MTK

Drove it all the way to the repairers - about 40 miles ! - without problem. Apparently the bit on the alternator that the pulley connects to had broken so it needed new alternator, new pulley and tensioner. Grand total of

Last thing I drove without power steering was my 1990 VW Golf GTI - and I think that weighed about half what the Octavia does !

Thanks for that. AA man confirmed that the belt's come off - he thinks that the lower pully has broken. I'll drive it to a (reasonably) local VW specialist later and they'll fix it on Monday, hope my arms are up to it!

Car is a 52 plate 1.9TDi 110bhp Octavia. 85000 miles. Cambelt replaced @ 80,000 miles service. Was driving to work this morning when, having braked reasonably sharply I discovered upon moving off again that I had lost power steering and the battery light on the dashboard was illuminated. A quick check under the bonnet didn't reveal anything obvious and as I was only half a mile from work I thought that I'd drive the rest of the way, which I did without steering assistance. Upon looking under the bonnet again I discovered that the belt which is visible on the left hand side of the engine bay (I hadn't taken the engine cover off) was no longer on its rollers at each end. Is this connected to the power steering pump / alternator? Is it serious? Thanks

My inlaws got their MK2 Octavia from Winners (via a broker I believe) and have recently bought another from the Skoda dealers in Bristol. The reason they gave for not buying from Winners again was that they weren't happy with how Winners dealt with their problematic door seals and a couple of other things. This thread would seem to confirm my opinion that my father in law could start an argument in an empty room!

Well, I bought a set for my Octavia because my passenger side wiper (an expensive Bosch one) has been largely a waste of space - leaves streaks and makes an annoying noise when lying flat and you're going over about 50mph. I fitted the passenger side one last night - first thing to notice is that in the set of 1 x 19" and 1 x 21" only the latter has a spoiler! Even so, the new one left fewer streaks after a few squirts of screenwash and doesn't make the annoying noise.

I emailed Skoda UK the other week to get the 'official' line on when to replace the cam belt on my MK1 TDI Elegance. They said 150,000km (just over 93,000 miles) or 4 years, whichever comes first.

I tend to agree with much of the substance of your sentiments William but don't share the same level of unhappiness about what's going on (yet - we all have a threshold, mine's just not been reached yet). Last night's BBC 10 o'clock news reported on the plight of local children in Thailand and Indonesia who had been orphaned by the disaster. What was really terrible was that not only had their parents died, many were the only survivors from an entire extended family. These children had literally no one to look after them. My wife was in floods (sorry) of tears, I'm a stony hearted git but even I was close. I'm really looking forward to my in-laws coming this weekend because I bet a pound to penny that they will say "Charity begins at home" at some point - they'll be leaving shortly afterwards.

Thomas Reuben - Thomas we just liked the name but also it was either the first name or middle name of my & my wife's grandfathers. Reuben happens to be the name of my wife's dog when she was little but it also means eldest son and we just liked it. Makes me think of jazz musician Reuben Wilson, which is no bad thing. No. 2 is on the way - if it's a girl Martha, we had that one ready for Thomas. We both like the name but I like the fact it makes me think of Martha Reeves & the Vandellas ! If no. 2 is a boy we're stumped. We're considering Daniel, but my aunts two boys are called Thomas & Daniel so that seems a bit silly but we might persist. With my name being Matthew Kelly we don't want anything that's shared with someone famous, doubly so since my wife's initial is R, so she became R Kelly upon marrying me. Also we want to avoid a first name that either ends in an 'ee' sound or can be shortened to something that ends in that sound (although we run the risk of Tommy Kelly). It's a minefield.

I have no idea what the factory fill is. Just because one spec is called 506.01 rather than 505.01 doesn't necessarily mean that it's a higher spec oil, rather it's a different spec oil and it's the next one in the series. The higher number doesn't necessarily indicate higher spec does it ? Given that 506.01 is used in only a very specific set of circumstances it makes sense that it won't necessarily be suitable for other sets of circumstances. You should consider whether SLX Longlife II matches 505.01, which is the spec for your car. It would appear not & so using it wouldn't be a great idea. I'm hardly one to talk about using over specced oil as I top up my Octavia 110 bhp estate with Millers PD oil (use it in the SEAT) but it DOES say that it meets the spec for the Octavia so I know I'm OK.

Airplane Grosse Pointe Blank Blues Brothers Lock Stock Monty Python & the holy grail (thank you George Harrison, for this reason alone you're the best Beatle) Play Misty for Me Midnight Cowboy Shawshank Redemption Usual Suspects Trading Places Coming to America - "Joe Louis - 137 years old" Blazing Saddles Toy Story Toy Story 2

1. Groove is in the heart - Deee Lite - as Gary Mulholland says in his book 'This is Uncool' - If I had to play a DJ version of Russian Roulette where you only had one chance to get people on the dancefloor or you die, this is the record I'd trust with my life. 2. Teenage Kicks - The Undertones 3. She Sells sanctuary - The Cult 4. I Believe in Miracles - The Jackson Sisters 5. Theme from Starsky & Hutch - James Taylor Quartet Bubbling under Just can't get enough - Depeche Mode Cigarettes & Alcohol - Oasis That's the way love is - Ten City Smells like teen spirit - Nirvana Step On - Happy Mondays Fools Gold - Stone Roses Oblivious - Aztec Camera

I too can big up the Miele washing machine. Had one for about 18 months, been very good. It seems to be the VW Golf MKII of washing machines, heavy, German, over-engineered and therefore reliable. The only slight problem we had was that the fabric conditioner was not emptying from its reservoir, however I phoned Miele customer services to get an engineer out, they told me what to do myself and it worked a treat. I like my Dyson vacuum cleaner though and it brought up the carpets in my old house a treat before we sold, but then we had been using a rubbish hoover bought for about