Pumatron

Is this a Skoda forum or a Citroen forum? It seems virtually every topic appears to have Citroen mentioned in it at the moment.

^^Posts like this is what I mean about the forum.....I make a passing comment about my Fabia, I don’t think I was rude to anyone in my original post and I’ve had two rude (in my opinion) responses back! My Fabia is a Lemon, a bad build. I don’t need to elaborate on that, I’ve plenty of experience from working in the motor trade to know a bad car. The last time I expressed my discontent with the Fabia and wrote about it I got a huge paragraph of “its you” the cars fine, get the dealer to fix it, blah blah blah. So I stayed away from the forum for a while. I been to the dealer (lots), they can’t fix it and I don’t want it pulled to pieces (again). All I’m trying to say is be aware, the last two skoda’s I had were fantastic, this new one (2018) was built after diesel gate and in my opinion it shows costs are being cut. It is NOT A GOOD CAR. Is there anything wrong with trying to warn others of my experience?? Or is that not allowed on this forum?.

Yeah definitely a silver lining!! I like a good walk, I walk to and from work as well and apart from an odd bit of pedestrian rage with my middle aged impatience I’m really enjoying it. I even dusted down the two wheel pedaled steed, and have been giving that a whirl. I certainly wake up with a whole new range of aches and pains. I’ve gone beyond caring with my Fabia, it’s why I added some sarcastic humor into my original post. I’m convinced it’s either cursed, or a lemon. Possibly both. It’s why I named it Christine. Still, I’m glad I’m leaving some more fuel for all you other Fabia owners to burn.

A skoda Fabia 3 1.0 Tsi color edition. I see it’s not changed on this forum much....

Well, I’ve been away from forum for a while. I’ve still got my Fabia, still dislike it with a passion and it still dislikes me, we both unfortunately persevere with each other. The damn thing took a bite out of me the other day, still got the bruised finger to remind me. Stuck with it as I can’t afford to have it shot. On the plus side, I’m saving a fortune on fuel and getting fitter, as I leave it at home on every opportunity, unless I really have to use it. That usually involves me kicking the stones with my hands in my pocket while I drag it out kicking and screaming from the garage. Only 2 years to go before I can meet the dealer at midnight to gladly hand the keys back. Ah the joys of motoring. I can’t believe how much of a difference two cars can be. I still get tears in my eyes when I look at pictures of my old 2015 Fabia S. Simple, behaved and was loved.

It was 7 miles.

Yeah, I dipped into the cancer club for a few months, thankfully for the moment I’m not a lifetime member!! So, the dealer is “okay” but I loathe to have a car that’s done less than 700 miles pulled to pieces to fix numerous faults. That distracts the whole new car feeling and it never would feel the same again. It’s a Monday morning car, a bad one, a runt of the litter if you like. I had to get one at some point and this is it. It doesn’t stop right (nearly crashed twice, brake efficiency is appalling, you have to apply massive amounts of force on pedal), the brakes squeal, and can “feel” the road surface through the pedal, like the ABS is activated on every brake application. It momentarily cuts out (coughs) occasionally when accelerating and turning right, the wife stalled it the other day, it refused to restart-clutch down turn key and nothing, she had to get out and defuse the road rage behind her, get back in then try again, on 3rd attempt success. It rattles/creaks in various places inside, there are various scratches and marks in the plastics, no idea from how or why, the hard Bridgestone tyres don’t grip and create awful cabin roar, the front suspension knocks, the gearbox is ridiculously tight, reverse and 3rd being a particular challenge, the front parking sensors bleep at fresh air, I have a duff front passenger radio speaker and it takes ages to fill with fuel (not that I’ve filled it up much). So there I said it, beans spilt over 678 miles of glorious ownership. Not! My 2015 Fabia was a gem, occasional squeaky rear brake, that was all. Such an idiot for selling it. The dealer did check the brakes and admitted they didn’t feel “right” but they claimed their demonstrator was the same....I realized I fighting a lost cause and really couldn’t be bothered with the car from then on. I’m a busy person (ain’t we all?) with little down time so rather than get stressed and battle it out with the dealer the plan is to hand it back and walk away. (Life IS to short). I don’t actually need a 2nd car at the moment so it works for me. Enjoy that new Citroen, Estate man. Onwards and upwards peeps.

I loved my 2013 Octavia 1.4 Tsi elegance. (sold it to early due to my ill health) I really liked by 2015 Fabia s 1.0 mpi 60 (stupidly sold it way to soon) I DESPISE my 2018 Fabia 1.0 Tsi colour edition. (Stupidity again, I “thought” it would be as good as my 2015 Fabia. Totally wrong!!!!) I honestly cannot wait to be rid of it. All I have to say as I really can’t be bothered to waste my time spilling the beans in all that’s wrong with it. It’s currently sat in my garage, unused, unloved, not stuck any fuel in it since May and used it 4 times since May. It will be my last Skoda, and when I get time it’s going. Sorry if wanted something positive but I haven’t got anything to say that’s good (well not about my 3rd and last skoda anyway) Sorry!!

Estate man, going to have to agree to disagree with your comments or it will just bat backwards and forwards with need less “brake stories” etc taking up someone else’s post. I will say though I worked for a mainstream manufacturer for many years and on two occasions had to deal with a brake recall due to the brake pad material being substandard for vehicle type and caused excessive brake disc wear and noise. On those vehicles concerned I saw what mine is experiencing and disc and pads were replaced WITHOUT question. Clearly after 300 miles (the damaged started appearing at less than 100 miles) the outer pad is faulty and requires changing. In a world of liabilities the risks are too great to not take action with it.

Sorry, but I am disagreeing with you on that one. The pad has scored the disc (which I can run my finger nail in) due to a foreign hard object which is in the brake pad material. What is not to say the hard object isn’t all the way through the thickness of the pad material? If that was the case the disc would be scrap long before the pad wore out. Please bare in mind the damage has occurred after just 300 miles. I am a qualified motor vehicle technician (but now in a different trade), and if that had come into my workshop I would advise they were replaced due to the damage after such low miles. The brakes are Poor for a modern day car (in my opinion) and any deficiencies in them is only going to emphasize this. Sorry to original OP for hijack on this post. I would definitely swap the brakes from my 2015 S to my colour edition as the brake are definitely not as good on my 2018 car at the moment. (Even when taking into consideration the running in period of brakes).

My old Fabia S had drums on the rear. The brakes always squeaked from cold on first couple of applications. I had dealer look at it twice, neither times fixed it for long. So I had a look, lubricated the back plates, deglazed the shoes and chamfered and edge to help stop it. Lasted about a month and then normal service resumed and I classed it a “characteristic” after that . I have discs all round now and find the brakes shocking if I’m honest. The brake pad material is harder than the discs as the picture of my 300 mile old disc shows with the ridge rings wearing on the disc. I will mention this to dealer on passing as I know shouldn’t be like that after 300 miles. On a plus note it doesn’t squeak at the moment. The brakes don’t inspire me with confidence if I’m honest.

So to give an idea, I’ve included some pictures of Right hand seat storage. I have a high visibility vest in a neat pouch (thank you Mercedes, lol) and a bottle of screen cleaner for touch screens (which I’ve never used!).

I have to be honest I was shocked to see them under the front seats. My old Fabia S was an ex rental car (2nd rental car I’ve owned and never any issues), but I wonder if it was part of a special spec for rental car? It had metallic paint, A/C and a spare wheel as well. I suppose only way to tell is if someone has a brochure from 2015 era.

I’m not sure if it will fit or not. The box once fitted doesn’t leave a whole load of room to the floor with seat lowered and I didn’t want to risk spending the money and it not fitting, hence why I just fitted one. I quite like having somewhere to store the umbrella as normally it’s in the boot or rattling in a door pocket. Please also note the boxes are not exactly large in internal dimensions. The handbook folder doesn’t fit in it, to give you an idea. I keep a torch and a folded high visibility vest in mine, and not much room left after that. If I remember right they are about €20, which is probably worth it, if it was much more I wouldn’t of bothered if I’m honest, I ordered a few other items as well so to use the postal costs fully. It would be interesting to find out the UK dealer price on the box.

A mark 3 Fabia s on a 65 plate.

Hi, I own a 2018 hatchback Fabia and was disappointed my previous S spec model had the under seat storage but my color edition did not. I took the plunge and bought a right hand under seat storage. It came with the fixings all but one screw which I added from my own supply of torx 20 head screws. Took about 5 minutes to fit, a little fiddly but using a torch and camera on my phone I was able to ensure the screw holes lined up with spire fasteners included. I didn’t do passenger side as has umbrella under seat which my S did not. I hope that helps. Oh, and welcome to the forum!

Yes, I have noticed this as well, I have a recent built Fabia with Bridgestone tyres. I’m guessing you have discs all round as well. My previous 2015 Fabia with Continental tyres and drum brakes didn’t do it. I have mentioned it to the dealer in passing conversation very recently and was told that my Fabia has a pre fill system fitted which tries to judge when your about to brake heavy from a rapid withdrawal from accelerator and primes the braking system. Whether that is any thing to do with what feel I get from pedal is unknown at this stage. I would suspect this is dealer brown stuff talk. The brakes haven’t inspired confidence since new and are not performing as expected even when taking into consideration the running in period. I’ve certainly driven many new cars where the brakes are powerful and perform well straight out the box. My Fabia does not. I have found a problem with my Front brake disc/pad which I would suspect is causing the brake pedal feel I have. I will be returning to the dealers at the earliest opportunity to report the fault.

Are you using one or two fuses in the tap? If there is no fuse in slot used on fuse board (blank slot with only one terminal visible) to get the wire pointing downwards you will need two fuses. This is fine as the fuses are in series with each other and each rated individually so no increase with blow rate. To have the wire pointing up usually just uses one fuse slot in the tap (when the fuse slot on fuse board has only one terminal). I needed mine pointing down (as per my picture in previous post), to enable to point the cable in the correct direction for my fitment. If using a “used fuse slot” (two terminals in fuse slot on fuse board) I believe the fuse tap needs to be installed with the wire pointing down to get the correct flow through the fuse tap, and then allow the original fuse to function correctly. I hope that makes some sense.

If you are referring to the plastic arch shaped mount that is bolted to the floor there are 4 torx screws holding it in place (2 at the back of mount and 2 at the front of mount). The long torx bolt to the side, once removed, should allow the arm rest and pivot to slide off just leaving the plastic arch shaped mount screwed to floor as I have mentioned above. You need to loosen the centre console to gain access to front screws. This is done with one torx screw at rear under the tray behind arm rest, two torx screws either side in the front foot wells and two hidden screws under cup holder rubber mat in front of gear stick. This should allow you enough room. You will probably have to slide front seats back and forth while doing this as well to gain access. It’s not easy but a long torx screw driver is very useful (the screws don’t seem to be overly magnetic either, which doesn’t help).

I’ve recently changed my Fabia from a 2015 model to a 2018 model. I removed the hard wiring I had installed for my RoadHawk camera on the 2015 Fabia and transferred to the 2018 Fabia. I had used a blank fuse slot (No26) using a blade fuse piggyback fuse tap, this worked fine on 2015 car, no issues at all. This was not the case on the 2018 car, something has changed as on cranking the camera was shutting down momentarily and once the engine started was starting back up again. On a few occasions the camera never started at all, this was a risk as camera was not recording without me realizing. Using a multimeter on slot No26 the 12v feed was dropping to a couple of volts on cranking. So I had to find a new feed that I could tap into. Using a multimeter again on the mini blade fuse slots (as the blade fuses had none suitable), I found a slot available that was suitable to piggyback off of (No34) which was live on cranking and live when stop/start kicks in, and of course live when the engine was running. This has solved my problem, and luckily I had a new mini blade fuse Tap in my parts store. I have included a picture of the fuse board under the steering wheel, red ring being the old fuse slot and green ring the new slot with fuse tap installed. All appears happy now, but just goes to show you that you sometimes can’t just plug and play from one model to the next.

What an upgrade that would be, I can see the kit now. 1. Tin opener. 2. Piece of glass. 3. Rubber seal. 4. Paper template.

Options are wonderful things, but cost a lot of money to add, cost money to fix when they sometimes go wrong and “usually” don’t add huge value to the cars come sell time, just a bit of desirability. I’ve had to reign in the options on my Fabia, I picked things that I would use and wouldn’t cost the earth to fix outside of warranty, (plus I had a budget to stick to). I would probably of ticked every box if I let my heart rule but thankfully the head kicked in on order day!

Well, my pennies worth. So, 13 years on the workshop floor of main dealers would say to me that was a manufacturing defect. 1. When a clutch over heats, usually the friction material turns to “fibre dust”. 2. You can clearly see the friction material (from experience) is not excessively worn, like you would get with excessive clutch slip. 3. The friction material has only broken off on one side of the friction plate. 4. The pressure plate and friction plate has no signs of excessive overheating. I would say the friction material has separated from the pressure plate due to the friction material being defective or the riveting of the friction material to the pressure plate was insufficient. I have seen what happens when a wrong gear is selected, usually the spring fingers (not visible in pictures provided by OP), fail causing catastrophic pressure plate failure contributing to damage to gearbox casings etc. The dealer/Skoda needs to provide solid evidence to now prove that it was Driver error (which it doesn’t look like it was to me). These are my own opinions and recommendations.

Horses for courses isn’t it. I like the options list (a lot) but common sense has to prevail. Extra power, or important optional extras. Creature comforts or Higher spec models, and so it goes on. You’ve made the right choice for you, as did I with my choice. Enjoy it!

Nice choice, although with those options I don’t think you would be far off of a Monte Carlo as white is free, privacy glass comes as standard, as do the black wheels and black glass roof making nearly an equivalent of colour concept. Thats of course if you could live with red and black seats that the Monte comes with (not for me!). Roll on May then.