Kingsley

Well, Nick, I had people complaining because I dared suggest that the new Jaguars haven't got enough wood veneer inside. if it's good enough for real luxury cars like Rollers and Bentleys, what's the objection? It seems a new fashion just to have leather and fake metal or if lucky real aluminium. Personally I absolutely loathe the pointless and vulgar silvery plastic **** trims that cars seem to abound in these days. What's the problem with wood? It has history and gives balance to a high tech environment

In fact the wood trim on the dashboard and door cappings AND a wooden steering wheel are available on the Chinese version of this car, and they look marvellous, well befitting the excellent but otherwise rather bland interior.

I go along with what you are saying, JJ, but looked at in a historical context, jaguars were once, rather like big Rovers, Humbers, Armstrong Siddelys, Lagondas, Alvises, the cars for middle class accountants, bankers, doctors, the settled professions. They were a cut above the plebean, they gave a sense of luxury just below that of a Rolls or a Bentley, but the 'Jag' had that extra edge, notably the big Marks 7 to 10, and of course the bank robber/ copper special, the Mk2. All of these Jags and ever since, until now, with this XE, had one thing in common. They had a very luxurious, slightly racy, interior, with tons of luscious timber and rich leather. I'd live to get my bum inside an XJ!. This is why the XE is, in my opinion, with 'optional wood' ( not mentioned anywhere that I have seen, must try to get a brochure) is devastatingly below any expectation I or any old geezer like me would have of a Jaguar. It's also worth pointing out that the traditional Jaguar was regarded as a relatively inexpensive luxury car. Nowadays JLR are trying to take the marque upmarket to compete with Astons and maybe even Bentleys, and in the XJ they have made a great job of it, but this only underlines the sadness of the XEs austere interior. I do not even compare to BMWs, cars where you have a bloody lever to hold then lean back to change seat back pitch!! At least in the 3. Primitivo! Let us remember that in the 1930s the Superb was also a big comfortable economical luxury car, quite a svelte beast. I love the way Josef Kaban has tied his new design into the historical storyline. The car is very coherent in its design themes, inside as well as out, the brilliant concept of one gifted man (for the same reason I love Herr Piech's single or even bloody minded Phaeton). So this is why I regard the new Superb as a better car than the XE , although it cannot of course be drectly compared to the brilliant XJ Jaguar. Because it is a lovely celebration of traditional Skodaness, and the XE is a very pale imitation of a 'Jag'!!!

I have an initial impression that the Superb is in fact priced below the Passat. Interestingly the Superb can be had with a 280 horsepower engine but the maximum power offered in the Passat is 220 hp petrol or 240 diesel! Just had a young friend here looking at 2013 Passats with top specs and the 3.6litre engine and 4x4 as offered in the current Superb, having done about 5000 miles, at half new price! Crazy, partially because of the hike in the Swiss Franc exchange against the Euro, and partially because of the new model (which I don't like as much). There are outrageous bargains to be had online right now.

Perhaps i was exaggerating, a gut reaction shared by another old guy with a gut sitting next to me! There was not enough space, the dash was ugly. I stand by the simple fact that any Jag should feel luxurious and this does not. It compares badly with the poor old X type in the interior. Of course the XJ is another class of car, it's one of the few for which I can have any respect after our Phaeton, one of the few I would ever want to own. The XF is nice too, but the XE is simply a downer, a major disappointment, not a real Jaguar at all. Compare the Mk 2 for reference size wise in the range. THAT is a Jag, not this plain Jane. That is why it reminds me of one of those extraordinary Chinese imitations, because the sad interior, with not even nice shapes, is the sort of abortion they might hack. It will not sell. Pay a bit more and get an XF.

My phone pics are useless. The stand was crawling, but I would say yes to your question. The interior quality seemed to me at least as good as the Passat. Very convincing, very neat, businesslike and pleasingly 'technical' , which I believe is part of the thrust of the car. I can see why Mr Vahland wants us all to think that it is not 'aimed' at be Passat, because he could be in big trouble with parent VW if we really compare it to the boring Passat. Oh dear, the Superb is a much nicer car...

I was in Geneva today, in that overcrowded hothouse. Deeply impressed with the Superb, which appeared in L&K and 'Style' versions, all 4x4s. None of them had rear window wipers. Our touring car is a VW Phaeton, which of course, is not a hatchback, however, given the exquisitely aerodynamic design of this Superb, quite similar in that respect to our Phaeton, it would seem unnecessary. At any speed I am amazed how rain and dirt just fly over the back window, so I do not think this will be a problem on the Superb. I was greatly impressed with the quality of its interior in general and particularly the leather on the seats. I could not tell if the door cards were also leather but the overall softness of surfaces and the coordination of the trims were very pleasing. I found it overall a much nicer car to sit in than the rather disappointing lacklustre new Passat. It also looks much more handsome. Oh dear. The other shock there was the horrid Jaguar XE, which looks on the outside like a Chinese knockoff of an XF and has not a sliver of wood veneer inside. Surely we expect to be cushioned in luxury inside a Jag? An unassuming Skoda Superb knocks spots off this sad disaster. Overall this must be easily the best Skoda ever, and certainly one of the nicest cars being produced by VAG at the moment. A triumph of well coordinated design.

Today I into the throbbing overheated jungle of the Geneva Motor Show. I always get a headache there. It opens at 10 and I was there by 10.30. It was already getting crowded, on a Monday morning! Much of the interest revolved around the big Skoda stand, right next door to Bentley on one side and VW on the other, so this Hall number 2 was seething with activity. One of my biggest surprises was that, next to the Superb, the Car of the Year VW Passat seemed lacklustre and boring. Frankly, VW seem to me to have lost the plot since the beautifully classic shapes and robust and handsome, even noble interiors of the B5 Passat of 15 years ago. In contrast, the new Superb in many details, not all subtle, carries many of the genes of Superbs past in the history of this noble marque. I noticed with a smile the retro 1930 style numbers on the big dials. The cars on show were, it must be admitted, all either L&K or 'Style' models, all with leather or leather and alcantara interiors, electric drivers seats, great looking alloys, etc.but it only goes to show that this handsome dynamic design can carry a luxurious finish very well. In contrast, the front of a Passat reminds me of a clenched fist in motion, and the interiors are fussy and uncoordinated in comparison. I was surprised how well the now 'classic' dash, like a bigger version of that in the Octavia, works so well and looks, again, formal and classic, something we clearly appreciate in Skodas. Everything blends well together, all the dash surfaces are soft and the door cards, looking perhaps too simplistic in photographs, are soft and as attractive in the geometry of their design as those in a Rolls Royce Phantom. While the actual level of sheer luxury is restrained (as, no doubt, the parent company demands so as not to compete too dramatically with fellow VW models) the outcome, in design and comfort terms, is wholly enjoyable and overall hugely convincing for the flagship car of the range. It makes you feel that the once maligned Eastern European company has returned to its heyday of making solid reliable and, yes, luxurious middle class cars. Mr Josef Kaban is to congratulated heartily, because in this beautiful car we see the coordinated vision of a true artist coming to fruition. I love this car.

Here in Switzerland, popping between villages, running the 50 minutes down the motorway into Geneva once or twice a week, nipping down to the local shops, we are averaging 43.6 mpg. Wonderful car!

I agree that the Tiguan dashboard is really unattractive in comparison to the Yeti. Especially if we add some of those pretty chrome rings around the Climatronic knobs from Superskoda, for instance. Or some adhesive wood trims from 'Wow trim'. Am I the only one who has ennobled a Yeti dash wiv a bit a wood, guv? It actually looks really nice if still not quite an exact match with the Boreal wood. Bearing in mind we are left hand drive, of course, but I do believe right hand drive trims are also available. Whether or not people think wood dashes to be fuddy duddy, i find them to offer great additional decorative value in a Gobi Sand leather interior. The basic Yeti interior is solid and well made and merits a bit of extra decoration. I would have loved a wooden steering wheel as well! And the car has anyway much more character than the Tiguan.

Richard, your leather seats are gorgeous, especially with the stitching and padding. I understand that most people wear denim these days, a bit like the cultural revolution in China? My own preference as a time traveller from the 50's is for summer wool or light cotton, especially having visited the factories in Sri Lanka that make denims for rich and poor alike. They are all made in the same place and just the labels differ. When did denim become so a la mode actually? So I perfectly understand why folks might not want light seating material. Just sad to me that so many lovely cars seem ruined by coal scuttle interiors. I don't agree about the dashboard, though. It's lovely in beige and brown, doesn't look blocky to me a bit. I like the fake wood in ours, too, can't stand matt silver plastic and in some cars the piano black wood offered looks just like black plastic to me as well. It's nice to have a bit of decoration inside a car, especially our robust but slightly austere Yeti interiors. Some of you will be horrified to know I am also adding an extra fake wood kit to enliven the Gobi Sand! Silly old sod they might say! Must say we have totally adopted our Miss Yeti, what a lovely little car!

RIchard, where did you go to recover your seats in nappa, and can we see a picture please? Personally, we love our Gobi sand leather seats and find the colour fully appropriate to the jeep like function of the car. We cannot stand coal scuttle black interiors, 'cloth' is generally horrible and synthetic and a nightmare to keep clean. I am amazed how people seem to think there is any comfort in black interiors, considering how much time we spend inside our cars, and why beige or gobi sand is regarded as the choice of older people is a mystery to me. It's just lighter and more cheerful. Time enough for black interiors when we are in a box, folks! So far our leather seats are very robust and comfortable, although we have only covered about 3000 kms. Obviously not like the (sunny beige) leather armchairs in the VW, which are nicer than anything we have in the house!

Designed to provoke awe, compete with bimmers and mercs rather than Vauxhalls! Very handsome! http://auto.blog.rs/blog/auto/top-secret/2013/11/17/skoda-fabia-iii-superb-iii-snowman-suv-i-sherpa-suv

Here in Switzerland, a litre of oil in a bag in the boot of our new 2 litre TDI 170 BHP 4x4 Elegance delivered two days ago.

Just got our new Yeti 2 litre TDI Elegance, built on the 19th august. Very happy and delighted with it, what an amazing car! I am pleased to say it has got the traditional green badges. The new ones look so ordinary. i don't want a car with badges like some Opel or Vauxhall, depending where you live. The chrome on black is rubbish, and means there has to be an extra name panel to say 'Skoda' on the back of cars, because the name is no longer a part of the badge. And the laurel leaves referred to the fine rallying history of this old old marque, which deserves much greater respect than most people seem to understand as the the oldest marque in the whole Volkswagen Audi Group. We are so happy to be driving our third Skoda. Cars that fit like a glove from new, so easy to drive and so comfortable. The green badge and that colour association has been so successful I do wonder why the bosses thought it a good idea to change to such an ordinary boring common looking design. Oh dear.

Just got our Storm Blue Elegance 2 litre diesel 140bhp 4x4 DSG delivered today. Gobi sand leather, Columbus, auto parking, iPod cable, spitzbergen alloys, heated screen, lots of nice chrome trim bits from Superskoda on the front. What a nice car! The engine is remarkably quiet and the ride quality is very smooth. Not a 'cheap alternative' to a luxury car, beautifully put together and finished. An instant member of the family, no wonder these cars are so popular and people are so wetly fond of them! Happy to have our third Skoda, this one is by far the best yet.

I remember on our Volvo 850 in 1995 already we had DRLs. A very important safety feature. As we get older our vision gets poorer, and I sometimes almost miss seeing grey or green cars under certain light or weather conditions. DRLs can be an important aid to seeing other vehicles in the day. I think it was already in Denmark that they found there were 14% fewer accidents after the introduction of them. If they are correctly set they should not be blinding. There are so many irritations in town life apart from that, for instance the sirens used by emergency services these days. What foul noises they use instead of bells and old fashined sirens! How distracting, annoying and even frightening they can be. Bright car headlights are nothing like as bad. I find it amazing when there are so many real problems in society today, that people waste their time and energy complaining about car headlights.

Our first Skoda was a Favorit in 1993, I think we just called it 'the Skoda', but then in 2001 we bought an early Fabia Combi, a marvellous car, and that became known as 'Skodey'. When one becomes attached to a car, for whatever reason, but mainly because it is so damn good and so useful, it tends to get a name. Skodas fit well into this category, and Yetis particularly so, being so multipurpose. Because right now we have a Phaeton, to which I am very attached, my wife calls it (her?) 'Mrs P', my second wife. When in august soon our Yeti arrives, perhaps in view of this she may be 'Miss Yeti', as the car my wife would prefer to drive, on account of the size factor. We have to see how my wife reacts when she comes.

Actually, looking back over my original mail I don't see 'name calling ' or character assassination towards anyone who chooses to waste their money on the Evoque.I did say they were rendered 'ridiculous' but that's hardly 'bilious'. I wonder how well people actually read these threads before reacting. You guys love a rant, don't you? This is finally a Skoda lovers' thread, and nobody seems to be reacting to my contrast between the BS that the fickle motoring press used to write about Skodas, and the resulting misguided snobbery of so many people (when a Skoda is perhaps an even better built car than any other marque in the VAG stable and certainly better value) and the fawning praise for the monstrous Evoque, just because it is cynically and expensively labelled 'Range Rover' . My biting criticism was levelled at the motoring press which panders to badge snobbery, but even now there are magazines where a long term Evoque has received criticism for someone banging their head when getting in the back doors! Really!! We await delivery of a wonderful Yeti. Can't wait. No comparison.

This the first time I ever got so annoyed by a car. I do think there are others who find the squashed roof bizarre and the fashion mad styling horrible. Quite a few friends of mine agree, and there seems to be others on this thread who agree. It seems exploitative to me, especially at the price. Have any of you seen inside the new A class Mercedes? It's really nothing special inside, the perceived quality is no different to many less expensive cars. People are really ready to spend a lot of money for a badge, even when that badge ceases to really have the quality it was famed for in the past. We used to have a mercedes, about 20 years ago, just before the E class renamed it. It was half hand built. Well, I am sorry if I ruffled feathers on this thread. Just that the Evoque is really a parody of a Land Rover at that price, however well it rides over rough terrain. Today's quality car is a Skoda. Have any of you tried a Dacia Duster? They are huge in France it seems.

Perhaps i exaggerated a bit, not really wanting to insult others' opinions, but I find the Provoke so unbelievably ugly and this whole fashion thing appalls me, especially as those of us who love Skodas took so much unfounded stick over the years. I have never really been so horrified by such a tasteless mockery of LR styling as this car is. I don't want to go on, but i do wonder how anyone could like such a squashed in roof. Bully for all of you with enough money to spend on a car, yes, no better than a Freelander.

Well, i am also amazed at the fierce reactions to my honest opinion about what really seems to me to be a monster fashion puff of a car. I just get sick of people saying how wonderful the Evoque looks, when it is so impractical and to my eyes dreadfully ugy. Am i not entitled to voice a contrary opinion? About 20 years ago we had a Skoda Favorit that cost us 7,000 dollars new. It was a simple car, designed from scratch in only two years, but it was a brilliant design. The rear view mirrors were large, the rear wiper covered most of the rear window, it was comfortable and in the 9 years we had it cost nearly nothing to service, had just 4 new tyres and one new exhaust pipe. I like a car that works well, does not go wrong all the time, and that looks like a car rather than a running shoe. Many fashionable designs today are of questionable practicality. Would you buy a vacuum cleaner that looks what you would think wonderful if it did not pick up dirt very well? My point is, we buy Skodas because they are well made, work well functionally, are good value and have rather smart classic lines, none of which in my opinion can be said to be true with the horrid ripoff Evoque. If you want a good rant, my friends, look back over the years at the stupid crap that was written about Skodas before people came to their senses. Some of you on this forum seem not to be aware of this. When the amazing Superb was launched every motoring correspondent said what a ridiculous pompous name it was for a car, completely ignorant of the historical use of that name on a Skoda car in the 1930's. And today they say how apt it is for such a fine car. All i' m saying is that these 'critics' are often rather uninformed and politically correct in their statements and buyers believe what they read. Wait a few years to see the outcome of ownership of this excuse for a 'Range Rover'. I have been heartily fed up with the stupid undeserved jokes about Skodas over the years. They have always been interesting, good value well designed cars. The company is the oldest in the whole VAG stable and one of the three oldest makes still in existence. Respect where it is due. Traditional Land Rovers are great at what they do, but the company is stooping low now to make a huge profit out of pure fashion. Form over substance. When everyone in the motoring press raves over it, with all their apparent political power to persuade people to buy cars, i think i am entitled to voice a different opinion rather strongly, when asked to compare these two cars? Thank god so many wise people like the Yeti so much. Let's make the comparison a few years down the line and see which car really was better?

The Evoque evokes disgust in me when i see how ugly and impractical it looks. It costs far too much and its interior quality does not merit 'Range Rover' as a description. It looks like a crushed frog. Has being fashionable ever rendered a bunch of drivers so ridiculous? It is a badge snobbery success, puffed up by the disgraceful pomposity and grovelling of the same motoring press that at first ridiculed the Superb for its name and now says 'how appropriate'. The same idiots who pandered to the snobbery of owning a 'merc' or a BMW rather than the superior VW Phaeton. Their loss has been my gain. Your wisdom in choosing the excellent Yeti poops all over the nonsense of fashion victims such as the huge ugly 'Minis' and this terrible Emperor's new clothes 'Evoque' thing. But thewily old Brits always had a soft spot for good value well built Czech cars even in the bad old 'joke' days.

Nice tour report. I'm looking forward to a long happy relationship with our new 2 litre diesel in August. However, I envy you your visit to the Glass Factory in Dresden, as I am the extremely happy owner of a nearly 5 year old V8 VW Phaeton, and can only disagree with the notion that it is not enough car for the money. Sadly, VW did nowhere near enough to promote this amazing car after its launch, and it has suffered from crushingly ignorant brand snobbery, much as our marque still labours under with some berks, even today. People seem to prefer fashion slave Mercedes and bossy Bimmers, rather ugly in my opinion. I love the classic lines of VAG's best cars, amongst which I number Skodas of course, perhaps the best built of all of them. Everyone who drives or rides in a Phaeton raves over them, with very rare and to me inexplicable exceptions. And the Yeti seems to be one of Britain's favourite cars. Can't wait for our two babes to meet!

I used to get caught driving across France, but now I have the cruise control, which i set at 138 kph which is just under 86 mph. It is rather boring if you haven't got a great sound system. I could go much faster very safely, however I just don't trigger those bloody radars like that. I have been caught and fined at 142 kph around Dijon, that's 88 mph. It really is all about making money on such fast roads, especially as it costs over 70 euros - £60 - to go across France diagonally from Geneva to Calais. Of course it's a total ripoff all round.