 production facility is built it can generate. Sure use v2g, but if I was buying a car outright with lithium batteries I wouldn’t allow it myself due to increased battery degradation. Small maybe, but I want to keep the v. Expensive car going as long as possible. Thing is though, it’s almost not at all about efficiency and hugely about localised air pollution. As I said elsewhere I’d use excess wind to make green hydrogen, store and sell for transport and keep some to make electricity for the grid in low generation days. Even with blue (and a few years notice plan for a suitable tax on blue for price parity plus a bit with green) the CO2 being captured is better than it going in the atmosphere along with NOx and PM from petrol and diesel. Local air pollution is a very immediate problem along with CO2 and if people don’t want a car with a plug, I’d rather get them a step closer until battery/technology improves generally. Smart meter installer told me they’re been tasked with looking more carefully at the seals now prices are much higher. To be honest, I think the DNO should be required to provide a fuse, meter and an isolator, but that’s just my view.

ATE says not to grease their rubber bushes. I greased them everytime (just need to use neutral-to-rubber grease) and all ok. My BMW friends doesn't grease them because "pull-back action works no more", ahaha.

No. Usable capacity is 10.5. It still can go about 70km in ideal conditions, but more realistically 50 to 60. I see nothing wrong with your range of 50km. If I drive only in my town (hills and lots of speed bumps) I can barely make 40km. Doesn't matter, car won't take more than 3,5kW.

There was a TPI back in 2019 for a similar issue on the Octavia which was resolved by a software update Given they tend to share SW across models, there's a good change there is a similar TPI and update for the Karoq. You'd need to log in to erwin to check Octavia TPI:

I was just looking at Chelmsford on ZAP map as I found it rather odd when you were saying there was not a decent choice of cheap public charging that you are aware of and Chelmsfor does seem to be rather poorly served by cheap and available public EV charging. Which is not the case for much of Essex. Chelmsford is less than ten miles for the the Braintree Gridserve super EV station which has 32 public chargers of various output including AC ones of up to 22 kW at the fairly reasonable 49p per kWh, use the right credit card and get some kick back too. Or pop in to Chelmsford at park at Q park in town the charge rate is 24p per kWh for, might be 25p or so for non Octopus Electroverse customers, that cheap than most people pay at home and could offset the parking charge and its Sunday rate is pretty cheap and 4 hour rate not too bad either at 115p per hours. Chelmsford might well get the proper EV charging at its Morrisons like Clackton got with its 20 chargers of various sizes. Its all going, one either sees the work going on at the site or if plugged in to the EV info channels like ZAP map one may well get a notification of a bunch of EV charge points getting switched on as part of the 2500 to 3000 points commissioned each month. I do not pay much for my EV PCP, well less than £300 a month and negligible fuel running costs and low servicing costs plus a very serene driving experience. Perhap lucky in Worcester with its location but there are not many places in England at least where running an EV is much of a trail, drive or no drive.

Correction and possible explanation inline, italic. More seriously, it's a weighted average figure that places more emphasis on recent miles. I've used my old Octavia (TDi 110) mostly for commuting including a 1 mile climb at journey end going to work. I got an acceptable overall consumption. I also used it for meeting people off a car ferry, covering about twice the distance on a more level route including my commute except for that last mile. I could complete the trip to the ferry terminal with more remaining range than I started with. So I think you're placing too much reliance on the trip computer figures.

It was the service staff - they picked up on it when it was last in for a service, The car can be sitched off in the Drive position and the key withdrawn. I never noticed it before because I always switched on and off in the Park position.

Well, there have been a few TV documentaries and there are also some tracker companies with their own YouTube channels that I think are well worth your while researching when time permits.

Mib2 maps won't work on an rns315. You need a one time map update SD card. It'll update the maps in the internal storage and then wipe itself. The latest release is v12 from around 2020. That's the final release for the rns315 so as new as you'll get I'm afraid.

Is not the solution easy ? Charging a standing charge, by the minute of being plugged in so that there is a point where ones cost of electricity effectively rises to well over £1 a minute and people will move. https://www.zap-map.com/ev-stats/how-many-charging-points 2,500 new charge points being added every month and now UK has 76k and that will hit 100K next year whilst petrol stations will start to close or covert as that market for hydrocarbon fuel continue to diminish as with Shell in Fulham... This Shell station removed all of its gas pumps—now, it’s being called the ‘gas station of the future’ Ben Stern August 14,2023 One London gas station has totally reimagined what a refueling area can look like. Since the beginning of 2022, a Shell station in Fulham, England, has removed all of its gas pumps to instead offer rapid electric vehicle (EV) chargers for those who need to recharge, as reported by Bloomberg. https://news.yahoo.com/shell-station-removed-gas-pumps-100000919.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAEEU3NqXb2ocOuBg6LlK2WAwUAq2iQ6fvpqLda0GvDWCOc0cLbGMTPNlr0EWf7MyIdz3kq5C7c7JV7GBSOTEHpNJHbysgGaZDviClL1UJ6cDzPFTZmoQ8Y2IlTwiZvPKJtsa-h5W-vaY7K_NWXyCiODhhwIKw9aU6hrXCAchEcFU

Welcome. Very reliable over the years. Get an extended warranty and be careful doing AdBlue top ups because Dealerships say 'User error' when well they know 'Design / component faults'. So the TDI,s with SCR / Adblue then it has been a few years of those now and they have been basically OK. Horror for those with a fault. We never know how good cars / engines are after a good few years until a good few years pass. We know about ones from 2017-2023. It will be another 3 years before we know how a 5 year old ones from 2021 are doing.

How many EV fires have hit the newspapers this week? This thermal runaway stuff is such a load of tosh. The Diesel electric hybrid ferry did have an overheating battery this week. but then it likely got a WTF is this weather shock. If in Scotland there are any EV fires i will be paying special attention to the news stories because i pretty much read everything there is to in the media.

@Graham ButcherI am pointing out there are 2nd hand EV,s that are as cheap as the ICE version & there are new cars no more expensive than the Petrol or Diesels now. The Manufacturers are becoming more desperate. But there are transporter loads of new EV,s going on the road because regardless of the Private Buyers / Renters there are Fleet, Hire & Utility companies, local authorities and emergency services getting EV,s and getting them cheap. Motability among them. Have a wee trip to Scotland and see just how many Green Flash registration plate vehicles there are on the roads and yes sometimes in driveways, but often just parked roadside.

Firstly, I have NEVER said that all EVs in car parks enter thermal runaway. It is a rare event, but that rarity will disappear over time as EVs become the normal mode of transport, then there is a real danger of a whole row of EV's becoming involved in a fire if just a single car does suffer a thermal runaway as they burn in completely different fashion with jets of fire shooting at sideways at low level and can set other cars on fire very quickly indeed. There are videos showing this happening already on social media, so it is not something I have plucked out of thin air. Currently, an EV is more likely to parked to next to an ICE car, but that won't be the case for much longer, do you not agree? As to the "to solve home charging, flatten all tower blocks, level all terraced houses", suggest another way that people in these conditions could easily switch and enjoy home charging to get cheap charging like you quote? And this is also part of the problem and it seems to a problem that most folk who bang on about how people need to switch to EV's somehow conveniently seem to completely ignore, which brings the discussion full circle back to the point where I started, HOW do you make it attractive and affordable enough that people in less than ideal living conditions CAN make that switch. I for one would be keen to see how you would solve that issue.

Thanks Toot, I did wonder if the insulation was just for noise or if there was a heat element to it. I leave for work at 5.30am to be in for 6 on an early shift so when it's freezing and the windscreen is full of condensation and I can't get any heat into the car it's frustrating. I just end up spending tons on kitchen roll to get rid of the condensation. That's a separate problem which again seems common with VAG vehicles. If I run the climate control and put anything other than 'low' to get any kind of heat onto the windscreen, the coolant temp won't get above the first line for the entire trip. My understanding of the coolant and oil correlation is that it will then take a long time for oil to warm up. Over an entire winter, that can't be that good for a car consistently? And that behaviour with coolant makes no sense to me, especially when Skoda are sold throughout Europe and in much colder climates, which makes me think the thermostat is weak?

There is also a Government site https://www.check-vehicle-recalls.service.gov.uk/recall-type/vehicle/make/SKODA/model/FABIA/year/2021/recalls Some 2021 Fabia also have rear seat backrest frame which needs replacing and/or airbag

Well yes, otherwise you would have to put it in park to get the key out.

I know paywall and USA, but it gave a few reasons, such as vehicle "upgrade" and curiosity to test EV. https://www.wsj.com/lifestyle/travel/electric-vehicle-rentals-tesla-hertz-38ecd430 Personally, I'd want an EV for the better drive. Also I'm used to "the search". I've set arbitrary limit of about 20% extra rental cost to get EV's during family holiday. We, as family, decided Norway for next summer. So I'll be renting an EV next year. 🤞 I've made a poll on SpeakEV to see if people seek out to rent EV's: https://www.speakev.com/threads/would-you-look-to-rent-an-ev-during-family-holiday.179998/

This completely misses the point of having batteries. Might as well throw out any cost benefits and go for expensive green hydrogen in fuel cell if you must need direct replacement. Simply take petrol station mentality across to EV charging does not make any sense what so ever. I've mentioned vehicle-2-X and smart charging many times. It is the reason why BEV are very important part of overall energy solution. Renewables generate unpredictably, BEV when parked can help here. EV ownership without driveway is indeed problematic. There's not much cost benefit and it's not convenient. There's no denying this need to be solved. But I don't think we should solve this by applying petrol station refuel mentality and demand this to be solved by asking those without driveway to rely on expensive rapid charging. Charging speed flexibility is a huge asset to the grid's renewable goals, I think this can be used to reduce public charging cost just like existing smart charging tariffs. Intelligent Octopus (IO) home tariff is a form of smart charging. There's no reason why this cannot be applied to street level charging, any location where car is likely to be parked for longer than it needs to recharge. There's leeway to tweak power draw so that demand matches supply, instead of traditionally firing up fossil fuel power stations to make supply to meet demand. Multiply this flexibility across all BEV fleet in a country, we have built a virtual hugely adjustable power demand leaver. Current smart charging tariffs: https://octopus.energy/smart/intelligent-octopus/ https://www.ovoenergy.com/electric-cars/charge-anytime In 5 years time, V2H would be mature (as in product to buy and cars to use with). That huge battery on the driveway suddenly becomes home battery. May be in 15-25 years time, most chargers will become V2G. We will have built a virtual power plant: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_power_plant We got to get use to a little forward planning, having all that energy stored and not actively utilised is an expensive luxury/waste. Same as having cash under the pillow vs make them work in stocks and shares (or crypto 😛 )

Be brave, go for it. It might well look like a private ambulance / funeral directors car but fill your boots. Night vision is no worse than driving a van and there are lots of van drivers. What is the worst that can happen, maybe a hard stop by Police Scotland officers and they shoot you dead.

Hello Everyone, currently on holiday I find myself with a little free time so I thought I would try to summarize my ownership experience of my (now my brothers but I still use it regularly) mkII skoda fabia. I plan to structure this more as a timeline of the 7 plus years it has been in the family for rather than a review going over the experiences I have personally had with it, also any maintenance and repairs that have been done over time. Then I will conclude with my parting opinions of the car. Please forgive me if my writing is a little clumsy, I am not a very good story teller/writer. Also I may end up missing the odd bit which I will add later should I remember. On that note, let us begin... 2016 I am in my first year of sixth form, taking driving lessons, in doing so, unearthing my passion for cars. During my lessons I realize that a car is something I would very much like to have so I set out looking for one, being a 17 year old I go through all the usual suspects for example vauxhall corsa, ford fiesta, vw polo, fiat grande punto, all around the 2007 model year as my budget was £2000 and I wanted a low milage example. After sitting in these cars I was left disappointed, being 6 foot 5 in height, many of them were simply too cramped to fit in comfortably. With that I decided to widen my search and came across the skoda fabia, which in terms of driver space wipes the floor with most of the competition, even the vw polo on which it is based strangely. After doing some research on the different models I decided that the Fabia was the car for me and that the best engine to go for was the 1.4 16v petrol due to its reliability. Fast forward 6 months, I am the proud new owner of a 57 plate 1.4 skoda fabia MkII with 60k miles and FSH for the sum of £2000 (which I realise now in hindsight was a bargin). One of the first things I decided to do with the car was change the oil and filters (oil, air and cabin), under the supervision of my father who is an engineer, using MANN filters and shell helix ultra 5w40 the cost came to about £55 and it took about 2 hours start to finish. One thing I would like to say is that this car is very easy to service, if you have long arms you can even reach the drain plug without jacking up the car making oil changes a doddle. Another very important lesson I learn is that cheep tyres are definitely a false economy and nearly landed me in serious trouble when going round a roundabout and the car nearly understeered off the road at a very surprisingly low speed. After this experience I decided some new tyres were in order. At the time Costco had an amazing deal which allowed me to get 4 michelin pilot sport 3 tyres fitted and balanced for just £180. I cannot recommend these tyres enough for outright grip and I believe they did save my bacon one one or two occasions, however be warned they do make more noise and the ride also became for fidgety and even crashy at times. 2017 it is at the start of of 2017 (i think) that I experience the first malfunction, which is of the electric boot latch. Initially I was worried that it would be and expensive fix however a replacement was only £30 and it took me about 30mins to replace so really not a big deal. I also managed to bottom the car out in the sixth form car park, which resembled a swamp more than an actual car park. This managed to punch a hole through the central exhaust silencer (it was also quite stony unfortunately), the fix for this was about £50 and a few hours of time due to the more involved nature. I also noted, strangely that the wing mirror heating had stopped working but this did not bother me at the time (see year 2020 to find out why). For the rest of the year the car proved to be reliable, not suffering any issues. In September 2017 I headed off to Warwick university to study physics and to my annoyance there was not car parking for students, however there is a solution. I managed to find a farm about 20 mins from the uni whom I payed about £80 a term ( there are 3 terms per year) to park my car. It is in December that I have the first major incident with the car, I was driving to uni when about 2 miles from my parents house on a country road I see a deer. Before I have time to react I hit it, doing about 40 to 50 mph, making a loud bang as it slams into the front of the car and clattering sound as hits components under the car. I pull over in the next village and phone my parents who meet me to check I am not too shaken up, amazingly the only damage to the car is a cracked front bumper and I can continue my journey, my experience is that this is a very tough little car. My parents actually recovered the deer and cooked it the week after when I came home for Christmas it was very tasty, they estimate it weighed about 35kg so not completely insubstantial. 2018 The first half of 2018 passes without any issues, the car serves me reliably, the only thing to note is when leaving the car for longer periods is to leave the handbrake off (if safe) as it can seize on. After finishing my exams I return home and give the car an oil change which again is very cheap, the anti roll bar drop links are also replaced with Meyle HD units at a cost of £30. I also decide to repair the bumper, since I am keeping the car for a long time my concern is with mechanical integrity rather than cosmetics so I use thick pieces of abs plastic, gorilla grab adhesive and bolts to repair the bumper as seen in the photo ( note I do coat the bolts in touch up paint in the end). Also removing the front bumper confirms no further damage was done in hitting the deer. The rest of 2018 passes and the functions without any issues. 2019 Again the car remains reliable even when used off road, travelling down rutted tracks, its higher an average ground clearance for this class of car proving useful. I also took the car on a road trip to Edinburgh and back from coventry where is performed flawlessly. Now at a milage of about 83k, what I believe to be the original front discs and second set of pads are now shot, they are replaced with padgid units at a total cost of about £70. This time I perform a much more involved service at about 85k miles, I changed the gearbox oil (£17) power steering fluid (£11) and spark plugs (£14) as well as the usual oil and filter. Please note that whilst some say you dont need to change the gearbox oil and power steering fluid I would disagree, both were quite dark and dirty (please see the photo below), also its much easier and cheaper to replace these fluids instead of a gearbox. A few months later in september the passenger side window regulator failed, an aftermarket replacement from gsf car parts was £45 and took about 2 hours to fit. 2020 During 2020 the car did not suffer from any issues. In june a towbar was fitted at a cost of £300 and serviced it for about £40. also duing my holiday I found out why the heated mirrors didn't work, some wires in the drivers door loom had failed, so I replaced it at a cost of about £110. The car was then used to tow a 500kg unbraked and then 1000kg braked trailer for about 1500 miles as my parents had various DIY projects on the go. I would be lying if I said it towed the 1000kg trailer with ease but it can do it, you just have to exercise patience. 2021 During 2021, the Battery was replaced for £70 with a Bosch unit from costco, aside from an obligatory oil change. This was also when I noticed the new feature in my car which was a small swimming pool about 6 inches deep in the spare wheel well. this of course was the well known vent gaskets failing behind the front bumper. The repair cost about £5 in gorilla glue and lead sheet sealant, as well as a few hours of time, the problem has not re-occured. right after that the electric windows started playing up, which was found to be a result of the electric window module failing. This was repaired by @Breezy_Pete for £50 if i remember correctly. I was at this point, ownership of the car was passed to my Brother (however I still used the car hear and there as well as do all maintenance and repairs). 2022 The car performed flawlessly for the first 7 months, the aircon was regassed for £50. However in july it failed it MOT for the first time in the family's ownership, also it was overdue for a cambelt and w/pump change. So I set to work repairing the MOT fail Items (tie rod ends, drivers side driveshaft boots) as well as replacing the front brake disc splash shields for a total cost of about £60. An interesting point to note is how well made these components are, even at 15 years and 100k miles there was no play in any of the joints and not a speck of rust on the driveshaft, even the original sticker was still on showing the date of manufacture (2007). After doing this I replaced the Cambelt and w/pump (£130) and auxilery belt (£10) with quality Gates parts, alongside the coolant (£20) and obligatory oil change (£40). Note going 7 years between cambelt changes is pushing it I was lucky to not loose the engine, one of the belts had lost tension and the w/pump was on its way out (see below). Also note you dont need the specialist vw cam locking tool, a pair of m8 bolts work in a pinch. Also the car suffered an engine malfunction for the first time, whilst towing a trailer down to Southampton it started misfiring. When I got to southampton I made a bet that since the spark plugs dont have many miles it was probably a coil pack, so I got one from a parts store (£30) and fitted it on cylinder 1 (wild guess) and hey presto missfire gone. the rest of 2022 passes without incident. 2023 Again for the first 7 months the car performs fine but steadily getting louder due to an exhaust leak. My brother had a frightening incedent where an oncoming car hit a deer which was then thrown into the path of my brothers car (the fabia), unable to swerve as this would be dangerous my brother went over the dear making a lout bang as he hit it and clattering as it went under the car. Amazingly the car escaped with only minor cosmetic scuffs and a small scratch, whilst the slammed bmw which was oncoming had its front bumper wrecked plus other damage. Unfortunately the car failed its MOT again due to a major exhaust leak driveshaft boots and lights. Looking underneeth the car I saw the entire exhasust was badly corroded so replaced the entire system excluding manifold and cats for about (£110) I also replaced the ball joints as the boots were failing (£15 each) and both passenger side driveshaft boots (as well as cleaning and repacking with new grease). To my great irritation one of the drivers side shaft boots had already failed at just 1 year old, note do not use Shaftec boots they appear to be crap. Then again the car had another oil change (£40) That brings us to the present day. To conclude, would I recommend this as a first car? Yes definitely, whilst it has had issues, none have left me stranded or been difficult/expensive to fix. The car has proven itself to be exceptionally durable surviving many an offroad/deer related escapade as well as towing heavy (relatively speaking) load. Yes it is not as involving to drive as a fiesta but knowing people who have owned them it is probably much better made. Finally, even at 16 years old, everything still works! air con is amazing even in heat waves it can turn the car into a fridge, electric heated mirrors, radio, aux input etc, which is mor than can be said for many a vauxhall/ford/fiat, at least from what I have seen.

The difference may be due to the fact that one quote is for the older 1.2 TSI 90 bhp and the other is a the newer 1.0 TSI. I will call my local Skoda garage and ask about the timing belt life on our 1.2 90bhp 2016 car.

Simples. No 2.0 TSI or TDI has a DQ200 DSG 7 speed Twin Dry Clutch DSG. (Kodiaq 1.4 TSI ACT does not have a DQ200) They are fitted to FWD , so 1.0, 1.2, 1.4, 1.8 TSI or a 1.2 or 1.6 TDI. 250 Nm or less and 180 ps with a Skoda, 192 ps with a VW that get a DQ200 DSG. 7 Speed wets are the norm now. 6 speed only with a PHEV i believe. DQ400-e We are talking EU / UK here though. DQ381 7 speed DSG has a 80,000 mile service interval. I would not leave them that long.

Anyone tried coding Via Obd Eleven or Vcds this useful feature? Most VW cars have this feature coded. Thanks

Do you want to do that post again? You tried to post images using an unrecognized format so the board won't show them, they need to be in jpg usually to display properly

Having owned a PPD170 for years I can say it’s been mighty. Every car has its issues. If you get a PPD170 made in very late 2007/2008 should not have any issues. I have the 2008 model. What to look for: - Revised C coded cylinder head. No problems pourous heads so make sure it’s got a C at the end of the head code. A and B heads were used in 2006/07 PD140s and PD170s and were known for going bad requiring head jobs. - DPF/EGR To be honest I’d say there’s more PD engined cars without these devices still in place than there is with them. Every car has issues with these including the CR it down to how it’s driven and servicing. The PDs can be a bit more temperamental than most as they were not designed for DPFs. There is a handy fix tho🫣😏 - Intake Manifolds are made from crappy plastic which can crack with swirl flaps and need to be removed immediately as they’ll go into the engine. It’s a cheap fix. Get an aluminium one from a BKD PD140 in a scrapyard or buy a refurbished one from DarkSide for 120. No mapping required. - Injector issues was another thing that plagued 170s. They used Siemens systems that tended to fail. A good few were recalled for it and had them replaced as they very expensive to replace. I have a May 2008 model with 180k miles which never had any injector issues and I know plenty with the late 07/08 models that also had no issues which would lead you to believe these models were fitted with the newer revision Siemens units. If they did fail there is a cheap fix also for this by fitting a BKD PD140 fuel system, including the Bosch ECU, Injector loom, and injectors. Other than these bits which if I’m honest can all be sorted cheaply enough there’s not much else to go wrong. Just normal wear and tare. The CR170 has been known to suffer similar issues as those mentioned with exemption of the cylinder head issue. I’ve seen many CR170s suffer injector failure and there is no cheap fix for them as well as turbo failures. The PD170 is more raw than the CR170 where the CR170 is more refined. PD170s also have better tuning potential if ya wanted more than a Stage 1 later down the line. Things get expensive after Stage 1 on a CR170. Finally, I know this will offend some CR170 owners but the Prefacelift (PPD170) is a much better built car than the CR170 (Facelift). Having worked and detailed with both the CR170 and owning the PPD170 this is my experience in them. The metals on the facelift CR170 rust quicker around the sills and wings. The interior plastics on the CR170 are a much cheaper quality and this can be seen noticeably in the rear door cards even the two tone seats feel of a cheaper quality on the facelift. Generally I got into a few CR170s with an open mind but the quality just felt a notch below the PD170. Also in relation to metals, I’ve seen a 2010 and 2013 CR170 where the sills were almost rusted through with half the miles of mine ! (We lived in the same area). The parts can be got cheaper for PD170s than the CR170s also. Fixing wise both are pretty much not too bad. That’s just my experience with them. Fuel economy will be roughly the same if I’m honest probably slightly better on the CR model. For a verdict, if you’re not into cars but want something refined and smooth, get the CR170 but in Blackline Trim with full leather as these are nicest ones. If your like me and into details, tuning, and like PDs but also like a more raw driving experience, then a PD170 is the way to go. If it was a CR170 vs CR184, then definitely CR170 as the CR184s are worse than the CR170s. Hope this helps you man. I’m a bit of a PD enthusiast. Jack Edit: Just noticed you mentioned gearboxes. Would advise to stay away from Automatics as it’s more than likely they won’t have been serviced every 35,000 miles and DSG boxes don’t take kindly to poor servicing. Could end up costing a full gearbox rebuild or gearbox. Manual is the only way anyways ! 😁

Noticed the same on many cars, not an issue worth investigating. Needle sits at top, and doesn't move for ages, and then begins to drop as you say. General consensus on the way they calculate is they have a reserve of 7lt (read in their documents before) that makes it appear to seem full for longer.