rum4mo

But this was in Oz not cool/cold UK, so maybe she needed the AC on to stop herself from overheating - just a thought.

They are not supplied painted to your car's colour as you have discovered, but if you are really lucky you might find someone selling painted ones on ebay - I found a rear boot handle for my wife's 2002 VW Polo when it was only a few years old, I can't explain why anyone was selling pre-painted handles, other than maybe a batch from the factory were crap - as like on her car, and VW supplied a "shed" load of pre-painted handles to address that, and I was lucky enough to grab one! Spray + Lacquer pack from VW Group is the cheapest way to solve this - I did that once when retro fitting parking sensors.

Having now read this "guide" I'd think that you should be able to find some better ones either within this forum or elsewhere like SEAT Ibiza forums, VW Polo forums don't tend to have many useful guides (in my experience). So you will need the mentioned Torx bit for the strut clamping bolt and a suitable "hub opening" tool, there is one that is suitable for all VW Group hubs and is safe and easy to use. If you just buying a "general" hub opening tool, you need to be careful as to how much you open the pinch point as you don't want to crack it. The 12 point of Bi-Hex socket you need to work on the drive shaft nuts, needs to be slim - I bought a Laser Tools deep socket - and that worked okay. Taking the "hidden" brake shield off - I just used a 1/4" torx bit, jammed that down hard into the head of that screw using a screwdriver in the space between the hub and the head of this bit, and used a small adjustable spanner on the bit to turn it. Just in case you didn't know, in my experience, it is just corrosion on the heads of these screws that makes them hard to unscrew - their threads should still be as fresh/clean as the day they were fitted! Make sure that you use the exact same lower swivel assemble as used on your car - or you might end up with a camber error that you can't sort out by other means. Also really do check the condition of the wheel bearings currently fitted to any knuckles that you buy as these cars all like to "use" their wheel bearing especially the ones that have the heavier engines - ie all the cars that used these knuckles. My wife's 2015 VW Polo 1.2TSI 110PS 6MT 5 door, needed a new front wheel bearing at maybe 35,000 miles and it was never abused - its front wheel bearing got noisy due to maybe water getting in past the seals in the bearing pack.

That applies to most cars from 2010MY onwards, no one has yet, I think, built up enough data to support that not getting re-coding done saves or costs you more money over the life of that next battery - I just play safe or do as advised and always perform re-coding.

Maybe this would help:- 256mm to 288mm brake upgrade - Skoda Fabia Guides - BRISKODA

I'd think that if you searched within this forum that you'd find info on doing this, it MUST have already been covered, either in the MK1 or MK2 or even MK3 sections or resources, plus Google should be able to find this upgrade on Fabia/Polo/Ibiza.

Yes, if you have the smaller discs, to move up to 288mm discs will mean changing the knuckles. 288mm discs and the associated calliper will still allow you to use 15” wheels. My wife’s 2015 Polo 1.2TSI 110pS has 288mm front discs from factory and 16” alloys, but I use 2013 15” alloys in winter.

I've been using Gunsons Eezibleed for over 40 years, and in that time replaced the kits maybe 4 times. I quickly changed my normal way of doing things into, first cover the top of the under bonnet and wings with newspapers - just in case there are any leaks, then started fitting a collar of blue towelling around the reservoir cap area - as that was normally where the fluid escapes from. Then extended the air pressurising hose a lot and using a small garden sprayer as a pressure source. Then used a large cheap garden sprayer as a pressure source. My best and to date latest improvement has been to buy a used brake master cylinder and use its reservoir with the fluid outlets sealed together, as a test rig every time before using that kit - oh and maybe making sure that I'm using the correct cap and correct rubber seal (44/45mm plastic cap with “5” 43.00X3.00mm sealing washer – for use with all ATE systems inc VW Group). As said in the previous reply, I always clean everything out and dry it and store it in a warm place, ready for next time, which for our 3 local cars, is unfortunately this Spring! Old brake fluid gets absorbed into wood chippings/sawdust bought for that purpose as that seems to a correct way to prepare it for disposal.

Current Gunsons Easybleed kit includes a cap that fits VW Group cars from at least 2000 > 2019 from personal experience, just make sure that you use the correct sealing washer.

I'd think that it will be up to individual car sales places what sort of number plate fixings they use - so not a specific Skoda issue. I bought an ex Channel Islands hire car Ford Fiesta many years ago, it was being sold by a Mazda dealer locally, how they fitted the UK mainland number plates was just to hold the new plates roughly level and drill a couple of holes through the plates and plastic bumper cover - rough as badgers bottoms, Ford always provided mounting points on their cars. I think that that annoyed me enough to buy a set of new plates and fix them properly using stainless steel screws and correct colour caps.

Tayna prices might impress you, for maybe a Bosch, with next day delivery - if that is an option now that you have a charger to try to make it just about useable for a day or two.

Maybe just the car industry's way of preparing/converting drivers to what might be coming along next, that EV thing. I still think that I am a "manual gearbox" person, but there again I've never driven an DSG or EV.

My older daughter bought a 2009 SEAT Ibiza 1.4 16V 84PS SC, and it gave her no trouble, she went abroad on an exchange job thing and I kept that car and used it now and again, it rewarded me by starting to drain the battery, using only the internet as a resource, I discovered that one reason for that on that age of any VW Group marque car of that size and engine, was wrong programming of the BCM by the supplier! As too much time had run before this became an issue, the relevant TPS on this had rolled out of the visibility and/or knowledge of dealership workshops, result was when handed into a local SEAT dealership, a faulty "clockspring" was found and replaced, though VCDS had no found any fault codes logged, that did nothing to fix the battery draining, then that SEAT dealership was closed by the chain that owned it so that the land could be sold of housing! They gave me a reference which would allow SEAT to support me via another SEAT dealership's workshop! I had initially mentioned this "known issue" and that a TPS existed covering the recovery action, but that info had fallen on deaf ears. Maybe a year later, just before that daughter returned holiday for a month at Christmas over her "Summer" break, I approached another SEAT dealership, Arnold Clark in fact, the service reception guy knew exactly what I was talking about - luckily for me, as they had had to sort out a same age and engine VW Polo that they had in, so that made getting the correct info from SEAT mothership a lot easier, and that sorted out that problem. Now, I'd think that every "same" BCM programmed over a known period in time would have the same problem - and what did VW Group do about it - well after first discovering it and issuing a TPS, buggar all, just left all the affected cars to let down their owners and end up coming back one at a time into their dealerships, the "flash patch" update is free, but carrying out an exhaustive diagnosis was not free neither was the time spent finding and requesting the "flash patch" and then applying it. No doubt this way of doing things gets covered by "wear and tear" and so customer coughs up for manufacturer's supplier's mistake. This is VW Group's get out of jail free card which gets used quite a lot.

I put the "wheel bearing" issue, well on the 2015 VW Polo 1.2TSI, down to the factory fitted bearing was "Made in France" SNR! Probably a very good (cheap) part, if it's in one VW Group marque it is probably in all that use that hub assembly, or even complete suspension strut.

I had a front wheel bearing becoming noisy in a 2015 VW Polo 1.2TSI at around the 7 or 8 year point in its life and roughly 35,000 miles. Initially I thought it was just a combination of having oldish winter tyres on and the road surface in a certain region of Scotland - as that one area was the only time I could hear this noise. Then it was happening in more/most local roads, finally it was still making noises after I changed back to Summer wheels and tyres, so for me, it was game over - 2 F A G wheel bearing kits ordered followed by buying a cheap GEN2 bearing removal/fitting kit for the correct size of bearing that was fitted to that car. Changing both sides wheel bearing assemblies sorted that noise out, I assumed that it was "just" water ingress into the bearing on one side that was to blame. I had a similar issue on my old 2000 VW Passat 4Motion at maybe the 8 years 55,000 miles point - I prepared for the worse possible issue, ie front diff or gearbox - so was almost quite happy when my local VW dealership diagnosed it to be front wheel bearings, and I got them to replace both sides bearings. It seems that in many cases, VW Group cars do require new wheel bearings sooner than you might be expecting from your past experience of running older cars from other marques.

You mention the alternator and then water pump end, I'm sure that the mechanical, ie engine driven coolant pump, is at the gearbox end of the engine, there is probably an electric coolant pump though at the "other" end of the engine. I'm only mentioning this in case you assumed that the "water pump" is at the alternator end of the engine. So, maybe check around the electric coolant pump body for signs of leakage.

Yup, sensor 1 is the control sensor at the engine side of the cat or manu-cat, sensor 2 is the measuring sensor at the rear of the 2nd cat. The reason why I "liked" an earlier posting was that having a torn/leaking flexipipe in these cars normally means having to buy a pipe with a cat in it as most garages I found many years ago, just don't want to bother with sourcing a suitable duty, dia, length of flexitube and welding it into the existing exhaust - I had to get that done on a 5 years old 2002 VW Polo 1.4 BBY as the alternative at that time was to buy a genuine VW Group 2nd cat with pipe as the aftermarket were not into supplying for that engine yet.

One thing or issue I came across with any CTEK smart charger is, the instruction manual claims that once you have set the "mode" the first time, and if you are then, some time later using it for the same, then it will have remembered the previous setting. I found out, much to my disappointment, that it can not always be trusted to operate like that. What happened to me was, I had left my own car connected up for a couple of days or more, as I had used it previously many times, I just connected it up and switched it on - waited to see that it was indeed charging as expected, ie the LEDs were lighting up sequentially, and left it to get on with things. A couple or so days later, all looked good, ie it was at the end of the prog'd range of LEDs - but for some reason, I measured the voltage and it was presently at the CTEK "safe low level" - luckily I had not planned to need to charge up another battery just then as my car's battery had essentially been discharged instead of charged, so I cycled through the charging mode options, and that sorted that out. Now I always cycle round all the charge options before walking away, and so far no more charging problems.

I agree that I've always seen high charging when on the over run, this year only, is the first time that I've spotted that the charging voltage is always high when the ambient temperature is very low, it must have been happening in the past 5 or so years that I've been "glued" to the plug-in 12V DVM. Maybe what was concerning me was that I changed the still useful 59Ahr EFB for a 70Ahr AGM in my wife's 2015 VW Polo - just because it was then over 10 years old and on its original Exide VW Group battery - and the charging "behaviour" was not exactly what I had expected for a new battery, especially in winter. Now that the temperature has risen, that is no longer an issue heading into Summer.

For inner track rod joint wear, maybe just rock the steering wheel with just the ignition key in to open up the lock. I've only ever had that issue on a 2002 VW Polo and a 2009 SEAT Ibiza, both of them had electro-hydraulic power steering. The 2002 VW Polo had an advisory for that in an MOT so I followed that up quickly, confirmed that it was the inner ball joint(s) and replaced both arms and TREs. The 2009 SEAT Ibiza, I was working on the front suspension, broken spring, and I again rocked the steering wheel, felt/heard a slight "knock" then got my wife to do the steering wheel rocking while I held the track rods tightly so that I could work out if any knocking was coming from them.

Remember to use a suitable lubricant on the spring compressor rod threads, not doing that will cause dangerous wear on the rods and "nuts" - I'll admit to "being there done that" on my first "set of 3", they have now been replaced, ready for the next time.

The last time that I replaced the front and rear wiper blades on my wife's 2015 VW Polo, I bought a Bosch "correct parts" or set for the front wipers, and ended up finding that it was cheapest to buy the rear Valeo wiper blade from Valeo directly - which surprised me!

So, logically, if you are moving away slowly without any loss of grip at the front wheels, the coupling should not be providing any gearbox derived drive to load the rear diff - when you remove the Haldex pump fuse you are 100% removing the possibility that any gearbox derived drive is being fed to the rear diff. Kind of strange situation, are the front wheel tyres the same tread depth as the rear ones - just in case there is drive getting through and "wind up" is happening slightly? I ran a 1991 VX Cav GSI 2000 16V 4X4 for maybe 8 years back then, I replaced the tyres at one end and in doing so should have removed any difference in tread depth as fitting the same Pirelli model of tyres. It was a bit annoying to after that, find out that when I pressed the brake pedal there was always a "bump" from probably the propshaft support bearing, as we were away from home I just removed the 4WD fuse and that sorted that for the time being. When I returned home I booked the car into my local VX dealership "unequal tread depth between front and rear tyres" was the diagnosis! I measured the tread depth at all 4 tyres and it was exactly the same, so I measured the rolling radius of the front pair and the rear pair, the fronts were the same and the rears were the same, but the fronts and rears had different rolling radius - very annoying. So I gambled on the fronts being the "correct" versions as they came from a "better" local tyre place, and got them to supply another 2 new tyres and fit them on the rear, which were almost brand new, but had a bigger rolling radius. That sorted that out - also, as I retained the almost new but bigger rolling radius tyres from the rear, if I had got the wrong tyres replaced, I could refit the almost new ones onto the front. I can't explain why that happened, possibly just different factory Pirelli used, these almost new but "bigger rolling radius" for the same tread depth tyres ended up being gifted to the primary school my wife worked for as playground equipment. Note, with that 1991 VX Cav 4X4, bought slightly used, pressing the brake disengaged the rear drive "to improve stability under braking" - that car was other than that issue, the best car that I have ever owned, only equalled by my slightly used 2011 Audi S4. Edit:- maybe the Haldex controller is getting duff wheel sensor info from the ABS controller at slow speeds - or a wiring issue. Second Edit:- I'm assuming that when the Haldex was service, "re-learn" procedure was run to optimise the Haldex clutch gripping, same for the next pump? Mind you, the pump should only be running and so applying pressure to its clutch pack when front end slip is being detected - still sounds a lot like inconsistent/incorrect being fed to the Haldex controller front the ABS system.

Yes, the top bearing is the top spring seat. You will probably need to release the right hand side drive shaft to move the hub out of the way as the drive shaft on that side ends up limiting how far you can push the hub down to get the damper out of it. You can buy "hub expanders" very cheaply on ebay or just buy the set of 2 bits that get sold to do the same job, I ended up breaking a screw driver bit using it to open up the hub pinch point, none of my chisels were up to the job of staying in the slot, for the side that had a broken spring, so essential to sort out, I might have used a ground down allen key to open up the hub. After messing around on that first side I made sure that I had bought a set of "hub opener" bits - and they worked really well! In recent years I bought a "hub expander" tool to use on another car, and that also worked very well - using my "hub opener" VAG bits was not the best plan for that second VAG car front suspension job. Edit:- removing one end of the ARB drop link and the track rod end also makes this job easier, best plan to to replace any/all bolts and nuts you remove - maybe even prepare for fitting new ARB drop links as "getting rough" with the fixing nut might lead to messing or cutting an end off, just don't buy genuine VW Group ARB drop links as doing that will damage your wallet a lot for no good reason!

Chineseium, hummm, I try to avoid buying that sort of thing as far as car parts are concerned - certainly important ones anyway, but sometimes even when buying trusted brands, you can end up with something made in China - probably I'm being "brand snobbish" especially now that UK and to a lesser extent Europe, don't seem to actually manufacture much!