Cheapas

Skoda Fabia mk2 Greenline Decided to replace the original very tired rear shock absorbers . Ordered 2 new ones off ebay , ebay said they'll fit . Got the first old one off surprisingly easy and lo & behold the new ones are longer , by about 3 cm I'd say . They look as though they'll still fit ( presume they are from the standard Fabia ) , but would they be ok to use ? Bearing in mind its just a commuter car , so not worried about performance handling ! Thanks for any advice

Thinking about it, yes I do normally use the same garage. Not sure if their triggers are overly sensitive. Reason I mentioned the pipe is I'm assuming the fuel tank has a built in vent pipe, that is maybe blocked. There is a very small hole built into the filler compartment, just under where your hand would be, maybe that's the vent.

2008 Fabia 1.4 tdi Greenline . Normally fill up once a month on 520 ish miles . Starting to notice its gettuing harder to fully fill tank . Trigger on fuel pump is cutting out around the 35 ltr mark ( or lower ) regardless of mileage . Tried pumping slower , pulling trigger out partly of tank , stopping / starting etc etc with little luck . Last fill up was well into the reserve ( 47 litre tank , reserve kicks in at 42 ltr used , iirc ) but stiil only squeezed 35 ltr in , giving a super 69mpg ( I wish , normally 55 - 59 mpg winter running ) . I'm assuming maybe the vent is blocked , just unsure how to sort it . Hoping the tank doesn't need to be dropped . Suppose I could live with it , but really want the range . Was mulling over running a very small flexi pipe directly into the tank on the next fill , see if this would vent it ? It'd be messy , but maybe worth a try . Anybody else had similar issue ?

Anyone had this before ? Fabia MK2 Greenline in for MOT today . Failed on rear brake imbalance . Not a happy chappy on hearing this as previous week had done my usual yearly strip and clean brakes all round . Typically on last corner found a leaking wheel cylinder . Changed it , bled brakes up , adjusted handbrake . Presumed MOT failure was down to me over adjusting handbrake cable or forgetting to rough up / sandpaper shoes one side . Left car with garage to sort , 5 hours later done , tested , passed . Reason for imbalance ? Other side wheel cylinder leaking ! Definitely wasn't last week as I'd checked under seals . So question is , if you change one side does that put more pressure on other older cylinder causing possible failure ?

Ok thanks, car dumped down road now for 3 am start for work , I'll have a go Sunday at getting more in.

Is there a knack/ trick to getting final contents out ?

Thanks JR , now elevated you to genius status. Warmed bottle up, tried again and sure enough fan kicked in, cold air in cab and climatronic fault codes gone. Guage reading low side of green. Bottle weighed 1250 g at start, down to 800g, so presume used nearly all gas. We'll see how long it lasts, and if Winos theory about fan was correct or there's a leak elsewhere. Thanks again for your advice and all other contributors, particularly Wino who seems to have the schematics for Skodas imprinted in his head !

Thanks JR. On it later this morning. There's a You Tube video of a chap keeping his cannister in a bucket of hot water while filling, is that a bit extreme at this time of year? Also reading your earlier advice is it best to ignore guage and just fill till fan kicks in ?

Thanks both, I'm learning as I go along here from you. Xman - yes that's what I did last year at one of the auto center places, forget which one. Still had to go back and get the port caps they forgot..... There's a bit of history behind this In relation to the slow speed fan packing in. Had a lot of advice of Wino ( thanks) who suggested slow speed fan failure put a strain on air con system seals . Anyway, it's all at the start if your interested. I'd hoped the system had only lost a small amount of gas, and the top up bottle would work. So will probably look for who has best deal on for professional regas. I'll weigh the top up bottle tomorrow.

The bottle cost £59 with £10 back on return of bottle. Says it can top up 3 cars ! Herein probably is my mistake, probably have been better to get car gassed up at garage and saved bottle for what it was designed for - top ups.

Ok, bit of detective work and trying to marry it up with your advice. Back of can says weight is 510g /18 oz. Air con label on car says 500g with a +-15g allowance. So taking all that in presumably if my system is very low as per climatronic fault code, 2 squirts of the trigger is not going to do it, regardless of what the guage says . More like looking at the complete bottle minimum.

Thanks JR . Annoyingly I'd planned to weigh the can before starting , but totally forgot. Back of the can does state it's R134 gas, it's not one of the cheaper eBay cans. Your stated pressure of 70 - 80 psi is according to the guage I've got is in the danger zone. But then as you say , how accurate is the guage? If the climatronic fault code is still showing low pressure fault code maybe I should ignore guage and carry on filling. Current temp here is around 18 degrees.

Thanks Rumo. Yes , while refilling had air con on on low, with recycle button on. In the photo of the guage, that's what it indicates attached to low port with engine off. Just this minute been out and attached guage again, needle in the green , charged zone. ( With engine off). Presume if I had serious leak guage would be in red empty section. And refill bottle still has plenty of gas, weird.

Well finally an update. Finally after a fair amount of grief managed to source replacement fan. This turned out to be wrong fan but this morning finally got right one. Decided to go for new one, as didn't want to end up with faulty used item. New one £94 ( ouch ) and that was with discount after they supplied wrong fan. Installed it, bridged wires , both fans working. Bought STP guage and air con recharge bottle. I'd bought guage first, it showed system safe to recharge, so then got gas. Unfortunately this is not a happy ending as 2 pumps of the trigger put the guage into green charged section, then, with engine still running guage dropped into 0-5 psi section, indicating abnormal leak. Still warm air, and fan not kicking in. So now with the engine off , guage attached, it reads 25-50 psi, fully charged. Start engine, and guage drops to 0-5 psi. Very puzzling. Did another climatronic diagnostic check, fan kicks in full blast, on high setting, gradually slows to stop, not sure though if it tests slow speed while winding down. Still showing fault codes 318 ( low pressure ) and 02. Bit stumped tbh, not sure where to go from here.

Just about to say the same . Our workshops are concrete floor with 4 or 5 of these dropped in. They use some type of sliding beam jack the width of the pit, our tankers go 7/8 ton empty, so must work easy on a car. Think the beauty of this type of lifting is it just slides out of the way when not in use. Next time I'm in Liverpool depot I'll have a closer look, ( I'm curious myself now ). The picture DieselMonte posted reminded me of watching one of our lads do the same with his BMW. Cringing I was !