Paul52

Hi, welcome to the forum. There are lots of posts over the years about water ingress so worth doing some searches. And if you resolve the problem it is always helpful to post what you found and how you cured it as it may help others. I'm not an expert so what follows is what I've picked up from other members over the years, If you have a sun roof don't rule that out. There are a lot of posts on this forum and elsewhere about the chassis that holds the sun roof cracking and that allows water to drain into the car - we did have extremely heavy rain recently. There are suggestions of d-i-y fixes using Capt Tolley's sealant but with variable success and no indication of whether it gives a permanent fix or just a temporary breathing space. On older cars the consensus was moving to sealing the sunroof so it can't open but at least gives a waterproof glass lid that lets the sun in. If you don't have a sunroof you can breathe a sigh of relief as replacements are wallet straining. From what you describe I'd be thinking along your lines - someone's interfered with the aircon and immediately after that you have a problem. Bit gross I know but did you sniff/taste to see whether the liquid in the well was likely to be water or something containing chemical compounds? It might have helped reduce down the options of what the problem could be. As you've been able to partially dry the carpets unfortunately that's not an option now but if the water keeps coming in worth thinking about. On the cars with sunroofs there are four drain tubes that run down the corners of the car. I'm not sure if they are there on cars without sunroofs but someone may be able to help with that. There have in the past been reports of these getting blocked and water getting into the car. From memory a common suggestion was to carefully thread a long thin cable from the accessible outlet holes at the bottom up the tubes to dislodge any debris. I say carefully as you don't want to puncture a tube part of the way up and make matters worse. (Just a though but these days you can buy endoscopes for a few pounds on eBay; don't bother with the ones that use your smartphone, they are usually rubbish. Possibly they are narrow enough to fit in the tube and feed up and see if there is an obstruction. The tubes are, I think, around 2m long so you'd need a "snake" at least that and maybe a bit more. If it fits not only would it let you see if there is an obstruction but also the head is unlikely to snag the rubber of the hose. There is an irony here - I had one with a 5m snake and found it clumsy to use so recently gave it to a charity shop when I bought one with a more manageable 1m "snake". I hope i don't live to regret it). Sorry I can't be more help but unfortunately most of the really clever guys that knew their Yetis inside out have moved onto new marques and models taking their expertise with them but you might be lucky because occasional one or two look into the forum and post replies. Good luck.

Worth checking these drainage holes as they are easily overlooked can get blocked. A few years back I had a small ingress of water and after clearing these I had no more problems. (It didn't make any logical sense but then when do these sort of problems ever make sense?). Not having a sunroof should be a big weight off your mind as leaks from the sunroof have always been a major problem coming up on this forum.

For what its worth, mine is 13 years old with nearly 100,000 miles on it and I can't see me getting rid of it any time soon. I've had my share of cars over the years starting with elderly Ford Anglias and going through Renault 16s (five of those) and even a couple of Volvos (best not remembered) but there is something about the blend of quirkiness, practicality and reliability of the Yeti I think would be hard to replace. And certainly the cloned slabs that seem to be the affordable choices in electric cars, I'll pass thanks.

I'll second the SGS Engineering struts. I replaced my original ones with ones ordered from here in August 2019 and seven years on they are still working perfectly. So they've lasted a year longer than the OEM ones!! From memory I had a small problem with the locking pin (?), emailed them and received different pins in the post a couple of days later which solved the problem. I like a company that gives a no fuss service.

I guess these days everyone has to err to the side of caution - in the "old days" the advice would probably been "we can give it a try and see how you get on" and 95% of the time the tyre would be fine and in the 5% of cases we would have shrugged our shoulders and said it was worth a try. Nowadays the 5% would probably end up as a law suit as failing in duty of care. It's the world we live in. I did check Kwik-Fit on line so knew they were comparatively expensive but when the technician phoned to tell me I'd need a new tyre I said I'd be wanting two but at that price Kwik-Fit weren't competitive and really expected a "Let's see what we can do, what prices are you looking at" and an offer in the same ball park as everyone else. But the price was the price so the sale has gone elsewhere. Maybe for Kwik-Fit no sale is better than a sale with a smaller profit because I can't see they would be paying more for tyres than their competitors. And if Kwik-Fit had come back with a revised figure within a few pounds of the Halfords price I'd have got the tyres there - Kwik-Fit is convenient for me and I'm now of an age where getting the absolute lowest price isn't important to me; I just don't want to feel I've paid way over the odds.

Thanks for your further thoughts. I inflated the tyre to 40psi and then dropped it to my usual 33psi and all seemed well for a couple of short runs. Then I had to make a longer trip along the A27 between Havant and Chichester, the direct route but for about 8 miles it has no junctions. About half way along the tyre noise ominously changed and by the time I was able to get safely out of the carriageway the pressure had dropped to just over 20psi. Took the wheel to Kwik-Fit for a repair only to be told it wasn't repairable; in this case I had unknowingly run the tyre flat for about 100m when I drove out of the drive and back in on that first day so I can believe that the sidewalls had been damaged although I'm surprised how these days so many punctures "can't be fixed" and you have to have a new tyre. More regulation than in the old days perhaps? Not the end of the world, the rear tyres had both been picked up at MOT in May as advisory because of a deep cut through the tread but not to the cords and I was down to around 3mm of tread so I'm changing them both tomorrow. What did surprise me was the range of prices quoted - for me Halfords were nearly £100 cheaper than Kwik-Fit although my wallet will still be £350 lighter by tomorrow night. (A couple of other sites were very close to the Halfords price so Kwik-Fit were very much the outlier). The bill would have been higher if I had 17" rather than the "special" 16" wheels as the larger tyre comes in £25-£30 dearer per tyre. So thank you those early members on this forum that let me joining the 16" Special Wheels Club back in 2013.

Thanks for these ideas. I would have thought the leaking valve would have shown up with bubbles through the water because it lost all the air within less than a day but I wasn't aware of the wheel corrosion issue. The alloys are now over 13 years old and 100,000 miles. That might also tie in with the complete deflation but once reinflated/over-inflated it seating itself. All was looking good at 8pm this evening so I'm crossing my fingers and waiting to see what the pressure is in the morning. Thanks again.

Backing out of the drive yesterday I realised I had what I thought was a puncture. Fortunately still being at home it was a quick job to remove the affected wheel and replace it with the spare tyre. (Sometimes you can be grateful for being old school). When I got home I carefully looked round the tread and both sidewalls but other than the odd bit of grit there was nothing. The pressure in the tyre was zero, so absolutely flat. Being tight with my money I avoided rushing straight off to the local tyre dealer for a pair of new tyres - the tread is down to about 3mm on both sides so a puncture repair would been better spent on a new tyre and as I like to keep the tyres on the same axle as close to identical as possible it would have been a case of replacing both tyres. I have a large capacity plastic trug, I half filled that with water and, after partially inflating the tyre (about 25 psi), I was able to rotate the wheel/tyre through the water a section at a time. After three rotations there was still no sign of a stream of bubbles, not even from the valve, which was my second suspect after a puncture. I inflated the tyre to 40psi (I usually run it at 33psi) and after 24 hours this afternoon it was still holding at 40psi. I've now refitted it back on the car but I'm bemused as to why it should fully deflate - it was sat under the car port after I used it the previous day. I even wondered about someone letting it down as a prank but firstly "Why?" and if you did that would you bother to replace the dust cap? And nothing was picked up on the security camera that covers the drive and car port, although that's not a guarantee as despite being a Tapo model I've found it not to be 100% reliable, just better than nothing. As far as I can remember I've not had a puncture repair in this set of tyres and if a repair had failed I can't believe it would self repair. There's no kerbing (curbing) on the wheel that might suggest a failure of the seal between the wheel and the tyre. I'm totally bemused. Has this ever happened to anyone else or has anyone any thoughts on what might have happened?

I don't think anyone has said it can't be a wheel sensor and perhaps that is what it will turn out to be. I only suggested getting the battery checked first because from 13 years on this forum I've seen a lot of "electrics" problems resolve when a new battery has been fitted. And of course also a lot where it didn't solve the problem and more investigation was needed. If garages in France are similar to ours you can usually get a battery tested for free, or very cheaply, and usually it can be somewhere very local so it's a quick and cheap test to rule out a battery problem. If the battery is fine then VCT can go to a garage knowing that she probably will be looking at a new sensor. Dogbook, I don't think you've been ignored but looking down the thread it looks like you may not have made the comment in this thread?

Under two years would seem a very short life for the battery but a quick Google search threw up this https://www.varta-automotive.com/en-gb/knowledge/articles/article-details/what-happens-to-the-battery-during-summer which suggests extreme heat can be very damaging to batteries. Combine that with short runs and although it might well be a wheel sensor as Prezafab suggests checking the battery is probably a wise precaution, just so you can rule it out. Good luck sorting it.

Hi VCT, welcome to the forum. I've been on the forum since 2013 so my car is nearly as old as yours. There are lots of post concerning faulty wheel sensors but also over the years there have been a lot of posts of seemingly random lights coming up on the dashboard which resolved when a new battery was fitted. Depending on how old your battery is it might be worth getting it checked to be sure it's in good enough condition not to be causing the problem or, if the battery is showing it's age then it's not a great expense to get it changed and see if you still have the fault. It seems, and I'm not an expert on these things, that even if the battery is starting the car and running things OK the condition can have deteriorated to a point where the electronics become sensitive and start misbehaving. This happened to me some years back which is why I mention it.

Purely by accident I happened to catch the top Gear repeat on BBC3 last night where Mr Clarkson did his level best to destroy the then new Yeti, including landing a helicopter on the roof. He clearly came away very impressed with all aspects of the car and, after 13 years of owning mine (and neither trying to land a helicopter on the roof nor using it as a mobile tattoo studio) I have to say he wasn't wrong. I'll repeat that as you don't often hear it. Jeremy Clarkson wasn't wrong. Yes, the Skoda Yeti has proved itself to be Top Gear.

Perhaps you just take out the spare wheel and fill the space with bits and pieces as necessary and will fit plus odds and ends in the polystyrene blocks. If needed you could put a simple support under the floor. You'd get a decent amount of extra space without any work and then when/if you decided to put the spare wheel back it would just go straight in. I'm all for a simple life.....

Thank you both (and Carlodiesel that PM'd me). I did both the above and still had the problem although fortunately if I didn't rely on the autoclosing function once up the window stayed shut, so no security/weather concerns, but kept on trying and suddenly for no reason it was back to working properly again. As the slogan goes - Skoda, Simply Clever ... and Occasionally Frustrating. So now its just a case of fingers crossed and see if it happens again.

I'm having the regularly experienced problem of the driver's window closing but then going back down to the half way position. This happens when I use the "auto" function on the switch but if I hold the switch up until the window is closed it stays closed. I've tried the usual remedy (several times over a couple of days) of turning the ignition on (but not starting the engine), lowering the window fully and then raising it whilst pushing the top edge out, then holding the switch in the up position for 10 seconds or so when there should be a click as the switch resets. But I'm not getting the click and the problem remains. Anyone any ideas? The car had a service about 10 days ago and a new battery but I can't honestly say the problem started then (in fact with the hot weather almost certainly I'd have noticed before now). For the moment it's just a bit of a nuisance so I'm in no rush to get a professional involved to start taking things to pieces and it's possible if it's a electronic glitch it will sort itself at some point. But someone may have had the same issue and found a solution.