2cvhound

Perhaps an aftermarket seat cushion (with heating pad) would be an easier solution on the longer journeys!

Forgive my ignorance, what is a FL model?? Ah, now I see it is facelift! What year did 3.5 start? The seats were never soft from new always firm, but I'm now finding on 3hrs+ journey that I am starting to shift around to get comfortable. Could just be getting older. They certainly are not as comfortable as some of my previous cars like the volvo 850 or the Citroen BX, both of which were brilliant ergonomically. Even my 2CV seats (which I restrung myself) are more comfortable on a long journey although there is no headrest! Will ask around for a local upholsterer! I wonder if Superb seats would fit? Would they be too wide? Thank you!

Sorry just being silly! I get fed up with people saying that after 100K a car is past it. I fully expect this engine to last 300K plus. There is such an expectation to upgrade and replace anything over 3 years old! ( Our newest car is 8 years old with 85K and oldest is 43 years with 140K!)

I have a 2014 Octavia Greenline Estate, just coming up for 165K. Finding the cloth seats increasingly uncomfortable on long journeys. Are the smarter ones with leather/alcantara more comfortable or is it just the fabric that is different? Do the VRS ones offer more lumbar support? I would consider changing mine as the car is just run in and I plan to keep it for a good few more years! Rob

£230 ish - I'll buy a 2nd hand part instead!! ebay beckons!

and I'm dreading going to the main dealer - hours of work at huge cost no doubt. The car is a 63, but I feel that this is the sort of thing that should be covered under warranty beacuse it is not worn out but has failed.

The handbrake button just popped out today with no warning. I couldn't get it to go back in which means the handbrake cannot be used because it will not lock. It's not the end of the world because I have simply left it in gear. Was wondering if anyone else had experienced this.

Very interesting. I was told that they were not fitting / allowed to fit fixed towbars and so only detachable ones. I was quoted around £200 for the actual bar, £130 for the wiring loom and another £300 for labour including running wiring back to the fuse box and then reprogramming the whole car so that Eco mode would be disabled automatically when towing. At that price it didn't seem worth it to tow a 6ft trailer half a dozen times a year!! My only tow bar remains on my 2CV!!

I was stuck at traffic lights last night and thought I would do a rough count: 10 lit switches/points on the steering wheel, 5 on the door mirror adjuster, 5 on the window controls, 13 on the ventilation, 7 on the headlight switch, 3 on the headlight adjuster, 3 on the central locking/optional extras (of which I don't have many!). That's 46 points of light that are not part of either the main dashboard or multi function display! There are probably aircraft with fewer lit switches!! I realise that some switches do need lighting but all? I will have a look as Rodge suggests to see if I can turn down the lighting, though I suspect it may only deal with the main binnacle. In the past I had a Renault Avantime which had a built in Sat Nav, which even when turned off, continued to backlight the screen, even though it was black - a glowing black screen - genius! It's the little things that make life fun!!

Apparently the 1.6D doesn't need remap, I think it was mostly the 2.0D. The gear recommendations are ludicrous if you are in ECO mode as they change up so early that you have no control, i.e. no power to accelerate from there. I know that ECO mode damps the low down throttle response, but it also makes it less economical if you are driving on a real road. On an empty highway with no other vehicles around you could make the early changes and allow speed to build up very gradually, but with other road vehicles around you would be a menace!

In my experience if you need to be doing at least 65mph to get much benefit from 6th gear. Below that and you find yourself wasting fuel as the engine is too low for uphill slopes. That said mine is only a 1.6 greenline, but I have averaged 65mpg over the last 64K on a mixture of roads, mostly A,B & dual carriageway. I have managed to get 75mpg on a long run by being featherlight on the accelerator pedal, allowing speed to drop up hills etc, but I'm never going to reach Skoda's fictitious 85mpg!! Front tyres, which were on the rear previously) have now done 69K and are not down to the guides yet.

Is there a way of turning some of these off? For example I don't need any of the switches on the steering wheel to be backlit, let alone any of those in door other than the driver's window perhaps) to be lit. When driving in very dark areas I would prefer a minimum of distraction! In urban areas it is less of a problem. (I don't know how people with sat navs set on daylight colours, mounted either halfway up the A pillar or in the middle of the main windscreen even spot other road users signs. Coming up behind them in the dark, their whole cabin is lit up!) Looks like I am turning into a grumpy old git, but I am genuinely interested to see if there is an electronic fix to dim / reduce the dashboard! Rob

Is it just me , or did Skoda massively overdo the internal lighting to switches? Am I the only person that doesn't need the door mirror switch not to mention the 5 million other switches lit at night? My Citroen C2 has a switch that dims everything apart from the speedo which makes it more relaxing to drive at night. The Octavia is like living in a city for the light pollution!! Rob

Sounds as though you haven't got the sticker. It runs around 3/4 of the outward facing side of the wheel face, thereby advertising that you should only be doing 50mph, which is a pain if it is exactly the same size and speed rating as your normal alloys. Because it is on the outside you wouldn't see it unless you get the wheel out of the well.