Gerrycan

Makes sense to me. What has changed is that the price of new and decent second hand vehicles has risen faster than for many years so when you already have a car you enjoy driving it is difficult to justify the cost of changing to a car that is, at best, only marginally better.

The Samsung Smart Watch given to me a couple of years back has died from mysteriously incurred injuries. The glass covered heart rate monitor on the back has broken and I have no idea how it happened especially considering it was the high end model with the better constructed case and it was only taken off for charging. My only real complaint was the unit was a bit too big for my small wrist so the heart rate function was intermittent unless done up uncomfortably tight. A brief but intensive internet search brought me up to date with current tech and prices and I settled on a Fitbit Versa 3 as a very cheap replacement. Pros: cheap price (A$196), GPS, heartrate, clear AMOLED display, lots of other Smart Watch functions, lightweight and a good fit on wrist, good battery life, made in Taiwan. Cons: My fourth brand so my exercise stats are spread across four different internet sites. Inconvenient but not a big issue really as I rarely look back at them. Only one run with it so far but getting heart rate stats for a full run is really interesting and vastly different from the Smart Watch. Previously my Smart Watch average would report somewhere between 135-155 but the Versa 3 reported 162 bpm average which I thought I had left behind some 20 years back. It might be due to running after a hard day at work, which I don't normally do, but yeah, had to try the watch out. Not sure how I can verify the accuracy really unless I borrow someone else's (more expensive) unit and wear both at the same time. Winter is here now in Aus and this particular 'adapted-to-the-heat' Pom needs the extra 'technical' incentive the new toy offers to get out there and just run.

If the Toyota hybrid estate that you are buying was available in Australia then I would have bought it by now...but it is not 😞 . Toyota hybrids are in high demand and the wait times for the SUVs they insist on foisting on us are out to two years for many models. A couple of years a go my wife and I rented a Corolla hybrid sedan on a holiday in the Northern Territory, it only had the 1.8L engine but easily cruised at the 130kph speed limits that exist on some roads there. Amazed at the economy at those speeds on flat roads where the hybrid system was not supposed to contribute much. Only criticisms I had were that the road noise from the tyres on their coarse tarmac roads ( worse than our Octavia) and I thought the active cruise control placed the vehicle too close to the vehicle in front, even on maximum distance setting. The CVT was a brilliant thing and offered an enormous range of gears. On a slight decline at 130kph the revs dropped to about 1500 to minimise consumption while maintaining thrust for the set speed. The aircondtioning system was extremely good in the tropical climate as well and being powered by the battery would run for a reasonable time even with the engine off. I'd be interested in reading your opinions of the car when you have had some experience with it and time to post a review in the review section

I find it difficult to believe it is possible in the UK driving environment. An active regen generates very high temperatures (400+ degrees) to burn off the collected carbon. Might be possible at Autobahn speeds or towing a heavy trailer/caravan up a long steep hill but otherwise modern vehicles use a fraction of their available power to maintain motorway speed limits so exhaust temperatures would never get hot enough. My personal opinion is that long runs enable low soot generation so what is thought of as a passive regen is just enabling extended periods between real regens. I will be quite happy to be proved wrong

When I bought a brand but basic spec new mk2 Octavia in 2007 I assumed the four speaker system meant front and rear fittings, especially since there was a grill in the rear but my then music-mad teenage son soon pointed out the error of my ways from the rear seats. An I-pod and headphones for him fixed the issue for him and solved the never ending argument over music selection and volume I was more annoyed with myself for not realising the four speakers were the mid-range and tweeters were front mounted rather than any real disappointment over loss of quality or volume. 90% of the time there was only a driver in the car and while a good sound system is not important for either my wife or I it was just adequate for our purposes. We now have a mk3 and it does have front and rear speakers but the very basic entertainment 'Swing' units fitted in both old and new cars do not produce quality sound from the cheap speakers fitted. I don't think that adding rear speakers is going to be worth the effort for the minimal improvement in sound quality you are likely to get. While I don't expect much from the mk3 Swing unit the quality of bluetooth phone calls is far superior to what I have experienced in far more expensive vehicles, go figure. As you only have front speakers fitted I'm assuming that you have the latest basic entertainment unit installed so maybe others can advise whether upgrading the front speakers is worth the relatively small expense for any noticeable improvement. Noise cancelling earbuds work a treat as well but you have to remain particularly visually alert like a deaf driver would have to.

The highway consumption seems quite high to me. 13km per litre is 7.69L/100 or only about 36mpg (for the UK readers) however without some driving environment context the bare figures offer little information whether it is really as bad as you and I seem to think. What sort of distance has the car done, has it been serviced as recommended? Remaps may get you a little better consumption if you don't use the performance on offer but you will probably never get the cost of the remap back in reduced fuel costs. @TheClient has summed up your best approach to checking the serviceable items and refining your economic driving technique but I'd add it may be worthwhile getting the cylinders compression checked as a low cost indication as to whether there are incipient engine issues.

Congratulations on your new car. My manual 1.4tsi dates back to 2014 and it is still a delight to drive so I can relate to your favourable early impressions of your new car What brand of tyres are fitted to your car? The mk3 was sensitive to some brands and that trait may have continued. The mk4 has much better aerodynamics than the mk3 so that should contribute to even better consumption on longer high speed journeys. I think you will find the eight speakers are accounted for by a primary speaker and tweeter in each door.

For the simple nails and screes I have had the plugs have been fine. I am not doing any Euro highway speeds after all. Strikes me that having your own plug kit is an excellent idea saving money and more importantly time. Since new BEVs rarely have spare tyres a plug kit is a much better idea than the cans of goo they install.

During my non-DPF 1.9pd ownership I was very impressed by how good the consumption was even on very short journeys. I only lived about 6 km from work and got over 50 mpg on the run to and from....however on cold days (less than 10C) I just started to get hot air from the heater when the journey ended. Compare that to the less than 1km for warm air from the 1.4tsi and only slightly worse consumption.

Did the misfire go away after the fuel filter change? As @toot says there are items that should be changed at various appropriate service intervals to ensure proper fuel combustion. The 1.2tsi is not a particularly high performance engine and is designed to run on UK/Euro standard 95 Octane fuel so the dealer's comments that it requires E5 are basically BS. Having said that if E10 fuel storage has been compromised, to the extent that the (hygroscopic) Ethanol has been allowed to absorb water vapour, either by the suppliers or if your vehicle has not been driven for a long time/filler cap seal is compromised, then the engine could be a bit lumpy until the fuel in the tank is refreshed. I've heard of rare fuel (petrol and diesel) compromises in Australia (well those resulting in catastrophic consequences) but cannot recall any similar reports on Briskoda. By all means compare the two fuel grades but I have never been able to notice any noticeable difference in performance or economy in my 1.4tsi when I have experimented. What sort of mileage has the car done and what servicing schedule has been adopted? VAG cars in Australia are a mandatory 15k km or yearly

Is the car garaged overnight or outside? As per @J.R. did the smell become apparent after refueling? Have you lifted the bonnet to 'see' if the petrol smell comes from that area? Do you have a jerrycan in the car that might not be properly sealed? ( I had to ask) Any old rags in the car used to clean up oil (on dipstick for instance). Older oil can be quite smelly. You are very unlikely to find any sort of petrol puddle under the car unless it is a really major leak it evaporates quickly even in cold weather. And do you have a fire extinguisher to hand in the car?

There are probably good reasons why there are so many 1.6d for sale. I believe they are popular with UK uber drivers so mileage would be relatively high and probable dpf issues starting to appear. Personally I would be looking at the 1.0tsi depending on price and availability of course. If you have to get the diesel it might not be a bad idea to get an odbc dongle and phone software to see the state of the dpf before purchase and maybe also see what error codes might be there?

The knees I understand, but from my pearls of aerodynamic wisdom all you got was Octavii! 🤣🤣

Jeez, you could have done that before you posted. 🤣

Excellent result from a simple procedure! If only other problems were so easy to solve. Not sure why you feel the need to find the source though. Are you now missing it after having to live with it for so long? Is this a variation of 'Stockholm syndrome'? 🤣

I have no experience with VCDS or OBD11 but it is not the fault codes I was referring to. It's the configuration settings for what type of bulb is installed. Someone else will have to give you guidance on how to do that but I believe you can get a dump of the whole vehicle configuration and then find the appropriate entry amongst the big listing. The dealer would not have done that. Very remote possibility it is just to eradicate it and it should not cost anything, other than your time.

Even with my low spec car when I manually unlock the car with the remote the internal lights come on. If I have left the car unlocked in my garage then they come on when I open any of the doors or boot lid.

Well it is pretty easy to see if any of the internal lights are LED compared to normal incandescent bulbs due to the former being whiter and brighter. IF there are some present then it is possible that one of the LED electrics are playing up. Cheap internet sourced units might not be reliable. Are any of the internal lights out? If no obvious LED units are fitted then it is question of getting an OBD2 reader and the appropriate software (VCDS or there are some 'free' software options) to read the settings. However since the fault occurred a month after purchase it does seem unlikely to be the problem. OR just try turning the internal lights off at the switch? Maybe it is related to the fuel pump priming when the doors are opened? There's always been a short whirring sound as I open a door on both Octavia we have owned? God knows how you prove it that is the source of the noise though.

Just a random thought but could it be related to the internal lights coming on? I'm thinking the previous owner replaced the standard internal incandescent lights with LED, and the lighting configuration was not updated OR prior to selling the LEDs were removed and the configuration was not updated? I've no experience myself but I know it is quite a popular mod amongst other Briskodians.

Congrats on your replacement car When you get the stuff fitted it would be interesting to hear if they are as successful an upgrade on the mk3 as you felt they were on your mk2 and maybe personal views on the two vehicles? Don't forget to change your Briskoda profile's Model details for your new car

The saga across several threads is a master class 🙄

When new my displayed since refuel averages were slightly pessimistic (real was better) and over the years the display has got slightly optimistic but the last three refuels have been pretty well spot on since I renewed my old Michelins with new Continentals. Not really sure why that happened but I'll just accept it . As you say who knows how accurate the instant display is but it is useful for showing what is working best in gear selection and throttle and the lower I achieve on the instant display the better figures I get on the average. I don't always get good consumption, if it is hot the aircon goes on, not much you can do in peak traffic, and I do put my foot down when at the front at traffic lights, not to race but to allow as many behind across as possible (I really hate traffic light dawdlers). No good me saving fuel if it at others expense! But the real consumption killer is the number of very short journeys we do supporting an elderly relative. Does not seem possible to get to her retirement village and back (round trip 3.5km) bettering 8.5l/100 (33 mpg). The best consumption I have got in recent years has been on visits to the UK with rentals. A diesel Kia Ceed gave me 60s and even 70 mpg returns on a tank, and the more recent Corsa returned over 60mpg on tanks. Obviously we were doing a lot of touring but that is better than I get with my Octavia (55ish mpg) when touring in Australia. Read into that what you will but I put it down to the forced close proximity slipstreaming of other vehicles on your densely packed highways. The normal space I allow to the vehicle in front here in Aus is an invitation for a BMW to slip into (without indicating of course) in the UK. Of course the sprawling Adelaide urban environment is easier to navigate economically than in the UK and I can see why BEVs would be popular urban transport there although the relative lack of domestic off-road parking or garaging could be problematic. Actually I forgot the loan 1.0tsi Fabia I had for a week. That was more economical than my Octavia in every respect and I regret not buying a new one at the time when the prices were about 40% lower than now and I thought the best value car in its category.

Usually 15 degrees minimum and yes it is displayed average consumption which I think IS a valid measurement if the display is verified as reasonably accurate when refueling. After all I'm sure the OP is quoting display figures. 50mpg is 5.6L/100km in my 'language' and yes it is good, even better than the NEDC figures for a 1.4tsi 90kw Golf at an equivalent 8km. However I'm not limited to the highly scripted and less than optimal routine the testers must follow. That's why autos often do better than manuals in the test if not the real world. I use 95RON with no ethanol so it theoretically has a slightly higher calorific value although I have to say the E10 I used in last years rental UK rental Corsa did not impact on the excellent consumption I got with that car. You are probably right that there would be a small consumption penalty with a DSG compared to a manual but they are pretty good none-the-less and the OP's car is smaller and lighter than mine so it probably evens out.

Agreed that 14 miles is not that long but from a cold start and urban light traffic I'd be expecting to be averaging about 50mpg in about 5 miles in my 2014 mk3 manual1.4tsi Octavia estate. That would be 'nursing' it through warm-up and from then it is quite easy to maintain that sort of consumption as I approach busier areas. I've not driven the 2.0tdi but when I transitioned from the 1.9pd to the 1.4tsi it took a while to get the best from the petrol engine which I think requires a bit more effort to get optimal consumption. There is minimal engine braking from the petrol compared to the diesel engine and, as using brakes is just wasting fuel, you have to anticipate the road a lot further ahead to get the full 'no fuel used' coasting distance advantage. When my wife drives the car around town she gets about 30% worse consumption than I do and it is purely because she does not anticipate as far ahead so uses the brakes more and also is slightly heavier on the throttle at constant speeds on our flat urban roads. There is an optimal point with tsi engines where on low revs and light throttles they achieve a very lean burn. From what I read once, the stoichiometric condition is concentrated around the spark plug from the direct injection but the rest of the cylinder has very little fuel dispersed. If you drive the car with instant consumption display at a constant low speed then you will realise how easy it is to push the throttle and consumption over that optimal point with no apparent acceleration just an increase in displayed consumption. Unfortunately the very interesting article I read on the three or four (?) different operating conditions of Bosch direct injection system has been lost from the internet. On an open faster road then there is little difference between my wife's and my consumption in the Octavia. I suspect the OP's Fabia is not running quite right yet but once it is and also some small technique adaptations then I think local driving consumption could be better than the diesel although unlikely at higher speeds and distances but the Fabia should be in the 50's imo. AND what I have written above may well be BS, but that is what sharing experiences and discussions like these are all about. So fire away

A GPS equipped long extension socket wrench accurate to within one degree??