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Crepescular Rays were especially prominent this evening.........

I will be honest - if you could get the work completed at the local dealer that did the checklist I would be more inclined but the reality is they won’t agree with that. I kind of feel that the trust with the selling dealer is broken but, then again, they would be fools not to do everything required and, in that case, the car would then hopefully be very sound with new disc, brakes, tyres, software updates etc. If you reject the car, which would be totally understandable, you never know what potential issues the next prospective purchase, irrespective of brand, will bring. At least you now know the issues that need addressing on this specific car. I have an SEL First Edition, built around October 2020 and first registered January 2021. After I purchased in October 2023 it was a bit of a shaky start, all software / firmware problems, but now they have been resolved it’s a very solid and stable car which I enjoy driving.

I would call the selling dealership speak directly to the manager and read them the riot act. Say you are contacting Skoda directly whatever as clearly they haven't done the necessary checks and then see what they might offer. Obviously follow everything up with an email. I honestly feel for @sam8520 as the whole thing just leaves a bad taste in your mouth and having such a negative experience. After your home, the cost of a car is a huge financial outlay and it's dis-respectful that they are so gung-ho in their approach to selling you a vehicle.

Ah. This is a subject very close to my heart. I had a similar experience 2-3 years ago. Hit what I thought was a pothole in the dark. Turned out when I doubled back and waited for daylight to arrive a very short time afterwards (after having swapped out the offending wheel for the spare), that it was a sunken manhole cover I'd hit. I parked up and took several pictures of the street location, GPS coordinates, road layout, offending manhole etc, plus the physical damage to 1 wrecked tyre, and mangled alloy wheel... I then tracked down the council responsible for that stretch of highway. Went on their Website and filled in an on-line vehicle damage claims form, detailing my incident and the indicated cost of repairs in the form of quotes. ( In my case 1 x knackered tyre, 1 x mangled Alloy, new wishbone, suspension alignment, and labour charges. What I received back from the council was a dismissive, (default) email quoting chapter & verse, the Highways act Section xyz and how they maintain their section of the public highway. I decided to dig my heels in out of principle and submitted a freedom of information request relating to when the offending manhole was last inspected AND for details of any other pothole claims made for that same manhole cover on that particular day.... Their 2nd response? Very different.. This time they pointed out that they would agree to pay my costs in this instance, but that this was in no way and admission of negligence on their part for the upkeep of the highway.... Now there's a thing... Sometimes perseverance and bloody mindedness does pay off. Just be prepared to dig your heels in. I hope this long, and maybe boring message helps someone else 😊

I’ve been using a dashcam for 11 years and I can categorically say it has had a positive impact, on my driving style. Having a camera in your car cuts both way, because it records everything you do in terms of speed, braking and risk. Fitting the rear camera is for exactly the reason @Matchman55 points out.

Who needs one antenna when you can have eight!! And still the DAB reception can be poor. 😁

Totally disagree. I got rear-ended and my rear dashcam footage helped my insurance claim go through without any doubt as to what happened and who was at fault.

As long as you have the full 30 days to reject it from the point of them delivering the fixed car to you it certainly sounds not a bad prospect. Just get a full paperwork trail of work done and the actual parts used.

So, the sales manager and head of business have discussed this. The sales manager tried to push it on me, that you test drove it etc etc. I was adamant that I want to reject it because of mis-selling. He wants an opportunity to fix everything. They have offered to collect the car from my place, drop a courtesy car and then fix all the issues. What do you guys think? I am still leaning towards rejection, do I have valid grounds? @spcdust @Rooted @Gaz

Does not install faith in the Skoda Approved Used car scheme at all. What do you propose to do? Go back to the seller with this and allow them the opportunity to pay for the necessary work. If the car is otherwise sound that would be my inclination as then you know everything is good once work is completed but understandable if you just reject the car outright. Another option is to contact Skoda UK directly, I have the email address of the CEO, you can email him - obviously, he doesn't deal with it but you are assigned a single point of contact in the Executive Team who could address these issues. Not to put too fine a point on it the report is damning and completely undermines the Skoda Approved Used Car promise - it's potentially something a consumer rights journalist would be interested in.

@spcdust, @Gaz the result from the check. And the report they provided. Does this count as gross mis-selling ? SDKN70AZC.pdf

It was actually more like rattling or chatter. It was audible in neutral and disappeared if I pressed the clutch. Mechanic also found some grinding noise when he listened with a stethoscope. However, there were no extra noises when driving. Refurbished gearbox will be installed in 3 weeks. It has new bearings, oil and seals. It would have cost me almost 3000€ but extended warranty will cover it 100%.

definitely got a few of them round here

I've removed the spare wheel and placed new floor. Added the Hertz MPS 250 S4 enclosure. Doorpanels is just two screws in the doorhandles and one at the bottom. Deadening doors and most important inside doorpanel. Amp will be the Audison DSP M8.14. So 2 way front active and backdoors coaxial. Disabling Canton is coding: F5/47: change byte 04 to FF and byte 11 to 05 I made a special 38 pin cable to attach to the original Canton cable loom to connect to the speaker. I've build everything so that I can easily replace back to Canton if I would sell the car. When disabling Canton there will be speaker out on the MIB. So a Quadlock cable from the unit to the driver seat where the speaker wires are located is necessary.

Just done a journey from Dorset to Oxford which is 90% dual carriageway. Managed to achieve 65.8 mpg. Well pleased. And no, I wasn't crawling along at 40 - 50 mph !! - Spent most of the time doing 60+ mph.

Very unlikely that hitting a pothole would damage the brakes on both sides but not the wheels, tyres or suspension. I think you've been lucky in a way to have the brake faults brought to your attention.

There are VW Customising Specialists turning out lovey VAG models with difference, as there are for many different manufacturers models. Lots of people do lots of mods to their vehicles, even brand new. In Scotland there are loads of very noisy Audi,s about, & slammed etc. Most annoying are the once making lots of noises, pops and bangs and bouncing off limiters and going no place fast just being heard for ages. Loads of plonkers with old Skoda,s doing exactly the same. Soot covered rear hatches.

There are other vids of conversions in other sections but i will put this here. (In one place for various conversion to maybe assist @J.R. and others.)

Perhaps it's intake 'roar' as normally the intake is external to the cabin.

From a trawl of the interwebs and the OED it seems "gasses" is valid but deprecated in British English but quite prevalent in American and Australian English. I've been doing a lot of proofreading for American authors so it seems I have become contaminated by immersion. Time for a stiff upper lip

Wow - use ‘em all winter! I have mine on 3 when needed. The only time I can hear the fans really operating - and this is odd - is when I pull away, as it seems to be connected to the vehicle speed somehow, as it seems to boost the fan speed as the revs rise.

Yes given the overall checks have been fine, I’ll stay put. My guess is, this is ex-management, hence the ignorance. But for now I’ve requested a written acknowledgment of my email detailing what they have to do.

Big Thanks Wanderer. 11 euros postage, what a difference to the near 100 euros from Kopacek. Got everything apart from wind deflectors which i can pick up aftermarket from UK company amazon or ebay.

Halfords sells a clip to hold that link arm in place, I've never needed to find out how good a work around fitting that would be - I'm mentioning that as most people can reach a Halfords branch. When my older daughter's 2002 6K SEAT Ibiza ended up with its wiper arms fighting destructively, I just bought a new pair of link arms and probably a new wiper arm, it was winter time and it needed fixing quickly, plus at that time, maybe 2006, I was not aware of them repair clips.

And odds on they spend money on mods rather than insurance and if they do pay insurance you can pretty much guarantee the mods aren’t declared

That'll do, won't it? Provided that's the outcome, and you've got it in writing. Bloody palaver, but reasonable if it makes things all good. Gaz

Quick update: Decided to get an M14x1.5 tap and die from Amazon for £9.99. The initial thought was due to the brake carrier bolts, and their general state, but weighed up the pros and cons of just getting new bolts. I then realised that the wheel bolts are the same, and they're in even worse state, so I felt cleaning them up with this will be worth it. Also this arrived earlier: The replacement hose to that additional cooler. Second hand one from eBay for £15.96 which I think compares similarly to an actual new one from lllparts etc. Guess I got impatient and didn't want to wait a week or the extra tenner or so for delivery unless I'm buying a bunch of stuff. It's the correct part I believe: So 5Q0 121 051 L as per https://www.lllparts.co.uk/product/5Q0121051L/skoda-coolant-hose-5q0121051l (the 5Q0 121 051 without the L suffix is more expensive). It's interestingly dated circa 2013, so it'll be the oldest part of the car! It came from an Audi Q2 according to eBay, so surely a premium part, lol. Anyway, the 7mm ratchet spanner to take off the clamps and replace with the new one: All tightened up to 5Nm. Then just topped up the coolant tank slightly: The old one with its rip: Chalk it down to my aggressive use of the pliers to free it from that radiator. Started to rain so tidied up, grabbed some bolts and ran back to the house. So this is an example of the brake bracket bolt: Just lots of aluminium corrosion where it passes through the hub and the rusty end which is where it's bolted and exposed to the elements. So got the die, put some 3-in-1 oil on its cutting thread and all on the bolt, and just winded it through: Any bit tight just got the ratchet spanner and for these bolts, a 21mm socket to aid getting the bolt through. It'll then usually go through easier and can then be done by hand. It's normally a case of winding a turn then back half a turn, but that's more applicable to cutting new threads. Once wound all the way in, just reverse it out: Quick wipe and it's better than it was. Repeated for the rest and started on the wheel bolts: The wheel bolts were a mixture of ok and horrid, some with mountains of grease built up and some without. This is after half of the wheel bolts: So I guess some brake cleaner would probably finish these off ready for reuse. Oh, and the other 10 bolts I guess. I'll check up on the coolant level later and once I top it off and it stays relatively stable, then we're really getting there. Still need to angle tighten the strut bolt to the hub, then reassemble the front brakes. Once those are done, then technically there's nothing stopping the car from being fired up! Maintenance: £2206.63 (+£15.96) Upgrades: £1322.97 Miscellaneous: £681.36 (+£9.99)

Just sent in an email, I have asked to facilitate rejection of the vehicle. The rear tyres need replacing, all four discs and pads, split shock dust covers, all the modules I pointed out are throwing fault codes (SOS, climate, infotainment control units/ microcontrollers). I wonder how this car passed their MOT or the "Approved" inspection, a massive red flag. The bill from the inspection report is at £988.25 for a car that passed it's inspections and MOT in the past few weeks, even if they fix this, who is to say they would do it reliably or have not hidden other issues from me. Looks like a thoroughly ignored car landed up on their steps and they've done the same thing and moved it along. I was really excited about my first Škoda (a brand I have always admired) and this has soured my experience unbelievably. That being said, I still love the brand and would still probably go for a Škoda next (with a lot of rigorous checks before finalisation). The sales person acted all surprised when pointing this out, let's see how they respond. Should I marking anyone else in the email or forward it to someone higher up?

I tucked it under the plastic trim that covers the edge of the carpets. Can't say it was a great job, but as it was formerly in the headlining, I was just happy to get it well away from the curtain airbags.

In the rubber boot going from the car into the door

I am quite sure they replace everything because they leave the stuff they replace so I can check it. Accuracy is 0,2L/100 better on the computer than in real life, I tried that. I haven't checked the undertray, but it seems in place to be honest. Also I was suspecting tyre pressure first for higher consumption, but not, that was also good. Me too, I also run out of ideas. I suspect the problem is either technical of psychological in nature I checked that too, the rims are not at all warm after a longer trip, or not warmer than everything else. Good point though! Yeah, that is strange part, lower speed consumption is quite okay. Last tank was only country road driving, on average it was 5,3L/100km real consumption.

Should be checked for sure but I would have thought the affects would be across the speed spectrum and his lower speed consumption is still pretty good. At 150kph sticking brakes would glow in the dark

Make all communications in writing because really their word is not worth the paper / or screen time not written on. The Dealership knows exactly who purchases and takes in trade ins and inspects initially. Also how much they spend on car prep and then have that set against purchase price, sale price. You pay tax on profits. It is amazing how much the Prep can be charged for and done by 'Mr Magoo'. That is for oldies...

Thanx @nta16, I think I got your point! I have already ordered some cheaper insulation with which I can give a try, but wanted to check if this wouldn't be a better solution.

Check the brakes using the 'Elsa Pro tool' (Item 87) - Proper pro tool that is then! Shoddy and incompetent. It'll be interesting to hear their explanations. 'It was alright when I looked, honest guv!' 🙄 If it's all fixed and tickety boo, then it might be you'll be minded to accept the car. I would, if it was the car I wanted, but otherwise I'd walk away. See how they respond and if it doesn't sit well, perhaps have a chat with Consumer Direct/Trading Standards. Very poor service 👎 Gaz

I find that generally the DAB reception in my Superb is inferior to my Old Ceed or to my GFs Ioniq to the point that I often stream Heart 70s via an app on the phone as a more reliable option

Solar panels, like EV traction batteries are falling rapidly in cost. Same for home batteries. I expect to pay less than 50p per watt of solar panel now, down by a half in a couple of years. Home batteries now less about 30p per watt hour of storage. This whilst inflation was over 10% last year and is still about 4% this year. True fall in cost of renewable and storage is staggeringly cheap hence countries like Germany are rapidly becoming more renewable than hydrocarbon, Denmark, Norway already are.

I've fitted one to a Superb mkII twin hatch where the rear camera is mounted at the top of the hatch window just below the high level brake light with the wire passing over to the top of the hatch opening / top of rubber seal with just enough wire length to allow the hatch to open ok without disturbing the camera. The wire is then hidden following the top rubber hatch seal , the around the top of a trim panel (drivers side behind rear seat) and then down behind the rubber rear door seal down to the sill trim and onwards to the front drivers door rubber seal eventually finding its way up the drivers side windscreen pillar and behind trim all the way to the windscreen mounted Nextbase dashcam. Pretty straight forward with no brittle clips disturbed. It has worked well for quite a few years now. Hope this helps.

Indeed there's 2 elements to FIT payment: generation and export. But don't always assume what you read is 100% correct, because websites like those usually take shortcuts to describe a complex system. All people on FIT start off with deemed export because it predates smart meters, older non-smart meter cannot measure export. Deemed export means for each kWh generated, they deem 50% export regardless of how much is self-consumed. Meaning use as much as possible without consequence for people on FIT. For example, my statement for gloomy autumn/winter days. Effectively it's ~20p/kWh based on generation for me regardless of how much I use, since V2H install, I consistently self-consume over 95%. Then there's higher paying SEG (smart export guarantee). People on FIT can move the export part to SEG (one way) to get better rates such as 15p from Octopus, currently. FIT still pays generation part whereas newer installs only get paid SEG. But today's solar PV installs are much cheaper and generate more. So overall ROI is said to be similar. My neighbour also installed 10 panels, but got 4 kWp system (my is 2.9 kWp) installed for just £4000. Coming back to your view that there's associated cost, it's only true for newer installs as you rightly pointed out. But for FIT, it depends, usually it is completely free.

@Balazs_HU, other than the expense there is obviously no harm in servicing earlier than required, may even be necessary if doing track work, but it doesn't necessarily guarantee greater reliability either. Changing the intake air filter as regularly as you do also seems a bit of an overkill but are you sure they are actually replacing it? The only other thing I can suggest checking is the accuracy of the displayed consumption. The only way really is to look at the 'since refuel' consumption display and compare it with the calculated consumption when you refuel the car. Try to use the same refuel procedure each time. When my car was brand new the displayed consumption was actually worse than I was really achieving by about 0.2L/100, then by about 40,000 km it changed to being absolutely accurate then by 80, 000 km the display had changed to being about 0.2L better than I was actually getting. Now it has swung back to being truer again. These are small variations for me but maybe yours are greater? Other things to look for that may affect high speed consumption are: Whether the undertray is still in place (significantly worse aerodynamics at speed), after all the thing would have been taken off a number of times with the number of services the vehicle has had, maybe it got damaged and not replaced by the mechanic? Whether the consumption change is related to a tyre size change (unlikely to affect it by that much though). I presume if you are travelling at those speeds they are at an appropriate pressure and checked regularly. I'm clearly running out of ideas now

I think you will find the 1.4TSI gives you more than enough power - I normally prefer manual box, but have driven a Canadian 1.4 Passat with the Aisin 8-speed and I liked it.

@Balazs_HU, fuel consumption variations are generally difficult to account for. A minor point but I think you may have used the smaller USA gallons instead of the larger Imperial (British) gallon for your conversions so 5.5L/100 is 51 mpg, 6.2 - 6.4L/100 is 45 to 44 mpg and 8.0 - 8.5L/100 is 35 to 37 mpg. I have a 2014 1.4tsi combi that has only done 105,000 km and there is no doubt in my mind that the engine is a really good, economical unit....however like most petrol engines it drinks noticeably more if you use the performance or if there are adverse road or environmental factors. Based on some official VW issued consumption figures I have seen for early 1.4tsi engines and my own experience I find it hard to believe that your car would have consistently achieved your claimed displayed consumption of 6.2 to 6.4l/100 at real 140 to 150 kph speeds. A diesel could possibly do it or maybe even a mk4 1.5tsi with it's better aerodynamics and longer gearing but that is a moot point. Most British drivers on their roads would not have the freedom to travel at those speeds for any distance without incurring punitive fines and the same here in most of Australia where I live. Quite honestly travelling at a true 130kph in good conditions and I am really happy to get 7L/100, which corresponds with VW claims. Obviously consumption increases with speed. A headwind or stiff crosswind can adversely affect consumption by 1.0 to 1.5L/100 at 110kph in my experience. Equally a tailwind or travelling at speed in enforced reasonably close proximity to other traffic can benefit consumption by similar amounts. If your car has a real consumption problem that is only manifesting itself at higher speeds then it probably has to do with the higher airflows. As @Rooted says check your air-filter is clean as a first step but it gets more difficult from there. Other possibilities may be turbo related or maybe the variable valve timing is not performing as it should? I imagine the only way to disprove either is to put the car on a dynamometer and see if peak outputs are below par? Personally I think your current consumptions at both low and high speeds are quite realistic.

With the all in plan I think the cost of the breakdown and services alone might justify it. You're almost getting the warranty part for free. Of course that's based on main dealer prices. Friend of mine had his water pump done on this warranty to, although the VW counterpart.

Poor bloke, just look at how much money, blood, sweat and tears he has put into the improvements!

Not a bad end to the day..........

Potential for it to be the thrust/input shaft bearing that is failing. It will make a noise in any gear. Does the noise go away when you press in the clutch pedal? If so, its a clutch out job. Best get the dual mass flywheel replaced whilst you are there too. Best to go for original VAG parts.

PS: btw, proof that i'm on 330 now i also connected the car to my wifi in the garage and perfomed an online update for the maps, i'm now on 23.6 database and not on 20.11 like the photo sais).

Yes, it is possible to mount the flywheel wrong way. Cutout with extra teeth should be on the bottom with 1st cylinder at TDC. The system fires two plugs at the same time, one in compression, other in exhaust phase. I'm not sure how it acts when it's in different phases, where electrical properties are different. You wrote earlier that you can hear solenoids in injectors being activated, that means that you should get some signals. Maybe your method of measuring is inadequate for such short signals?