Paul52

Hi and welcome to the forum. I've been on the forum a few years now and your problems seem to be very unusual. I can't help with the noise and comfort issues but you complain of still getting headaches and a "stale air" feeling. Is there any suggestion of an oily smell? This seems to be a problem with some VAG cars (not just the Yeti) and is a quick and easy fix so if this is even a possibility you might want to read through this link. https://www.briskoda.net/forums/topic/435685-oily-smell-in-car-skoda-yeti-12-tsi/ If it's worth investigating it would probably be worth removing the part to inspect it as a partial break might not be obvious from visual inspection. The other thing that headaches and stale air suggest to me is whether there is a problem in the air conditioning/climate control system - could rodent damage be preventing flaps opening and closing as they should? I'm probably saying the obvious but with the aircon switched on if I select reverse there is a distinct change in sound as something closes; I was told it is to prevent exhaust fumes being draw into the car as you reverse but then I'm pretty gullible!! 😊 Again a quick check to see if you can hear anything happening. Also try using the control, buttons to switch between re-circulation and windscreen/footwell/face so see if you can detect changes which might give you some clues. Hope you get to the bottom of your problems because for most current and former owners the Yeti has been an excellent car.

Firstly, it's been a long time since I've been called "Junior" - Old Git seems to be a closer fit these days. The reasons why I still have my 2013 Yeti are various. When Skoda announced they were bringing the Yeti to an end I did consider ordering a new one but it was perhaps a year too early; I had the 5 year warranty and had had no problems with the car at all so I'd have been taking quite a hit on depreciation. I also rather like the quirky Classic front end, one of the attractions when I bought it. It's now 7 years old but still reliable, only has 58,000 miles on the clock, depreciation has levelled out a lot and to change would mean buying a used three(?) year old that might not be as reliable and without the light interior I've grown used to. And finally, I'm tight with my money. If I spent say £10,000 on a replacement that's £10,000 less to run my fingers through as I count my wealth by the light of the slightly extravagant two candles I permit myself.

"The response was a string of expletives". I thought that was sufficient to deduce that he wasn't in a Yeti (a car known to be driven by a superior class of person). I think it might have been a BMW but I think I'll leave it there.

At Bosham, West Sussex near here I live the road runs right down to a small shingle beach and people park here rather than pay to park in the nearby car park. Walking down there some years back I heard one of the residents (whose gardens back onto the beach) shout out to a driver parked on the beach and about to walk off. The response was a string of expletives. You might be able to guess what the resident had been telling him and the driver probably got the idea when he returned - when I came back my own walk the sea was gently lapping the bottom of the doors. Funny things tides.

Where do I get the membership pack? Mine is now seven years old, the longest I've ever kept a car, and I've no plans to change it in the foreseeable future with any future bills offset by reducing depreciation. Perhaps the "I kept my Yeti" Club will fill the niche role left by the declining membership of the 16" Wheels Special Build Club - I'm guessing we must be down to half a dozen or less by now. Watching the discussions on this forum it's interesting that it's seldom (if ever) Yeti owners make more than an inquiring look at other Skoda models before shortlisting then buying elsewhere. Kia certainly seem to be benefiting from there being no obvious Yeti replacement from Skoda.

I'm non my second set of Michelin Cross Climates. The first set did around 25,000 before a non-repairable puncture and I decided to replace all four tyres rather than just one axle otherwise still a millimetre or two of wear before reaching the legal limit so I was happy with the wear rate. They were noticeably quieter than the tyres the car came on and road holding good in dry and wet but not had the need or chance to see if they live up to their claims for use in snow. I'd be happy to recommend them but obviously there are a number of other equally suitable choices out there and unfortunately you don't get a chance to try-before-you-buy with tyres.

Thanks for that chaps. One less thing to worry about !

Any advice about earlier Yetis? Mine is one of the last Classic Yetis from May 2013. I bought the 5 year warranty and to protect that it was serviced by the local main agent until 2018 and since then has had two services, one by a local independent and the last by an independent VAG specialist. No one has mentioned a need for or advised a cam belt/waterpump change so I'm not sure whether it's just not been picked up (and at seven years old ought to be booked in as precaution) or just not required or necessary for what I assume is an earlier version of the 1.2 engine. (The car's of an age now where £500 is a manageable expense, particularly as I'm not looking to replace it any time soon, but £5,000 on a new engine wouldn't make sense).

Thanks guys. As regards doing it myself, with limited tools and less experience I don't fancy messing around with brakes and having been fortunate to have had a reasonably successful career in retirement the costs are affordable. To answer Jars, it's a local garage that came well recommended to me and specialise in VAG cars and thanks for confirm my thought that replacing just one strut may be inadvisable and false economy in the long run.

My now seven year old Yeti has just been through its MOT and passed without incident but a substantial list under "Monitor and repair if necessary (advisories)". They all relate to brakes and suspension and as I'm of the old-fashioned view that the bits that stops you are rather more important than the bits that make you go faster they will be done - the cars booked in for a couple of weeks time. But I am a bit curious as to whether the age and mileage (just coming up for 60,000 miles) makes these repairs pretty much to be expected. The advisories are: Replace front discs. Replace front and rear pads (this was identified at a service about 6 months ago and was intended to be done at the same time as the MOT ). Replace both front brake disc backing plates - one has corroded away the other isn't far behind. Replace nearside front shock absorber. When I were a lad shock absorbers were always replaced in pairs and it seems reasonable at 7 years/60,000 miles if one is failing then the other could be close behind so my gut feeling is bite the bullet and have both sides done together but is it normal practice these days to only have one replaced? (The additional cost of having both done is £200) With both shock absorbers and all the brake work it's looking like around £350 parts and £500 labour which bearing in mind it's the first major expenditure (excluding tyres) in seven years and I'm not keen, or probably competent, to do the work myself doesn't seem so bad. Any thoughts?

In case it helps anyone else I think I may have found the cause of my rattle. Those with the spare wheel option will know under the false floor are stuck four polystyrene triangles which rest on the storage trays. As part of my quest I'd removed the spare wheel and the removable box but the other two are fixed in so I'd simply emptied them of their contents and put the contents back when I still had the "rattle". Following some of the above advice I decided to take fully rotate the seats and in the process decided to take out the fixed boxes just in case something had got underneath (although I couldn't see how). When I got the boxes out I realised the front two triangles nearest the back seats had at some time dropped off and fallen in the small compartment moulded into the front to each fixed box. They could have been there for ages but I've re-stuck them (there's a hole in the floor and locating bulge on the polystyrene to make sure the go back as Skoda intended, although oddly they don't line up very well with the top of the boxes, so I don't know what's going on there) and since then - no rattle. Whether these triangles were rattling in the foam boxes (although a bit odd they should both fall off at the same time) or whether in the absence of one or the other the false floor was just touching somewhere I have no idea. But if you have a Yeti with a spare wheel and false floor and get a hard to identify rattle its something quick and easy to check. (and if the triangles drop off, don't just throw them out!).

At times like this you dream of the days of the old round headlight that could changed in about ten minutes and for a few quid. The reviews for the repair tape seem pretty mixed. As we are talking about hopefully a short term fix would Captain Tolleys be an alternative? as that seems to get good reviews from those who have used it fixing/trying to fix leaking sunroofs.

For the second time a totally childish contribution but it has at least reminded me of the function the web-site provides to block specific members. Congratulations, you are only the second person I've blocked in more than seven years.

Thanks for your thoughts everyone. Can't find any bits missing from their rightful place but it's helped narow down possible causes. Hadn't thought of the tail gate stops needing adjustment (I seem to recall having to do something with these not long after first buying the car) but slight wear on the parcel shelf fixings is an interstimg thought so that can come out for a couple of days which should either prove or eliminate it. If it doesn't solve the problem I'll move onto the tailgate stops. Any further ideas welcome and if I can track it down I'll post here as it might help others in the future. (Trying to trace this problem I wanted to roll the seats forward, two were fine the third wouldn't budge and then I remembered a post for a few years back that if the seats are fully back you can't move them. Sure enough the "stuck" seat was just slightly forward. Problem solved. This forum can be invaluable for these sort of tips).

It's a pre-facelift registered May 2013

The point was that the OP wasn't sure which size would be right so to only realise that the wrong ones had been ordered when everything had been stripped down would have been somewhat annoying. It's really not that unusual these days to order two items knowing one will go back - the down side of internet shopping compared with "I'll try it on whilst I'm in the shop". Anyway, good to hear the problems now been sorted.

I've got an frequent but intermittent rattle from somewhere at the back of my Yeti. Quite low frequency but not a drumming sound, if that makes sense. I've had everything out of the boot and there isn't anything loose, it's not the seat belt buckles rattling on the wheel arch (but it's that sort of sound), the three rear seats are firmly in place as is the rear shelf. Of course you can only hear it when driving. This morning I found the part in the photo in the drive by the back of the car. I can't see where it's come from (or if it is indeed even a Yeti bit and not just something that's found its way onto my drive) but if anyone recognises it and where it has come from I'd be pleased to hear because it might be connected. As it seems very clean I assume it would be something internal. Any thoughts please? (And to save anyone the trouble - you know who you are - it's the bit that isn't the top of a pencil).

Picking up on Austin 7's comment, which seems to make sense, if you are going to order them on-line why not order both sizes and immediately return the size that you don't need? Presumably ordering two sets rather than one won't increase the delivery postage costs and it might cost you £3 or so to return the set you don't need but a small price to pay to avoid ordering the wrong set and all the wasted time and effort that might entail.

As the owner of a Yeti with a sunroof I follow this thread avidly. So far I've only had water appear in the cabin once and that day it was monsoon-like so I drive with my fingers crossed it was a one-off occurance!! Unfortunately the number of Yetis with 16" wheels and sunroofs is probably too small to have statistacal significance but I do wonder whether the initial crack occurs when the car takes a serious jolt (a deep pothole ,say) and the deeper tyre depth compared to the usual 17" tyre is enough to give that little bit more cushioning. Although there are a decent number of Greenlines out there I believe they couldn't be specificied with a sunroof but also the 16" tyre fitted to those isn't as deep as those on the "Special Build" Yetis. Just a thought.

Until she died my Golden Retriever travelled happily in the back of my Yeti and she was tall for her breed. I never used a crate or dog guard (aren't there issues with fitting a dog guard in a Yeti unless the required fixings are specified at ordering?) and I simply don't like crates - it reduces the space available to the poor dog and if it's not tall enough it prevents them getting their head above seat back level to get any breeze - it can get very warm in the boot with the windows closed even with the aircon going. I've heard the arguments concerning what happens in an accident and the tailgate springs open but in that circumstance I'd be more worried about the crate distorting and not being able to get the door open. It depends on your personal assessment of risk. There's not a huge amount of room front-to-back in the Yeti and the seat backs are quite tall so unless you have a very determined dog I think most would find it a bit of a struggle to get over onto the back seat. Perhaps try without dog guard or crate with an adult in the back and see how things go?

I would start with Muddyjim's suggestion - it's easy to get at to check and if the pipe has broken the part is cheap and it's not hard to fix even for those not technically minded. I had an oily smell in the car and the garage couldn't find it (which makes me wonder how hard they looked, despite what they told me. Now use a diferent garage) and I just found it by chance.

Have you tried using both keys and does the stop-start work with one and not the other? I haven't got it on my Yeti (thankfully) but others will know whether you can switch it off completely somehow and whether if you can is it key dependent, as some of the other functions are. If the answer to both is "yes" then that could be your problem.

At the end of the last millenium my team had an all electric Peugeot 106 as a pool car - we had some European money to try innovative "sustainability" inititiatives and this was one of them. I believe it was the only one operating outside Coventry because at the first service Peugeot seemed very surprised to find it was in Portsmouth. Every once in a while we had to pop in to the petrol station for 2 litres(!) of petrol becasue that what ran the heater. Well, in theory. Overall the car worked very well, quiet and reliable and very suited to stop/start city driving, but the heater was a constant problem so many cold drives in the winter although in fairness because it ws usually only used for short runs - up to 5 miles - a petrol equivalent probably wouldn't have been much warmer. I suspect the reason the Niro doesn't have electric heating is in winter it would hammer the batteries and so the effective range. But worry not, it will all be sorted by 2035. (And sorry Marie for highjacking your thread).

Totally agree. I love almost everything about the Yeti but the windscreen seems to chip if you so much as look at it! I read/was told once that heated screens are more prone to this than "normal" screens but I don't know if there is any truth in this or its just an urban myth.

The OP hasn't given any information about the car and I haven't got the expertise to offer technical suggestions but, being prepared to be shot down in flames, a number of times on this forum odd behaviour has been finally tracked down to a dodgy battery, even though in day-to-day use the battery seemed to be fine. It's just a thought. And if the battery is a few years old then at least money spent on a new one probably isn't wasted.