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Dual dashcam installed today. Installation videos on sellers websites saying only 10mn are needed is a joke! It took me several hours to install both cameras properly. I paid attention to use tie-wraps to fix the video wire to existing harnesses to be sure it doesn’t disturb airbags blowing out especially along A-pilar and along the rear seat backrest where my Mk3 has additional airbags for rear passengers. Making the cable connector go through the rubber hose of the tailgate was a mess… I finished quite late and night was already down. I ´ll go for a drive tomorrow to check the video quality and adjust the rear camera pitch angle.

Did it actually fail the MOT on the rear discs Kodiaqsportsline? What did the failure certificate say? Notwithstanding that I think you have found a very good solution and thanks for sharing it, it deserves to be promoted.

@wyx087 The question was to me using the MINI to do 974 miles. So it would not do 120 miles, it would as today need charging before 100 miles. The Corsa electric could do 120 miles,. but would be slower charging on 50 kW chargers even though it had a 100 kW charging. I was not paying to use 100 / 100 + chargers. & i had only 7 kW AC onboard charging. 900 miles would be 18 hours driving and the car would be on a rapid / 50 kW charger for 8 or 9 hours. Too expensive charging North of Inverness to Rapid Charge that amount really. I will do the North Coast 500 in the Mini and in total do 800-900 miles but it will be be at times when chargers are working and in the past that would be out of season and mid week. There is no out of season anymore on the NC500 and there are the plonkers in Taycans to be avoided. They tend to not stay in their side of the road,. @Graham ButcherNo idea what the idiot in the Porsche did to head to their nights stop over and if he went to Edinburgh but if he did then why? They traveled to Scotland while just north & east of where they were going when reaching Perth had a Red Weather Warning, and they were in an Amber & a Yellow and the road works have been well warned in advance if they just bothered to check.

The below 205/55R16 tyre and 6Jx16 ET48 rim combination allows the use of snow chains on the Octavia MK3, as shown in the owner's manual. In combination with your 4x4, they should work very well in winter conditions. Michelin winter tyres also have excellent tread life, better than most of the other big brand names. Michelin Alpin 6 205/55R16 91H (Euro label C B 69dB) https://www.mytyres.co.uk/rshop/tyre/Michelin/Alpin-6/205-55-R16-91H/R-377244 Alcar 8247 6Jx16 ET48 5/112 57.1 steel rim https://www.mytyres.co.uk/rims/details?vehicleId=185805370466243696&rimCode=ALCAR8247

same as above, have done this for years in my auto AC cars, no foggy windows etc, nice comfortable temp inside, not worth worrying about fuel for the cost of it

Sump sensor is for oil level and temperature.

Other cars seem to share the lcode of 001000000000000001A481808080000000008181000000F400 so I doubt that's your issue. If you haven't already, check the adaption channels. I would expect one called "installation position" which should be set to "Memory seat driver side".

I checked my car earlier and it hadn't switched back to GMT from BST, it's nothing major to do, but it should do it automatically, everything with a clock in our house, bar 2 analogue wind up clocks and cooker do it themselves

Oh you bet they did - they were knackered. I wrote ( kodiaq section ) a few months ago that I suspected something may be up as the brakes had a pulsing feeling and suspected they were on their way out. The question is why didn't the pre-MOT ( same place as MOT took place ) or the 3yr service pick this up? Pre-MOT said they'd likely be an advisory, the service made no mention of the discs themselves but said pads were 75% worn and recommended chaning them b4 next service. Driving home this afternoon just showed what a difference the new brakes made - no judder but something I hadn't appreciated, no noise! I'd just got used to the rubbing noise generated when the car was braking, never thought it much of an issue. In fact I thought it may have been the fronts. Apparently the fronts are fine. Service brake excessively fluctuating Offside Rear [1.2.1 (e)] And yes, you're right, it is Eurocarparts and not Europarts. The day after I bought the parts, CarParts4Less proved even cheaper if you used a code which reduced the price by 23% taking them down to £90 !!! That's unbelievable. CarParts4Less are the same company - EuroCarParts by another name but that website doesn't offer booking the garage online service. Could I have bought from CarParts4Less and then went to the same garage direct without booking online? Probably, but I'm not sure I'd have been seen within 48hr and for £17 I wasn't taking the chance. Apart from trying to help others save a few quid. what the above shows just how much Joe Public is being taken for a ride. The Quick-fit centres especially. This nonsense re: they can't fit parts which aren't supplied by them - oh yeh? Sorry about the long reply but it's not the whole story. At first the guy at my local National Tyres said he'd charge approx £90 labour if I supplied the parts but when I went to book it, I guess it was the gaffer on reception and he seemed quite annoyed, asking me to point out the bloke who gave me the quote. The guys at Halfords - when he said they couldn't warrant other peoples parts ( including Halfords ! ) I reminded him that a few years back I bought tyres from Camskill and they charged me £13 a corner to fit them. He just shrugged his shoulders. I've plenty of time on my hands so can shop around but I do feel for those who're compelled to pay whatever price they've been quoted.

The burning question is - did those rear discs and pads really need replacing? No information of miles covered - but a three year old vehicle (1st MOT?) - I'm finding that a little difficult to swallow. Given the vehicle had passed a pre-test and had a service, I'd be asking for a second opinion.

This one took me a while to trace, so I thought I'd document it to maybe help others. Fault - (2009 Fabia 1.2 Hatchback, BBM) Door open light and chime and interior lights coming on at random whilst driving and stationary. Fault was intermittent so made it harder to test. Summary - Opening and closing each of the doors wasn't conclusive but I thought it was drivers door when I could get the fault to occur. I read up on here and then checked the wiring in A pillar bellows (all looked good unusually), so I then removed the door latch mechanism as described in posts on here. I tested the latch micro switch on the bench and all seemed good. I checked the PCB contacts for the connector and switches both visually and with meter for continuity and all seemed good. I ran 9v from a battery through switch and all good. I then removed the complete door loom (a little fiddly but it can be done without removing the speaker) and double checked all wires - all good. Having not found any problem with door lock mechanism or door loom I decided to put it back together and reinstall without changing micro switches or re-soldering so as not to disturb anything. I then looked at wiring diagrams in posts on here to see if something else could be happening. It showed that the door latch circuit has two wires (brown, brown/yellow) and when the door is open then these connect in the latch micro switch and earth is supplied to the brown/yellow cable and that feeds back through the bellows to the Convenience unit under the dash. However, there is another brown/yellow cable that goes from the same pin in the bellows connector to the Window Motor/Door Control (not sure why). This meant I could easily test the state of both brown/yellow wires at the window motor connector with the door in operation (have door open all the time and just use a screwdriver to push the door catch cam all the way in to simulate it being closed). Doing this when the connector was off the window motor I was able to see the door catch micro switch always operated perfectly and only completed the earth circuit when the door was open (and the dash light operated correctly). However, when I reconnected the connector to the window motor, that wire was earthed intermittently and caused the dash door open warn light to come on even when door was closed. So I concluded the window motor was incorrectly earthing out the circuit and causing the fault. As an aside, using this window motor connector (status of brown/yellow wire when unplugged) would be a good way to test the door micro-switch operation without needing to dismantle door catch as easier to get to than the bellows connector and allows window motor to be excluded from the test (as its unplugged). So I then decided to strip the window motor as couldn't find much info on here. First time stripping it came apart completely and I found a very tiny spot of green corrosion, some metal filings, but not much else so I cleaned and sealed up the pins on the board with PCB varnish thinking it was maybe just moisture or filings causing a short. Reassembled, tested, just the same fault.... So took it off again (three screws, easy), and second stripping it came apart in better way and PCB easier to access. I tested what i could with a meter for continuity of soldered joints behind main connector, but everything else was tiny SMD stuff so beyond me. I didn't find a fault but decided to reflow the solder on the connector joints as they cause issues elsewhere (dash, lock pcb etc). They are small and fiddly, but I got it done and then added PCB varnish on top. Reassembled everything, and everything now works as it should - the original fault of door open light coming on has not happened since. I did look at replacement window motors before i stripped it and there are many versions, and some are costly, so this might be an option to try before going that route. The circuit board is small and I couldn't see detail that well (corrosion, joints, filings, etc) so I zoomed in on camera and took lots of photos, then zoomed in again whilst viewing and surprising what can be seen then! Some pics below, but they are just a fraction of the couple of hundred I must have taken.... Testing the door latch on bench (now know this could have been avoided by testing in situ through the window motor connector) Model of window motor on this 2009 1.2 hatchback Window motor connector (brown/yellow at bottom right here is the wire that should be earthed when latch closed (test with connector unplugged from window motor to test latch micro switch first, then plugged in to see if Window motor is providing a false earth). Connector block on Window Motor PCB, - small amounts of corrosion, but perhaps more under the block itself, but didn't fancy trying to remove. PCB from Window Motor with my thumb for scale (board is small....) - I reflowed solder on back of connector block (the 14 blobs in the middle - they look a bit domed but connectivity was good and I was concerned at leaving too much heat on the pads with all those SMD's around...) PCB Varnish added on top to seal out any moisture. Hope that helps someone. I have more pics of dismantling things is required (but there was a 10mb limit on this post).

Hi everyone! Had the car a few months and thought I would introduce myself. I've always wanted an Occy VRS estate and after the birth of my daughter last year, it seemed the right time to take the plunge. I parted ways with my dearly loved and still missed FK8 Civic Type R and collected a 2016 Octavia VRS with the petrol engine and DSG. As a first foray into self shifters it's a wonderful thing to have when the journey is long or traffic longer. A first test of boot space came at a boot fair and blew my mind with the amount of baby clothes and toys that could fit into the back of this piece of metal wonder. More about the car? Well it's a petrol DSG with the optional 230 pack plus keyless entry. The bodywork leaves a lot to be desired, the wheels are in need of a refurb and the dealer purchase experience can best be described as woeful with a side of disastrous, but I love the car and mechanically it seems sound. I've got a few plans in the pipework to get things sorted, but at the moment I'm just enjoying the car and slowly reducing the nights I cry myself to sleep missing the FK8 🤧 Looking forward to getting involved in here and being a part of the community.

Depends on the year. Probably 6JA905217AWHS. Last three letters are the color code.

Today, unexpectedly and for the second time, came another infotainment reboot version 1941 (HW H61). I feel like I found a similarity with the last reboot. I suspect the reboot is triggered when the internal modem is lost/moved to a new internet provider in another state. Today it happened that I crossed a state border within the EU, and the restart occurred after 10 km beyond the border, when the original internet connection provider was no longer in range and was connecting to a new one in a new state. Do you think switching to another provider in another state might trigger a reboot? It shouldn't ... first the radio turned off, then after 5 seconds the whole system restarted. The joy of the new FW is already gone

I am not daft I will take the BMW 520 diesel estate. I got 60 mpg yesterday and on return trip son driving it was 45 mph. Same average speed trip.. difference being I do not touch the brakes, go faster quicker and coast. Yes his Porsche takes charging time and costs lots if paying high public charge costs, but it you want a 80 kWh battery and get 3.5 miles per kWh then that is rather different form an under 30 kWh battery like I have. But I don't eat and drink every time I charge or even need the loo. MINI had 50 kW max charging and the Taycan 270 (350) kW when you get to that type of charger. 150 kW charger does fine.

So i finally have my new car, she's a beauty! It is all singing, dancing with bells and whistles! I've read the manual from back to front and I may get ribbed on here but I have a question that I cannot find the answer to. On the drivers side wing mirror there is an orange light that flashes, it's facing the glass of the door so not for other road users. What is it for?? I've added a little pic of the inside, albeit quite dark!

On the MK2 glowplug failure registers a fault code but does not bring up a MIL light, or at least it didn't on mine, they are not mission critical. I doubt the MK1 even monitors the circuit.

I feel your pain. I did this a while ago to mine & more recently for a reversing camera. My tailgate rubber boots are getting rather full!! Copious amounts of WD40 helped slide them through.

Updated with 2nd Price drop to £1,800 without the spare set of wheels, £1,900 with.

It is doing it as a part time job. He has been up and down past Perth umpteen times in 2 years with that car. @Graham ButcherHe has said he uses Waze. He has a built in system in the Porsche, he could use ZapMap or Plugshare. But he messes up everything because he has a very quick charge car and never seems to get quick charges. I met a lady in a Jag EV today, into Scotland from Leeds, said how expensive Gretna Green was, was using a charge place scotland charger running dead slow, had not had a Charge Place Scotland app, had to download, thought she could tap and pay. I helped with Tesla non Tesla for Aviemore, told her when to charge in Perth if she wanted and where to in Inverness, she was away to drive into epic weather. They have suspended the Road / Gas pipe work on the A9 because of 2 hour delays. Enchanted Forest etc Pitlochry. PS Why were they crossing the Forth on a John O Groat / Landsend, just for further delays? PPS I was not quick today. 85 miles then a 39 Minute charge, 90 miles and a 42 minute charge. 50 miles and 30 minutes charge and now @100%. Cost, home charge, so 30 x 21 pence. £6.30. & 1 x 39 minutes £7.20. Next 2 were free. Next charge will be free in 90 miles, then i will need 25 kWh @ 55 pence so £13.75. Then likely home to charge to full again.

Taycan man has the usual excuse of holdups because of waiting for a charge at Ionity chargers yet there are alternative 100 + chargers in the near vicinity of them as an option. Sitting about as often as he makes out he has no lack of time to check out what there is around and about. As to the Porsche chargers charging costs, that is as it is then if you are paying full whack. PS D!ck head in the Solid Blue Taycan reg DJ ** on the A9 in the the torrential rain in the 70 mph limit Average Speed cameras had no need to go passed in the outside lane at over 75 mph and then stick in the outside lane going slower than 70 mph as the rest of us wanted up the road. The brake light coming on when going through the water was maybe the car deciding it was lacking grip or the driver thinking bl00dy hell this water is deep. At least they turned off at the junction for Gleaneagles having been leader of the pack for about 10 miles.

For my first decade in France people used to stop in front of my place to ask directions and it was always to somewhere a very long way away, not something further down my road or even in the area, nor somewhere big, it would be like asking in London for directions to a small village in Yorkshire! I would ask them for their map (naive I know) to illustrate as people then could not understand my French spoken with a foreign accent, not one ever had a map and not one French person I ever knew did, if they borrowed mine it would never be returned but they would claim they had given it back. Anyway back to the drivers asking for directions, after consulting my map I would start with directions to the next main town on their route and they would either stop me there or drive off, it became clear that they would stop to ask for directions in every town or large village! This happened multiple times per week every week then it completely stopped over a period of about 18 months with the introduction of smartphones. I still carry loads of maps in the car and am always adding to them, I cannot use them when driving any more and was forced to get a satnav when I lost the vision in one eye, if I still had a pair of young eyes able to focus close and far I would still not have a satnav but even I have to admit that with a smartphone if you search for say the nearest Lidl, hospital, pharmacy whatever when miles from home its much simpler to click on the map link and let the phone guide you there.

"on my MK1 it was a radio cassette with CD multi-changer in the boot" ... thats the one 😀 ( 21 this year - the car that is ) "It was being a passenger in a then newish Mondeo....." ... I'm probably about to hit this stage. ( I'm still inclined to get out and ask for directions 🙂 )

It's funny you should say that, as so far, the MPG hasn't been much different, given the usual vagaries of day to day driving. This morning's 48.9mpg on the way to work was pretty good. I'm still highly sensitive to changes, so I need to just get on with it and forget about it, but so far, so good. I did some calculations, and for my car, assuming a long-term MPG of 42.4 for 97RON, so long as the 95RON stuff gives me 40MPG, there will be a small cash advantage to using 95RON, while there's a 10p/litre difference in price. By my reckoning, depending on the actual price of regular unleaded, a 10p premium for super-unleaded is only around 6% more than regular, so as long as the MPG difference is 6% or less, I'll be better off using regular. But if it's more than that, then I'll get better value from Super Unleaded. But as you said, @Rooted, the reality is far more complicated than my somewhat crude experiment is set up to unpick. That said, I think a rule of buying regular when the price difference is 10p/l or more, and super unleaded when it's less than 10p/l more expensive than regular will probably be my general rule, going forward.

Tried this last night then drove the car this morning. Think its made a difference but a bit hard to tell at the moment as the weather is fairly mild. Will report back when its been tested more.

If it was a simulation any drop or total loss of pressure would not be identified as any reading aligned with revs would still show pressure. It may be digital taking a signal from a pressure transmitter, or piped with a tapping from a oil gallery. Most cars do not have a constant pressure and will generally show some rise in pressure with the revs, until a point where the pressure relief valve actuates to maintain a pre-set pressure. The oil pump is generally a constant displacement type with the flow going down oil galleries and through bearing clearances. The small clearances will give some throttling of the flow, creating a back pressure as seen on a gauge (finger off then partially over end of hosepipe to understand). As the flow increases with the revs, the clearances cannot accommodate this increased flow causing more back pressure seen as a rise on the gauge. This is why a pressure relief valve, which technically bleeds flow, is needed as the pressure would keep increasing without this control. The ECU probably does not have any logic to convert a variable signal from an oil pressure transmitter to a read-out for the instrument cluster as it currently does with water and oil temperature. Breezy_Pete may be able to expand on the operation philosophy of the oil level, I know some can actually give a measured level.

Thanks JR. I understand I shouldn't use a 235 tyre on a 7" wheel. Im trying to find out if I can use a 19" 7J ET 43 Rim from a Kodiaq as a spare IF I can figure out what tyre to put in it. Finding an exact matching 19" 8J 44et Vega Rim has been difficult.

Not used with FWD 1.6 TDI,s, or 1.2 TDI,s or 1.0, 1.2, 1.5, 1.6, 1.8 petrols basically FWD under 192 ps or less, 250 Nm or under. (Other than with a Kodiaq.)

By its nature it cannot be a full MOT test but simply a look over for anything obvious visually, in fact its just a con to get the car with them so they can fleece you, in this case by making you think it would pass with them when you probabmly had doubts elsewhere because of the juddering brakes, it was not a benevolent gesture, they always intended reaming you when the actual MOT came, well done for not falling for it. I would not expect a pre-MOT test to include the brake roller test or the emissions test or even using the jacking beam front and rear to lever suspension linkages, check wheel bearings and swivels etc, these are all the things that take time and are dirty hands on tasks, I think for most people a pre-MOT means a look over, it had more value in the days when cars fell apart with rust, if the floorpan or subframe was dropping out and the repairs clearly uneconomic then you would save the cost of the test fee before scrapping the car. Now a free pre-MOT test is just bait to entice the customer into their web.

I had not seen your previous postings regarding noise and pulsing under braking - It remains a concern that the rear discs, which would normally provide very little braking effort except under ESP conditions, have warped - have underlying causes for this been checked?

28 months of use from my battery from new, just changed it two weeks ago on the same day the dashboard warning appeared. I certainly won't complain about almost 2.5 years of use out of a very small battery that is subject to heat changes, being chucked about etc etc.

GPS is sufficient - but VAG have a long history of getting clock setting wrong, e.g. on the B7 Audi A4 even if you have sat nav fitted it ignored the GPS time when setting the time on the instruments and even offered the option to set the time on the sat nav from the (wrong time) on the instruments!

Probably more likely to be a sticking shroud in the water pump.

The issue is the coding pin. For some reason your module isn’t picking up the additional ground pin that determines what side of the car the module is on. You need to check the seat wiring to see if there is a damaged pin on the connector with all the small wires going into it. After that we can look at running basic settings and renenabling the memory. unless we are missing something and you’ve messed with any of the coding to cause this?

OK, fair point. But the car has an eSIM so it is connected to the mobile network, that alone is sufficient to set time & DST - every smartphone does it.

It was through the radio, with the old [now defunct?] Traffic Master info service which would give alerts of major holdups.

How many people, as a percentage, do you think would be able to spot if a disk is warped or how much meat is left on a pad in terms of mileage from looking through a wheel? Even I'd have to take the wheel off to be sure and I've changed a few in my time.

No, they have oil pressure switches. Simple things that just short a wire to earth at a given pressure. Not able to give a pressure reading.

I think the news reported correctly. Hangry presenter with a temper, missed his food slot and took it out on an underling (although he was quite a senior person that Clonkson thumped). 100% Clonkson fault, he behaved in an appalling manner. I'd have pressed charges if he had done that to me. I wish he hadn't done it though, as most importantly, he shouldn't have hit another person, but also because it deprived me of a show I loved. Even my mum, who couldn't drive and couldn't care less about cars, enjoyed the show.

My 2023 MINI Cooper S Electric charged to 100% ready for a long trip over the next few days is showing only 76 miles range. But then it has been running the last few days with AC, Rear and Front screen demisting and heated on and only doing 2 miles each time start to stop. Hopefully i do get 90 miles between charges & maybe 100 miles plus available if using less functions and still being comfortable. As it is i am OK for chargers ever 75 miles on the routes i am going. Since its gone Mini, here is my favourite vid with a Yank and a Scottish person.

I still think there is a place for TG, but it needs to reset. More serious car stuff, with lots of gratuitous slow motion and epic classical scores. Then add humour back in slowly until it feels right. Keep Chris Harris and add a couple of other presenters. At one more car guy/gal (like the James and Jeremy being genuine car jorno's), perhaps someone like Tiff, Jason Plato, Jason Dawes, or Jonny Smith They can also a woman if they other wo are both men, but it has to be for the right reasons. VBH would be an easy fit, but also Ginny Buckley or Penny Mallory would also be worth a look. Personally I'd love to Steve Sutcliffe in a car show, as he is a superb driver, probably the best car journalist driver out there - he taught Chris Harris a lot and drove an F1 car getting very close to the professionals times. Oh and Steve also raced the feared Tuscans, the scary ones, not the road car ('ve also got a bit of a crush on him).

The Chris Evans and Matt LeBlanc era needs to have all the tapes destroyed IMO It started getting better with Paddy McGuiness/ Harris and Flintoff but yeah, Clarkson, Hammond and May were the best years.

Never really bothered with TG since Clarkson, May and Hammond stood aside. There’s been no one since that matched their enthusiasm and sheer fun

Thank you To be fair to the M3, it is a faster car than the F Type, in every way except top speed. I think the F Type is positioned as somewhere between a GT and a sports car, whereas the M3 is positioned as a weapon. If anyone wants a practical 4 door, that is ridiculously quick and has more roadholding that any car that weight deserves to have, then the M3 is worth considering. Astonishing accomplished car. But it felt like you had to drive at 9/10s to get near the real fun zone, whereas the older Jag, should be a little more accessible in that department. If you want to drop that boy racer on your tail, I can't think of many cars that can do so as easily as the M3 XDrive. I didn't get around to track'ing the car and probably would have been able to enjoy it more if I did (except the tyre and brake bills might be a bit much). But... Sometimes less is more....except BHP of course (and the drop in insurance is nice too)

My failed attempt at humour.

I bought a new genuine VW Group NOS a few years ago for my wife's 2015 VW Polo 1.2TSI, "exhaust centre joining piece VW 1KO 253 141 M 59.6mm relaxed or open diameter - length 95mm". But, so far, that joining sleeve has not started to fail, I always plan to "keep an eye" on these centre joining sleeves at annual service time as they do fail after 8 > 9 years, replacing them soon after the clamps have rotted through is a lot easier than trying to remove still intact clamps. I think that VW Group has changed the design of these clamps and that was why I managed to buy a NOS genuine VW Group part via ebay. In the past I've bought after market versions cheaply and just "harvested" the clamps from them and left the original split sleeve on the car - I've still to find a use for maybe 4 redundant sleeve bits! Edit:- the convenient thing bout some VW Group cars/engines, is that there is a body cross brace near this exhaust join, which supports one end of the loose exhaust, from memory the end that benefits most from needing supported when the clamps fail. I'm not sure that this is true on this age of Fabia/Polo/Ibiza with the 1.2TSI 16V engines - correction, from your pictures it does!

I had a 2018 245 Tsi vrs manual & upgraded to a race blue Tsi 245 manual in September 2022 (same spec as greendog but with a reversing camera). Very pleased with the car & I'd recommend it to anyone - excellent blend of performance, practicality & comfort. I think I've been lucky as far as the software glitches & haven't suffered with them like some others, I had a short period with the infotainment restarts but they went away presumably following an OTA update. Comparing my 2 vrs's I'd say definitely spec the DCC because it makes a big difference. I find my current vrs a more comfortable & smoother car to drive in normal mode but a switch to sport every now & then is always good. Electric handbrake with auto hold is also an improvement as is the ACC (which works fine for me). Couple of minor negatives, preferred the alcantara seats in my old car & having to switch off the fake noise & lane assist is irritating. Overall very happy though.

I have a similar car, with the CAXA engine (1.4TSI) currently at 180K km. No issues whatsoever (owned it since 56K km). Any questions let me know. Its a very pokey yet economical engine, loves 7,500km oil changes, i'd recommend a oil flush if its been sitting around doing little for 13 years. It probably has the OAM gearbox, which the mechatronic oil can be changed every 60K km (easy DIY, 1.7L of fluid - 15 mins). Replace the brake fluid if it hasn't been done. The timing chain is not an issue if the oil change intervals (thus the tensioner) has been kept good. I get no rattle, no issues. I have vcds and can measure any issues and there is none. Never had a single code. I get 5.3L/100km on average, 6.3 if i give it a bit. The 1.4TSI with the 7 speed DSG is a really good product IMHO. 30K km is brand new. But change all the fluids. Here is the service/maintenance manual mate. Skoda Octavia II – Maintenance.pdf

Some really good trips away this summer. Not all of them dry, but we had fun anyhow.

You can adjust the regen level in settings but not sure if it can be done by the paddles. I'll give it a go.