nicknorman

No experience of it myself, but mr Google turns up stuff like this which suggests that it depends on exactly which product… Regular snow foam is slightly alkaline. This helps it break down dirt more effectively, but it can also slightly affect the sealants on your car’s paintwork, too. While some professional-grade cleaning products are quite caustic, most of the ones you’ll find in shops are only very slightly alkaline and won’t affect your paintwork in any noticeable way. However, if you have a valuable or vintage car, you might not want to risk it. That’s why pH neutral snow foam is so popular – it’s chemically neutral, so it’s safe to use on even the most sensitive and valuable car

When I picked up my new L&K last year, the dealer branch manager mentioned that if I used the snow foam stuff to clean the car, it would tarnish the chrome strips as it is very caustic. Because this would be due to use of aggressive cleaning chemicals, it would not be covered by warranty. No problem for me because I never use that stuff. But even if that is the problem, it’s something that the dealer should sort out before you buy it, regardless of being a warranty issue or not.

Is there actually a different matrix for LH and RH sides? I wouldn't have thought so. I would expect there to be one source of hot air that is then mixed with cold air with valves to get the right temperatures in the various zones. Could it not be the temperature control flap sticking on that side, or the motor defunct?

Certainly an astonishing amount of rust underneath. As I said before, I think it must be due to being left for 4 months covered in salt spray. Pretty sure it was only beginning of last year I replaced the rear NS spring, which I did without a compressor - ie disconnected the lower arm from the damper, the level sensor, the drop link and the hub. I wasn't particularly dificult. And I did put grease on the bolts when reassembling, though probably just ordinary grease. And of course the OS spring was replaced by the MOT garage in Feb 2023. Which was annoying because when I checked it at the same time as doing the NS spring (a few weeks before the MOT), it wasnt broken! As to the level sensors, they are different according to the fitting position but the actual clever bit is the same, only the bracketry is different. So if you can't find the one you need on ebay, you can get the one that is on ebay and transplant it to the old bracketry. Somewhere it says to do the bolts up on the suspension when the springs are compressed to normal unladen weight position (to avoid twisting the rubber bushes too much) but you probably knew that already. Thinking about the pedals, I did have a racechip throttle box on it which did make a big difference - really dead without it until it goes woosh - but I suppose the need for that depends on what your plans are for the tune state.

I’d recommend undoing the engine oil filter first - at which point oil drains back into the sump, before undoing the sump plug. That way the oil all comes out at once, rather than a bit dribbling out afterwards and blowing everywhere! Oil filter goes in either way up. You can get to the DSG oil filter without removing the battery, contrary to the workshop manual instructions. i would avoid draining the DSG until you can run the engine, because you need to have the engine running to refill the DSG and it’s probably not ideal to leave it empty for a while. Battery is original so it can’t have much life left, although I did tend to turn off auto-start-stop most of the time. That said it never exhibited any signs of being low on capacity.

Yes I agree. I’ve had Saabs and Subarus much older that didn’t have as much rust. To be fair I do a lot of driving on the A939 but even so … did the same thing with the Subarus and Saabs, all of which were well over 10 years old when I sold them, and not in bad condition. Not sure if it is a “bad car” or if it’s par for the course for VW group cars. I need to work out how to make my new Skoda last better!

I think the huge amount of rust is in part due to the fact that I dropped the car off 8th December having driven 100 miles on very salty roads, lots of salt spray on the motorway etc. The car then sat there, or elsewhere, for several months caked in salt. Normally after a brief salty road spell there would be lots of rain and thus cleanish water spray to get rid of the salt. The worst bit was having to drive my gleaming shiny new car the other way in the salt spray. By the time I got home it was filthy! On the wheel bolts, as far as I know one is not supposed to put grease on VW wheel bolts? Someone please correct me if I’m wrong? I had a huge amount of hassle with one locking wheel bolt that refused to come off, in the end I had to take it to a small local garage who were prepared to use obscene force to get it off. After that replaced all the locking wheel bolts with ordinary ones. I always put lots of grease on the wheel centre hole and face, but the wheels do seem prone to sticking on due I think to corrosion of the wheel centre hole. There should be the plastic wheel bolt cover removing tool in the toolkit under the boot floor. Re. The damage to the front left bumper, this was no kerb, that was a big fat badger that ran in front of me at a range of about 5 metres, I was doing about 50. Behind that area is a plastic duct that takes cooling air to an aux radiator further back. Shards from the plastic duct punctured the radiator, so 10 seconds later I got the “coolant low” warning. Fortunately I was close to destination and with one stop to beg water from a house, I got there with no overheating. I bought a new radiator and a new duct, but I just patched up the front bumper with hot staples.

Just on the sump drain plug thing, you are supposed to replace the plastic sump plug each time. Not a big deal as they are about £3.50 from TPS. Recently I made a stupid mistake. I’d run out of the pukka drain plugs and didn’t want to go to TPS so I ordered a couple from eBay. They were much the same price as the TPS ones, but would come through the letter box. I drained the oil and put a new sump plug in. Ran the engine in the garage a bit to check the oil level. Everything fine… Next morning I came down to about 5 litres of oil all over the garage floor. This definitely spoiled my day! Still, could have been worse, I might have run out of oil when driving! Turned out the O ring on the plug was the wrong size - just slightly too thin - and this allowed the oil to drip out over night. Needless to say I then made the trip to TPS. So the moral is don’t use anything except the pukka sump plug from TPS unless you are CERTAIN it is the exact right size!

Just FYI, when I was going to buy the car there was the retracting tow ball that I needed, but no reversing camera. All that great expanse of white plastic bumper... asking for trouble! So I got them to retrofit the factory camera system before I bought it. I think it was just the early (2016) L&K 280 tsi that didn't have the camera as standard. Never mind, it is there now! If you do any towing, bear in mind that as soon as you plug in the trailer electrics, the side assist and rear traffic alert are automatically disabled. When you unplug the trailer electrics, these two systems do not automatically re-arm! (They do on my new car) So it can be a bit misleading if you are expecting the rear traffic alert or side assist to work as normal, but in fact they are disabled without any obvious indication. You need to remember to re-activate them once the trailer is unplugged. Also with the camera, there is a useful "look down" mode that looks down onto the tow ball and a line to tell you where to put the steering wheel to hit the tow hitch directly. And of course when to stop!

For me the best fix is the Apple Carplay that doesn't disconnect 30 secs or so after starting, then reconnect.

The car already has the "virtual pedal" which is what I think you are talking about? Wave your foot just under the rear bumper area to open the boot? It seems to work well when the car is locked, much more reluctant when the car is not locked. No idea why, but the new car seems to be much the same. Maybe it relates to having the folding tow ball (both the cars have that). And the key fob has to be close but not too close.

Wow huge amount of work there! I’ll just mention that the Haldex fill screw has a very small hex socket that is made of cheese. I wasn’t quite clear from the above whether you have one, but I’d get a new fill hole bolt before changing the Haldex fluid. It will be interesting to see how much gunge there is on the Haldex filter and in the oil. It was horrendous the first time, better but still fairly grotty the second time. Maybe it will be less grotty this time if the wear has settled down. Hopefully we’ll see.

Some great work there, at least you didn’t find anything else too embarrassing under the seats! When I replaced the rear LH spring my spring compressor didn’t fit - the manual shows kind of blade things that engage with the spring, while the screw bit is off to the side. But I discovered that it was easier to drop the lower suspension arm right down - this involved disconnecting the drop link and the position sensor as well as the damper of course. But dropping the arm right down enabled the spring to be inserted un-tensioned, then I jacked up the lower arm to tension the spring until the damper could be reconnected. The droplinks etc do look rusty, but there was no play in them when I did this job a year or so ago. Mind you with shiny new dampers, maybe rusty drop links will offend!

I’ll check that. I think it has also fixed the annoying issue with Apple CarPlay where on startup it would be connected, then it would disconnect after 30 secs or so, then eventually reconnect. This morning it seemed to remain connected.

Mine just did this update. As said, a few scary messages and it took it a few days, but I am now on 330. I have yet to notice any differences though!

It does sound like the pipe has come undone again. I fixed it after the MOT last March and it was still working fine in December. You should be able to access it easily by removing the wheel arch.

I will be very interested to hear how you get on with the B6s. When I had to fork out £500 for one front OEM shock I was sorely tempted, but at the time they were still on a long lead time and it was an MOT failure. I said that if another one went, it would be B6s. But it didn't. I do think the standard setup is too soft, I nearly always had it in sport, very rarely in normal, and never in comfort. Far too wallowy, just horrid. So I think you have done the right thing going for B6 over B4 (the latter being much the same damping rates as the OEM) My new car is the same as the old one in suspension terms, so once the warranty is out I will probably go for a set of B6s

Well I'm impressed at your bravery re. the MIB upgrade! On the washer thing, I lost the rear washers at one point - right after an MOT where I suspect they adjusted the headlights slightly. I had a go at removing the rear washer nozzle but gave up as it was too difficult. I then noticed that when I ran the rear washers, water came out in front of the front RH wheel. I undid the wheel arch and found that a washer hose just behind and very close to the headlight, had come adrift at a connector. I suspected the garage had pulled on it. I plugged it back in. This was a while ago and so I wouldn't have thought it would have come adrift again, but I would check for any water coming out in front of the RH front wheel when you run the rear washers. It is a bit odd that the reservoir is behind the front wheel, but the hose runs initially forward in front of the wheel before making its way back to the rear windscreen. On the DSG oil change thing, I bought a cheapo Draper manual oil pump thing which was a bit slow but did fill the gearbox adequately. It is a bit of a faff but only once every 40,000 miles! I did change the oil and filter at 80,000 miles so there is no need to do this again until 120,000 miles. On the steering wheel, I now have the new one with the new Skoda. The heated wheel is great at this time of year, but the button/thumbwheel arrangement is not as good because it is far too easy to knock the buttons and/or thumbwheels whilst manoeuvring. I routinely find the radio on the wrong station or gone to mute etc. But this is a first world problem I guess, and probably the heated wheel is worth it! On the wheel size, I wasn't a great fan of the 19" wheels but now I have 18" wheels they seem about right (and cheaper tyres). I would have thought 18" was fine and maybe 17" is getting a bit small / high profile for a fast car. Intrigued to know what you found under the seats. Chips, crisps and sweets I can imagine, anything else must have been when someone else was driving!

According to Skoda/VW it is a “legal requirement” that the drive mode reverts to normal on power-up. The pre-facelift Superbs remembered the drive mode. But not the post-facelifts. It is a bit silly and annoying.

I got mine, it’s booked in in a couple of weeks time. But I had a look, as far as I can tell the heat shield is correctly installed. I was in Germany last week and hit 140mph on the autobahn. If the thing wasn’t going to melt then, it probably isn’t going to melt!

Regarding the key fob I have virtually never used that key, it has always sat in a box in the living room. Just checked it, no emergency key there. I am fairly sure it wasn't there when I got the car. On the other hand, in 7 years and 102,000 miles I never had to use the emergency key. Also I am fairly sure that you get 3 keys with an L&K, I certainly did with the new one. But when I got that car at 6 months old they definitely only gave me 2 keys. Umbrella - I kept it for the other side as you only get one with a new car. Tough! What I do have is the plastic things for the boot that clip off the bottom of the sides. They have velcro and can be plonked on the boot floor to stop stuff rolling around. I took them off when I was hoovering out the boot and found them after I'd sold the car - forgot to put them back! Can send if you like. As to the paintwork, that is quite annoying because I spent hours sanding, treating with rust converter, spraying primer, spraying the base coat and spraying the top coat. Looks like I shouldn't have bothered! I guess the rust converter was rubbish. But yes it is just surface rust and it all appeared suddenly after i had driven through a snowdrift. Personally I never use a pressure washer on the car, I always just used a hose and a soft brush thing with soap dispenser. IMO pressure washers are not good for the moving gubbins as it can get water into bearings etc. I never used snow foam either, but interestingly in conversation with the manager at the showroom where I bought the new car, he volunteered that I should not use snow foam because it is very alkali and makes the chrome bits around the doors corrode, which is not covered by warranty.

If you are into doing your own maintenance then these days something like VCDS, ODB11 etc is pretty much essential. I made some changes to your car including turning off seat belt warning (because I use the car at the gliding club airfield a lot and I hate beeping things!), changing the leaving/coming home lights to the fog lights, activating traffic sign recognition and probably some other stuff I’ve forgotten. I did reverse the seat belt warning thing before I sold it. I would also recommend getting a throttle pedal box, I had a Racechip one (transferred to new car). Of course it doesn’t ultimately make the car go any faster, but the standard throttle response is very soggy and the pedal box transforms the way it seems to drive.

Actually that “fault damper” was the suspension level sensor issue. Fairly trivial to fix. When the front damper pumped all its oil out, there was no dashboard warning. And indeed it wasn’t noticeable when driving, presumably due to the anti-roll bar transferring the damping action from the other side, I was fairly surprised when the guy in the MOT garage showed me the damper he’d taken off, he could pump it with his hands with absolutely zero damping effect. Regarding the springs, I’m 67 and had plenty of cars in my life. Before this car I had Saabs and Subarus, all very high mileage. I never had a broken spring, so it is not me or the environment, it is the crappy VW springs! It’s the same with the rear brake discs, the OEM ones had to be changed at 20k miles. The fairly budget replacements ones (Delphi iirc) were massively better than the originals. Car was always garaged overnight and Aberdeen doesn’t normally suffer from a salty air environment because the prevailing wind is offshore, but there is obviously a lot more salt on the roads for longer, compared to Englandshire.

This is my old car. Happy to advise on what was done when etc. Generally the Haldex and DSG were serviced by me at the appropriate times, Haldex pump gauze cleaned, engine oil & filter changed every 9000 miles or so (I put it on to fixed servicing after the first couple of years). I think it is probably due new spark plugs but on the other hand, when you change them they still look good as new. Brakes pads are getting a bit thin IIRC. I got £9k trade in for it. Yes one front shocker went, £500 for a new one! The other side was still fine when I sold it. I also had 3 broken springs at various times - VW group springs are rubbish! I guess the 4th one had broken without me realising it. Sorry about that! Not sure why there is an issue with the washers, they were fine when I traded it in but that was early December. Some rust appeared along the sills after a prolonged encounter with a snow drift. I did treat it with rust inhibitor and repaint it, but maybe it’s come back. Definitely just surface rust though. A bit poor for a modern car! i never used comfort, almost always sport or occasionally normal on slow bumpy roads. Anyway hopefully it will be a good car for you, the engine and gearbox were as sweet as when I bought it with 9k on the clock in Sept 2016. I only changed it because I would need a new one in a couple of years and I don’t like the 2024 Superbs - I got one of the last 2023 ones.

I had a 2016 Superb with the cornering xenon headlights. They were quite good, but a bit of a gimmick really. I now have a 2023 superb with LED matrix headlights, they are much better in all respects except for the absence of the cornering gimmick. I don’t miss it at all.