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This is mine taken a couple weeks ago at the entrance of Cairngorm Mountain Resort, the snow just started to appear at the top. An absolute brilliant car to have and I love every second of driving it. 68 plate, 1.6 TDI SEL Manual

All EVs I can think of love trundling along at 60 mph or so and can even do better than there quoted range if they are kept down to 40 mph due to being on slow country roads and being held up by lorries now and then. The crunch tends to come, not for the Taycan, but for most EVs as they are SUVs or tallish city cars, that their efficiency in miles per KWh goes off quite quickly much over a true 60 mph ie indicated 64 or so. Tesla Model 3 excluded as it is low, new Highland model I think may even have hunker down mode for highways, even the taller Model Y does pretty well. Tesla software is so intelligent it could probably tell you what the optimum speed is to complete the journey as it already works on which on route chargers are available and their speeds etc. It cannot tell you, yet, when you need to stop for a jimmy riddle. EV can be constantly talking to various inputs, charging network availability, wind effect on consumption. Due to the fact that it is electricity being used for motive power and not hydrocarbon juice there is much more scope for journey optimisation and we are only just at beginning of the technical journey to optimise such matters and with the car driving itself shortly it the software will just let you know what it has decided. I, robot tunnel scene.....

Tortoise and the hare. Mr Battery Life did a, what he calls, Range, Consumption, Best Speed test, does it for many cars he has driven, as he is on the Austrian-German Border he can do some average speed tests at speeds well about the UK national average ie 145 kph /90 mph. I think we all know the best speed for most cars, ICE or EV, is around 60 mph. Every car is different. Aero drag coefficient, charging speed for EVs. So Mr Battery life did the below for the ZE40 Zoe, slow charging car,. relatively, If one speeds on to 7:30 on the video one can see the cruising speed versus lost time ot charge but then one will probably, I know I do, go quicker than the 90kph optimum cruise as one would arguably go over the optimum ie 100 or 105 kph so one had more time for comfort break. Certainly at my age I do not want to, anf struggling with bladder range, do more than 2.25 hours driving in one go so stopping every 200 kms is needed more for me than the car.

Can confirm, always have to go manually toggle summer time on or off, even with latest software. Pretty annoying, even my old Renault Clio from 2013 did it automatically.

It is rather a click bait. All advanced countries have plans for what to do in power shortages. It seems Switzerland has identified EVs as a potential load that can be reduced or removed at the third tier of escalation of emergency powers to reduce demand. I suspect they are the first to do this as the plan needs to be ratified by the federal court, it is not yet law. No doubt other countries will follow. The UK will no doubt be a bit behind on this as our plan (Electricity Supply Emergency Code) was last revised in 2019. The ESEC requires increasingly frequent and longer rolling blackouts as it gets escalated. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/electricity-supply-emergency-code

You can get it to save a certain percentage of charge. Deselect auto and you can go up and down on how much percent to keep. if I’m going on a hundred mile round trip I’ll get it to save 50% for the way back.

Sure, charging the battery via the ICE will clearly (and seriously) impact the mileage. On the Formentor I had the opportunity to play just a bit with the battery options: To keep the charge at a certain level - there's no problem, even if I decided to drive a bit sportier. It will give the electric boost anytime I need it and it will recharge quite fast via ICE. Once I tested the charge while driving option; I was down to about 15%, on the highway returning to the city and asked the system to charge to (maybe) 30% - it's hard to say, 'cause the CUPRA menu is different to the Skoda one, so all I can see are level bars instead of percentage. In about 20 km on the highway it got to about 25% - enough for me to cross the city in EV mode. But that was just to test the way it works, otherwise I'm able to charge daily, and for the really long trips I'm reserving some battery percentage from the start of the trip. Too bad you have to remember to set again the battery reserve if you have a stop along your trip... it would be nice if it would remember that setting for short stops. The same way a short stop will not reset your current trip mileage for example. I don't have a picture of that menu on Cupra, but I found something online; if you press the "=" symbol the system will preserve the current charge level...

So the numbers are out on the diesel vs EV "race". Source video on Geoff channel. Some how Taycan driver managed to find all the slowest chargers and stopped 8 times, took over 5 hours of charging time. Meanwhile, this is what I got when trying to route via the car's app, using same as in-car sat-nav routing algorithms: At the same time, Google map says 14.5 hours, same route. So Tesla routing thinks only need 2.5 hours of recharging, starting with less than 60%. (my car's current SoC) Whereas the EV in the "race" took over double the time for his charging stops. Inverness supercharger is open to all EV's, 6 stalls, apart from Gretna Green 4 stalls, all other sites have 8 or more charging stalls. Exeter have 32 supercharger stalls. The Taycan using 350 kW Ionity chargers should be able to do it with less than 2 hours of charging:

I didn't know too much about the hybrid system on Octavia, but it's the same one that I now have on the Formentor - it's the one VAG uses across several brands and models. Long story-short, this PHEV IS ABLE to charge itself. I had to search the web for a while and find a video for Octavia (to make sure I'm not wrong correcting you guys), but there it is: Sorry for the French, it's the first I could find... At minute 19:05 you'll find the setting in the infotainment that allows the user to set the car to charge the battery to a certain percentage when needed. Assuming you're on a long highway trip and you depleted your battery on the first part of your journey, but there's a town ahead of you that you want to cross in EV mode, this setting will allow you to either preserve a certain battery level, or to charge it to the desired level using the ICE if the battery is too low.

If you are using the car display to figure out your mpg you’re dafter than you realise. After a couple of years of tracking MPG I have the following conclusions for my driving, bearing in mind I live in a hilly area. 1) I can do solely electric miles if driving locally but recently it hasn’t been worth it due to the price of electricity. As prices are coming down I am doing the math to see if it’s worth it again. 2) Long motorway journeys keeping to the speed limit without a full charge of electric gets me 45mpg average 3) lowest mpg I ever got was 30mpg, no charging and town driving only (might have had a heavy right foot for a couple of weeks) 4) General MPG for me with a lot of town driving and 20 mile journeys is about 35-40mpg with no electric charge. All in all I’m happy, it’s not too much less than my previous Toyota Auris mild hybrid and it has nearly twice the power and is a lot bigger.

Yes you are right, just looked RSEV video's first leg on Google maps and it says need 6 hours: https://www.google.co.uk/maps/dir/John+o'+Groats/Abington+Services,+M74,+Abington,+Biggar/@57.3579776,-4.9429875,8.16z/data=!4m14!4m13!1m5!1m1!1s0x489adf22b8be52c3:0x86f8db37f5b5c574!2m2!1d-3.0688997!2d58.6373368!1m5!1m1!1s0x4887e336e93696ab:0xf60a6414675c609!2m2!1d-3.6942407!2d55.5065858!3e0?entry=ttu Minus possible morning rush hour, it's still very much the "speed limit". For short range EV's, Nissan Leaf 24 kWh (earliest smallest battery) had done the journey in 27 hours and 46 minutes. https://fuelincluded.com/2015/10/electric-car-trip-from-lands-end-to-john-ogroats-a-record/ This article says 33 charging stops: https://www.autovolt-magazine.com/john-ogroats-to-lands-end-and-back-again-in-24hours-for-free/ The latest and greatest from Germany, in the hands of someone who has zero clue, is as fast as very first gen Nissan Leaf? FWIW, in Model Y, I set autopilot at 70 *cough+5cough* mph on the motorway. Same as my diesel Octy, it's use mostly on motorway. My lifetime average over last year is 271 Wh/mi, which translates to 3.69 mi/kWh. As lol said, decrease speed down to 70 mph makes efficiency go up by a lot. During summer trips, drive in slower traffic at ~60mph can see 5 mi/kWh.

I think the issue is explained. You need to plug in and charge your car for best MPG, @mccririck.

In the video with Richard in the Tesla doing John o' Groats to Land End his first stint of 316 miles done in 5 hours and 25 minutes had him making very good time considering the roads and average speed cameras getting to Perth and then the 23 miles of Average speed cameras Broxden Roundabout Perth to Dunlane. (Keir Roundabout)

It has to fire up the engine and heat up the Cat and there is the GPF. Then the battery needs charging. It is a hybrid after all and not an EV.

The day after I bought my 2021 Fabia I had the headlights set to Auto and I noticed that the SatNav display turned to night-time mode each time the lights came on...

Good luck on your warranty quest, if they can replicate the fault easily I think you are golden, hopefully the issue comes back straight away when you plug the pump back in again.

Have you got DCC (electronically adjustable shock absorbers)?

It is already in the regulations that wall boxes must have the ability to remotely control the output to an ev.

A heavy car uses exactly the same amount of power to keep moving as a lighter one, drag coefficient and frontal area make the biggest difference but for the same vehicle the mass makes a de minimus difference to the power consumed to keep moving Getting up to speed, accelerating, driving up hills, all those the vehicle mass influences but not steady speed power consumption other than the de minimus frictional and tyre losses.

Unless they ban the electric plug it is not going to affect EV 'in a terminal sort of way. One could use the Granny charging method. Charge the car via ones solar panels and home batteries . Electricity is everywhere. Where as diesel and petrol comes, mostly, from nasty regimes run by despotes. Yes governments want to control spikes which cause brown outs, they are way behind the curve at throttling EV car users drawing massive power. They need to get a move on a soon thousands of EV trucks will be drawing down electricity on 1 MW truck chargers !!

Well......It's not the ICE alone that made the VW car remarkable, it's everything around it. Efficiency is king with everything, so all the aero mods and weight savings etc. Combine with electrification allows it to be efficient. Key isn't engine development. Unfortunately people want bigger interior in their cars with more head room. Just like some people want 5min refuelling for 600 miles, not willing to budge for a more energy efficient powertrain. The Swiss proposing to prohibit non-essential EV use as level 3 out of 4 energy shortage plan was last year's news during the great European methane fossil fuel shortage. Well done for doing your research. Shame about the YT video's spread of misinformation "Swiss EV driving ban", there was no ban. Simple, more renewables. As the energy shortage was purely because of geopolitical reasons, energy independence is key. In-border energy independence can be achieved by excessively building renewables and any excess can go into car batteries. If rolling blackout becomes a thing, installing a gateway switcher into any house already with home storage will mean they won't notice blackouts at all. So if electricity becomes in short supply, whoever can store and access the most has the most power (literally and pun intended).

A while ago I posted that the ICE could still be further refined and offer far more MPG and be considerably less polluting than the current cars are, and it seems that I was right. In fact, I had actually forgotten that Volkswagen had made some futuristic cars that showed it was indeed possible, and this car featured in the video by Jonny Smith of the Late Brake Show (YT) is one of those cars. It is a diesel PHEV, engine is 2-cylinder turbocharged of just 800cc, 5.5 kwh Li-on battery, CO2 emissions of just 24g/km and top speed of 98mph with a combined mpg of 300miles. What a shame that they never continued to develop the system. Fuel tank capacity is only 2 gallons but would have been the ideal solution to people not being able to home charge, as you had the option of driving in pure diesel mode, so you should be able to drive into places where chargers are pretty rare and not be bothered.

If you're changing asphalt texture (roughness) - which is quite probable on longer trips or across towns - and the noise that you hear doesn't change tone and/or amplitude, it means it's not coming from the tyres. I personally considered the GoodYear Efficient Grip that were fitted to my Octavia to be very noisy, but one could clearly hear the noise changes with respect to asphalt texture.

I stand corrected, I was going from this old chart.

This from the manual. "The strength of the steering movement can be activated/deactivated in the Infotainment » operating instructions for Infotainment, chapter Setting vehicle systems (CAR button)."

Thank you for setting me right on this. 👍

In a Metallic Grey Corsa. The first time stopped the HGV driver with his load of alcohol had been tailed for 30 miles by some other car and then not long after by me and called his Emergency number or pressed SOS button or what ever. 2nd time it did not look like an unmarked trailer & i was surprised when the blue light vehicle pulled me. The officers were familiar with the habit of EV drivers and just warned me to think on.

I find the instant MPG function useful to see how your driving affects the MPG in a new car but otherwise I just ignore it once I’ve figured out how best to drive it.

Brown plug between the cam pulley and fuel pump pulley

OP could do that. Personally, I'd charge the PHEV, run it in hybrid, note how my MPG had dramatically improved, then make a mental note to RTFM in future. Although there might be one of those "Oh no!!!!" moments when it struck me I'd just bought a car I need to both refuel and charge after nearly every drive to get the best out of.

Ok going to pull the trigger on the Guardsman. As far as I can see it lets you use the parcel shelf which is useful when not carrying the dog.

Firstly. I get the urge to disagree, but it helps if you have to have something to disagree with. Secondly. I disagree. Once the car is rolling, it doesn't take much fuel to keep it going. I believe 50MPG is perfectly doable on a run for the 1.4TSI, even lugging the PHEV gear around, which is a bit over 1600Kg including the car AFAIK. I can get 55MPG in my 2.0TSI fully laden on my holiday trip, which can't be much different weight wise, with us two over 6' plus all our camping gear. Unless there are a load of other efficiency losses associated with the PHEV side of things on the PHEV Octavias.

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.

^^^ Absolutely. A Plug in Hybrid. PHEV. It can get power in the battery as it regenerates but it is not a Hybrid (Self Charge Hybrid) Silly term really. The Government reduced Grants on them because of these Tax Effective vehicles for Business users that were never getting charged.

The short answer is yes. Somewhere in the car settings there's the option for how the car reacts when a change of lane is detected. I've had mine set to give just a very slight resistance when detecting lanes changes, but I'm sure there's some option, which when selected, will actively "twitch" the steering wheel in the correct direction to keep you in lane. Note this feature only triggers if a lane drift or change is detected and you are not indicating in the appropriate direction at the same time. If you indicate then the lane assist doesn't trigger as it assumes you are making an intended manoeuvre.

They crossed the Queensferry Crossing. To Edinburgh. Just stupid. Easy, Perth Porsche Broxden then 200 yard Broxden roundabout and go south on A9 past Stirling and then to England as LEE the forgetful or purposely stupid has filmed before. Passing chargers right next to the A9.

Blind spot assist? https://youtu.be/g_iJ5YPMORA?si=3H-lu-t2B-p4Ugrb

Poor battery is always a consideration. It was for me. Once changed problem fixed. I did a cranking test in advance and the voltage drop was more than recommended. I think anything below 10v is considered bad but i'm sure others can advise.

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.)

Do you have a DSG gearbox? And has this update caused any changes to its operation? 23AX made my DSG stuck in ECO mode and it was ****ing painful trying to get Skoda to roll the software back... The dealership are dead to me after claiming there was nothing wrong and I must just drive funny...

This photo was taken on a recent trip to the west coast of Scotland. 71 plate Skoda Karoq Sport Line 1.5 TSI DSG in metallic Race Blue.

Workshop manual suggests bumper off for the left fog:

Bit concerning given the age of the car? Appreciate you're in Aberdeen. What is the rest of the car like underneath?

Yep I've got skoda one and it locks in using the plastic covers instead of Alan key. I was lucky and picked mine up second hand via ebay.

The dealer supplied one meets your requirements. Granted, it’s not cheap but looks ok compared to others I’ve seen

I might leave the keys in the Beemer, as it has GAP insurance...I just need a way to figure out how I could claim I wasn't a total pillock and left the keys in the car As it stands I've shoehorned the car in on my drive and jammed another car across the front of it. Only got to last another 4 days. Can't believe how much cheaper the Jag is to insure, though. It's actually cheaper than my Peugeot 3008. I think Direct Line might have made a mistake, will have to chase it up when I get a day off.

https://manual.skoda-auto.com/210/en-gb/Detail?model=Superb_3T&edition=11-2011&market=&manualLang=en Drop down menu and select year

Yesterday I started a thread in this section describing how I had cleaned the throttle valve and inlet manifold tract to remove the soot crud that had built up from the EGR gases, I said that it seemed to run a lot better with more go and I hoped there would be a decrease in fuel consumption as it had always been a dissapointment to me. Tonight I did the 2 x 10 mile return trip to the running club, a trip I do 3 times a week always on empty roads & at the same speeds & always getting the same (indicated) fuel consumption of 45 mpg, tonight it was 53.6 mpg a 19% improvement in fuel economy, even compared to the overall figure on the Maxidot of 47 mpg it is a 14% improvement. I will see what the brim to brim MPG figure is on the next few tank fill ups to see what the overall improvement is but am very pleased with a job which was rewarding to do and cost nothing.

You have to work a bit blind but as I am a bit blind I find that quite easy! Doing the job a second time would be easier because you know what is where and what the fastener head sizes are. If you remove the U shaped intake trunk from the air filter to the snorkelling box on the bonnet slam panel it gives much more room. 10 minutes to remove the throttle valve approx, disconnect connector, slacken hose clamps, remove bolt holding disptick bracket then 3 bolts holding assembly to manifold (might have been 4)