MarkyTDI

I would say that 18s are the sweet spot of ride, handling, road noise and looks on the superb. I have 17s fitted with Cross climates and 19s with the S001, I think they are pretty much a 10 year old design now. The S001 are so so noisy compared to the 17s inch cross climates, it's like a totally different car when I swap them over. On back lanes covered with mud and leaves in low temperatures the 280 does a good rally car impression on 17 inch wheels and all season rubber, it's fantastic. There is a small trade off with the grip levels on a warm dry day but one I'm happy to pay....I'm not sure I've driven on a dry road in the last 6 weeks. If I was going to run one set of wheels all year I'd probably go for 18s with a decent all season. I like the cross climate and also recently fitted Goodyear vector 4 seasons to my wife's car and they are excellent as well. I've always quite liked the Antares 18 inch wheels. My 19s are actually off a Karoq, they look great but there is a trade off in every other way.

I've just started looking into this mod seriously for my 2017 280 estate. Going by your comments JR am I right in thinking from the following I pulled off with OBD11 I wouldn't have to physically change my gateway or DCC module?

Interesting you say that! SInce I've had the 280 I seem to be forever topping up the washer bottle when I'm sure I only did it a couple of times a year in my Octy II 4x4. Its also good to know all 280s have a DSG cooler as I tow regularly. I'd read about them but wasn't sure if I'd have one as my 280 had an aftermarket towbar fitted and didn't have factory prep. God news the replacement rad isnt too expensive in the grand scheme of things.

Good to know you got it sorted, I imagine the majority of balancing machines in garages arent regularly relcalibrated after installation...some manufacturers say they should be done every three months and I just cant see this happening a lot of the time. I like to think that a garage that opts to install a much more expensive piece of kit than necessary, like the garage you have just been to will also then choose to maintain their kit correctly. As you said its probably not worth going to the cost of a road force balance on tyres that have already covered 60k km if a normal rebalance does the trick but it is something I like to do on new tyres myself.

If one of your wheels is slightly out of true or buckled it won't show up on a normal balancing machine. A normal balancing machine will be happily balance a square wheel as it spins it in air which does not impart any forces into the wheel from the road surface, it is purely a weight distribution balancing operation. Have them checked on a roadforce balancing machine which loads the tyre against a roller while they spin to see if the wheel/tyre assembly is imparting any forces into the hub. Often the tyre can be rotated to allow forces from tyre imperfections to cancel forces from the rim. Not always easy to find a garage with such a machine but I've had wheels that "balance" fine on a traditional machine instantly flagged as being a problem on a roadforce. https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwjlwufk5Mb-AhXaR_EDHWwBAAUQtwJ6BAgsEAI&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3Ds_wnxpR_t0Y&usg=AOvVaw27r9S2nGNipiUy5RqCrAL8

Totally agree on the benefits of 4x4. I have a Superb 280 4x4 and previously an Octavia II 4x4 and I wouldn't go back to 2wd now. I also do a fair bit of boat towing and the 4x4 is very reassuring launching on gravel/sand/seaweed covered slipways etc as well as just in cold wet or snowy weather. I run on cross climates in the winter as well so I'd hope it would need a significant amount of snow to cause it any problem at all. Reliability wise mine is coming up on 60k miles since 2017 and has been fault free in the two years I've had it other than a leak into the boot that the dealer couldn't solve when I bought it. The spare wheel well had an inch of water in it when I picked it up after it had supposedly been fixed (it had been with them for three months as I was working abroad).....at which point I decided it would never visit the main dealer again.

Does your 2017 also have the mode button on the Cc stalk?

Mine is a 2017 Pre FL 280 SEL and it has this mode button. I'm away at the moment but I will check the coding to see if normal Cc can be added to the menu when I get home.

Similar situation for me too but it is the lashes in one headlight that are losing their whiteness and yellowing compared to the other side.

Ive totally rebuilt the lighting board before but it still gives the same problems almost straight away. I even replaced the plastic plugs with metal as these don't wear in the same way. They just get battered being taken off and back on every outing and the mounting poles way out past the back of the boat mean there is loads of vibration. My feeling of moving to LED avoids much of these problems as they will be more vibration resistant but its likely the CANBUS wouldn't like them due to the low currents drawn. I guess my main question is if anyone has had their cruise control disabled by a bulb out on the trailer?

My 2017 has a retrofitted towbar that appears to be coded correctly. Fogs are disabled when the trailer is attached, parking sensors off etc, bulb warnings work...... Problem is I've noticed that sometimes the cruise control works when towing and sometimes not. It always works fine with no trailer electrics fitted. Now..sometimes when towing I get a bulb out warning for a few seconds even though everythig is working when I leave home and also when I get to my destination, its a boat trailer with removeable trailer board and the lighting board gets shaken up pretty violently over bumps which I think is the cause of this. I now think that once there is a bulb out warning the cruise is disabled until the car is restarted. Has anyone else observed this behavior? If this is the case I'll look at getting a newer trailer board using LEDs but then I also wonder if this will cause the car to go haywire due to the low current draw.

When I bought my 17" rims (off a Tiguan) they had 215/65/17 tyres instead of the 215/55/17s for the Superb. When I test fitted them out of curiosity they barely fitted in the arches even with the steering dead ahead and the rears almost touched the mudflaps despite only being about 6.5% larger diameter than standard. 245/60/18 is about 12% larger diameter than standard and pretty much the size used on say a Landrover Discovery 3. All of the standard sizes (215/60/16, 215/55/17, 235/45/18, 235/40/19) essentially have the same diameter within a couple of mm. Even when people go for 245/35/20 rims its only about 1.5% bigger than standard.

I'd also be keen to get this mod along with a camera retrofit once it has been cracked Elliot. I'm in Cornwall but my wifes Aunt lives in Brookmans park so we are often up that way. One question...does anyone know if it would likely work with the earlier MIB2 screen in my 2017 SEL?

I've got a 2017 280 SEL with DCC and run 19" Bridgestone Potenzas and also a set of 17" with Michelin Cross Climates. I love the look of the car on 19" wheels but breath a little sigh of relief at the improved ride and reduced noise when I go onto the 17" wheels in winter. Fuel economy is also a tiny bit better on 17s though handling isnt quite as sharp with understeer more likely on turn-in. Being the SEL I also like the low key look on the 17s, it definitelty adds to the sleeper nature of the car. I still swap back to the 19s in spring as there is nearly £700 of tyres there and I may as well use them up. If I was going to run one set on the 280 I'd probaly go for 18" as a compromise between the two. Another factor is the 19" wheels are very prone to distortion, three of mine were wonky when I bought it.

Haha, yes I never intended to drive it like that. I had to remove my 19"s for a couple of days and preferred putting these on rather than leaving the car on stands. They were summer tyres and were promptly sold. The 215/55/17 on 7J ET40 wheels are as big as you can go if you want to be able to fit chains. It slightly reminded me of Clarkson's offroad Bentley with those tyres on it though, enough to make you do a double take if you walked past it. I quite like the Tiguan wheels on mine, they look ok and I have now managed to source some Skoda centre caps in the larger VW size too from Ali-express. Any Skoda 17" wheel with appropriate offset will fit but these came along cheap and Tiguans wheels also had the correct ET40 offset for the Superb. I personally would start by trying either a 215/60/17 for maximum side wall or 225 or 235/55/17 if the 60 profile doesn't fit. Hopefully you can can find a tyre shop that will help you check for clearance before you have to put your hand in your pocket too deeply. Let us know how you get on. If Skoda UK had decided to sell the Superb Scout in the Uk I would have had one in a heart beat but for some reason all they want to sell here are bloody SUVs. Even the Octavia Scout is no longer available other than to emergency services I believe.