Gerrycan

The Subaru XV is a pretty well "idiot proof" car to drive with mediocre power outputs and an effective awd system. Transitioning to an Octavia vRS with vastly more low down torque applied only to the front wheels is going to require far more considered driving on public roads irrespective of what tyres are fitted. I'm pretty confidant that changing the tyres to a more recognised brand will make a noticeable improvement but if you buy summer biased tyres for winter then you will be back on here making exactly the same comments in the cold weather. Try looking in Briskoda's tyre section for some background on the benefits of appropriate all-season tyres especially if you are likely to experience some snow (Ireland so probably not). Also when your new tyres are fitted avoid the temptation to see how good they are for at least 100km to allow for them to bed in and also scrub off that slippery new surface. Read some reviews of the Davanti tyres and they are amusing to say the least. They vary from "would race on tracks with them" to "they nearly killed me" so you can assume, as with many low cost tyres, that quality control is more a concept than reality.

Ooh a Corolla Hybrid Estate...jealous! Not available in Australia, we are only allowed bloated "SUV" type vehicles. Had a hire Corolla Hybrid Sedan, but an economy focused 1.8L, a couple of years back. Blown away by the excellent consumption, even on the open highway with speeds upto the 130kph speed limit where the hybrid functions were not supposed to contribute much. My only criticism was a lot of tyre roar noise on the course tarmac surfaced highways in the Northern Territories, it was virtually silent on the smooth surfaced roads of Darwin.

Your "G-spot"?

Totally agree with what you say about how environment and style being such major consumption factors but a bit bemused by how much better your car is with the higher ron fuel, but hey if it works for you then . There may be a couple of percent more calories for the potentially lower ethanol content for higher rated fuel and most manufacturers claims I've seen will say there is a potential 1% improvement in consumption for each individual increase in ron on a standard production engine, but only if the engine is designed to recognise the higher ron fuel. I've used this example before but Mazda produce a turbo assisted SkyActive 2.5L engine that is designed to run on a range of fuel types in the US where they have the equivalent of 91 ron fuel (appearing as an even lower rating by a different measuring system) and presumably as high as 98/99 ron fuels for 'exotica'. Mazda say their engine produces 13 kw more power using the higher rated fuel which I think is close to a 7% improvement. Unfortunately they did not make any comparable statements regarding the effects on consumption.

Don't expect much improvement if any just from changing fuels. Comparisons are so difficult! There can be differences between individual vehicles which are otherwise identically specified but more likely it is due to the driving environment and individual driving styles. I suspect that @AlanOsborne is also a far more accomplished "hypermiler" than he is letting on Differences between my wife and I driving the same car: a) highway, speed limit, no traffic - we get the same consumption b) highway with traffic - I'll get 10 to15% better c) urban driving conditions then I'll get about 30% better consumption. Hopefully my wife doesn't read this post.

Glad to hear you are enjoying your new car and getting good consumption with the Aisin 8 speed box. Modern torque converters are way better than they used to be although unbelievably there are still ancient 4 speed versions on a few brand new cars. With your very good highway consumption I'd be interested to hear what revs the car is doing at the 110 kph legal limit in 'top gear'. Adelaide petrol prices vary by up to 25% percent over a 2 or 3 week cycle. I recently bought 95 ron at a low A$1.78 a litre which at the time converted to 96 pence. The next day the price rocketed to A$2.25 as the school holidays ended. There is a thread in the Briskoda "Off topic chat" zone entitled "£1 per litre" and dating from October 2014. For British readers our 91 ron fuel is about 15 cents cheaper still although forbidden for use in VW group vehicles.

Thanks for the information. I only saw the online promotional technical details on the launch of the 1.5tsi years ago so I am really surprised that the variable turbo is not currently fitted to the most commonly used 150ps version. Maybe it had something to do with the protracted non availability of the 1.5tsi during their issues meeting WLTP standards and non-variable version was retro fitted? I did not even know there was a 130ps version! If your A4 owning friend is averaging 5.5L/100 (51 mpg) then he is matching most one-off best journey reports from standard 2.0tsi owners, best averages are usually in the mid 40's mpg range. While the speeding fines here in Australia are probably not as high as Finland (where I think they are speed and income related) they still raise billions for the regional governments as many Australian drivers are slow to learn from their mistakes.

Let's be clear I have no experience with an engine with cylinder deactivation so I am going by previous owner comments on Briskoda. I have no real idea how modes affect operation in different driving environments. I don't even have modes on my car but I do have different 'moods' and that can affect consumption The 1.4tsi that was put in the Superb had it and owners reported similar consumption to the lighter/smaller Octavia without it so I assumed it was worth a bit more than 5% improvement. I do remember reading an early 1.5tsi Octavia owner complaint that the cylinder deactivation did not cut in as much as he expected but it turned out he was trying to lug the engine in similar gears to his previous 1.4tsi and needed to adjust to allow the engine to rev a little more which reduced the load and allowed the cutout to activate, which for his version was reported from 1500 rpm. I'd love to get my hands on one to see what I could achieve but alas there is no 1.5tsi Aussie Octavia mk4 and I let the purchase opportunity for a really well priced new manual 1.5tsi engine Scala slip by during the instability of the Covid era. The only current one on the market is an interstate demo (2500km away) and about A$20k more expensive than the original including A$8k of packs I don't want.

Yes you have and

So 70mph would be 2100 rpm (give or take) which is substantially lower than my 1.4tsi calculated 2700 rpm and the reason for the mk4 requirement for more gear changes. My 6th may well be closer to your 4th gear in gearing. Both engines produce the same 250Nm of torque. A few years back in the UK I had a hire Kia C'eed manual diesel. Fairly average car but it was economical and was delighted to get 60 mpg on tank, however it had very long gearing and the display was always suggesting a lower gear than the engine felt comfortable with. The instantaneous consumption display was a fairly useless bar graph that only showed under 30 mpg. Once I had worked out that the recommendations were wrong and that I could not use 6th below 60 mph, 5th below 50mph, 4th/40mph and so on, my calculated refill consumption improved to 70mpg. It was then a nicer drive and actually able to accelerate more easily. This required more active use of the gearbox was not a biggie, I got a bit more fun AND better consumption.

Interesting, I honestly cannot remember anything being written about the 1.8tsi in manual versions. Never read any really notable consumption reports from manual or auto versions either, so I sort of discounted it because of that. While I think my 1.4tsi is very tractable it is possibly quite low geared compared to the 1.5tsi. As near as I can tell I'm doing about 2700rpm at 70mph in 6th gear, allowing for the known inaccuracy of the speedo and unknown tachometer accuracy.

Not everyone will agree with my personal opinion that the smaller capacity tsi engines have for many years offered a better balance of power/economy than the larger 1.8 and 2.0tsi engines, as I have never needed to use the full potential of my 1.4tsi on the road. The mk4 Octavia has class leading aerodynamics and the 1.5tsi with variable geometry turbo and cylinder deactivation is one of the most sophisticated (complicated?) production ICE engines so no real surprise with the excellent figures quoted especially on a longer (UK summer trips). I believe the cylinder deactivation activates over 1500 rpm and under 30% available torque in Eco, which would be 90+% of my driving. Do the 1.5tsi owners notice the difference? The quoted figures are measurably better than I could probably achieve in similar circumstances with my 2014 manual 1.4tsi but not enough to justify the expense of upgrading even if it was available in Australia. Our Mk4 Octavia is limited to 1.4tsi with 8 speed Aisin torque converter box below the 2.0tsi options, no manual version at all 😞 . I prefer manuals, not that you have to change gears much at all on the open road due to the oodles of low down turbo torque and the relatively light body. Out of curiosity does anyone know if the 2.0tsi 'Budack' cycle engine is still in the Skoda range and if it actually was more efficient and whether there is a 2.0tsi with cylinder deactivation?

What size engine and transmission type?

Our local 95 Octane does not yet have ethanol added and so when I tried a few tanks of local 98 octane in the 1.4tsi I could not identify any performance or economy improvements. I did it because the dealers recommended I try 98 to address a cold start jerkiness experienced for the first 100m (1st gear to road) after a cold start, made no difference to that either. The UK Corsa hire was fed E10 95 Octane and apart from feeling gutless at lower revs (compared to small capacity turbo) I was more than happy with the near diesel like consumption. I agree with @Prezafab's assessment about the effects of more careful driving on petrol and diesel consumption returns. The Yeti is a wonderful little Tardis and I have no idea what to suggest as a replacement.

@Expatman 's figures are interesting. A best at near 50 mpg is good but not great, but relative to that his overall average at over 44 mpg is comparatively outstanding. A lot factors involved in the overall figure, good economical driving technique, most journeys a sufficient distance for the engine to warm up and without excessive speed. The Yeti's Achilles heel of poor aerodynamics reveals itself on the longer faster run although that can be mitigated by the 'normal' close proximity driving (imo) on busy British motorways. I can understand his enthusiasm for the Yeti's overall versatility but I also think he would get even better figures with a more modern engine vehicle (Karoq?) or a Toyota hybrid. Many drivers are not very good at driving economically, or as I call it 'sensibly' and I think this was demonstrated when I hired a 1.2 litre NA Corsa in the UK. The long term consumption for 8000 miles averaged low twenties but I was getting sixties on a tank and I was stunned on a cross London journey in peak to average 50 mpg (the display seemed accurate to refill calculations). Conversely, a recent interstate holiday trip in Aus in our 1.4tsi Octavia returned about 50 mpg. I was a little disappointed by that but the roads on our route were empty, speeds were high because of the distance to cover, there were strong head and cross-winds (both directions 😞 ) and it was cold (our winter). Normally I'd hope for high 50s. I do not keep a record these days but when I filled up the car last night I calculated the average at 6.4L/100 (44 mpg). Wife does most of the driving commuting 13 km to work across town. 95 Octane was A$1.75 a litre which converts to 92 pence which is at the low end of our price cycle and why I filled up.

Petrol or diesel? Manual or DSG auto?

Considering the millions of our 1.2/1.4tsi engines installed for nearly 10 years across all marques you would think we would have heard if there were issues? There would be a substantial cohort who either chose not to or could not afford changing the belt when recommended. I am not going to be particularly concerned if it is not done this year, and my dealer seemed to be equally sanguine about my decision when he broached the subject at 7 years and said I was not the only one deciding to defer.

The date is a mystery but 'seem light years away' would be an understatement as I never was, and am still not, the forward planning type. The important things in life have worked out so far though so I'm not sure I would change much even if I could go back.

Mine expires when I am 70 as well but that does raise an interesting question about the issue date as I had a motor bike license when I was 16 and passed the car driving test on the second attempt when 17 (I think), but I have no recollection what happened for the 'valid from' date to be from when I was 22. My South Australian driving license covers me for the UK as well so I won't be undertaking any UK retests on my occasional visits as @toot has indicated, not that the concept is a bad idea though. Each Australian state has its own rules and systems and our local government is putting through laws for a special driving license for high power cars after the tragic death of a young female pedestrian after an (experienced) Lambo driver lost control at urban low speed due to the safety control devices were turned off. I fail to understand why such high power vehicles, whether ICE or EV, are allowed on public roads anyway. Thinking about it I will have to check whether I need an international driving license for Europe though.

The topic prompted me to find my UK car driving license which was issued in 1976 for the princely sum of five pounds. The stated expiry date is January 2024. Original green print, no picture version and still in the same intact plastic 'wallet'. At the time the expiry date seemed so impossibly far away.....but here we are and now so close. I can assure you that the power of my early cars were unlikely to break any highway speed limits although the narrow crossply tyres fitted could easily lose adhesion under almost any conditions other than bone dry.

Dunno, but our 2003 Toyota Echo is at 205k km and on the original timing chain with no rattles, also on the original auxiliary belt drives although these are looking a little old Nearly bit the bullet a couple of years back to get a manual 1.5tsi Scala at what was a really good drive away price then but could not get a test drive of a manual version (during the Covid troubles). Our Octavia was and still drives like new and meets every demand we make of it but is old enough not to care to much about scratches or risking a bad road or even a drive along a beach. I will start getting local quotes from independents this year I think, but then again I said that last year.

For what it is worth, my personal experiment for non replacement of our 2014 1.4tsi 96k km is continuing uneventfully. Australia can be quite dusty especially the dirt roads in summer, and it has travelled on a few of them.

79.7% of Briskoda posts from members changing their wheel/tyre combinations to larger sizes do it because they like the look. 81.3% of professional car reviewers say that the higher spec larger wheeled versions of a particular model ride worse than the cheaper smaller wheeled version. 87.2% of statistics are made up on the spot.

What was the condition of the old plugs like?