evilC

Are there any good ones? The Superb is well built large estate car with good dynamics and very good packaging - I don;t think that applies to the Dacia and besides it has Renault underpinnings that sends it to the bottom of the pile for me.

We must be close, I am in LE9 looking for King Richard's horse. When I am back back in circulation - I am self isolating for at least 12 weeks- I will get in touch

But I have been a huge advocate of the Cruise Control in both the Octavia and Merc, which I am in full control over, that is all that I want. Its the extent of the adaptive part that I find objectionable. I am not aware that my Superb can be personalise and if so does that mean that I have to re-programme the electronics every time we change drivers or is there a simple switch to identify individuals? The point here is that new vehicles always have MORE technology not less. I would love to purchase a vehicle with the specification I want and not what is presented to me. I enjoy all the vehicles in my stable but even the Merc is due a mod to the gearbox to allow the ETC to be temporarily disabled as well as the ABS (if possible) so as to improve control over a greater range of conditions. The so called safety features cannot assist in all circumstances and all conditions, when an experienced and knowledgeable driver can quickly adapt to them.

.Using any control in a vehicle should be 'one touch' as any thing else is a dangerous distraction also, those controls should be simply located by touch to maximise the attention on the road. Its a question of horses for courses. The 500E has 285,000 Kms on the clock, of which 190,000 Kms are mine, it cannot be fitted with a tow bar, for all sorts of sane reasons and parts for it are very scarce as only 1500 were built by Porsche. For example, LH dip headlamp lenses are non-existent and I must have purchased the last two from the state of the packaging. I therefore use it sparingly. I am all in favour of having worthwhile safety features in vehicles but the choice of which to use must be the driver's. The very sad fact is that a good deal of the add on modern safety features seem to have stemmed from the inclusion of abs that has allowed the inclusion of then ETC and the plethora of associated features that were very cheap add-ons. Parking sensors spawned Lane Assist, ACC (as opposed to CC) etc. Its clearly advantageous for the manufacturers to add these cheap features into vehicles as a sales point as well as persuading the legislators to mandate them so as to make their products more desirable. Crucially, having all these 'safety' features masks the real issue - poor driving. Training drivers properly and regularly would net much greater safety, but that wouldn't sell cars, in fact, it would reduce sales as less people would be declared competent?

Thank you for the sane and reasoned reply that I appreciate. When we bought the Superb I had to rely on the Brochure to tell me all the features that were included and I had hoped that those I didn't want or need I could turn off at the flick of a switch like abs and ETC. I find scolling through menus to adjust the 'inputs/features' highly distracting and therefore dangerous on the move. I have used simple CC for a long time and I suppose I have added my own 'adaptive features' to my normal use, but crucially my own features are much more sophisticated than any ecu, taking into account many more elements than the vehicle can register, its a case of the best ecu in any vehicle being the one between the driver's ears! It has been said on here that I should read and understand the owner's manual before driving. In the first instance, when I collected the car the salesman gave a brief induction before I drove the 120 miles home. He warned me that the OM contained instructions on many more features that related to higher specifications, so which ones do I have - it will be a process of elimination I fear? Having read the OM more than once,, all I can say is that is pathetically short of information, a quick comparison with our Octavia manual shows how devoid it is and yet it purports to cover many more features BTW what is VCDS? The point is I don't want ACC or its features or I want to tailor it to suit my driving style. I was not aware that the headlights and the ACC are adjusted to the GPS positioning, that is not something that is advertised. The take a break warning occurred when I was neither tired or had carried out an improper manoeuvre. I would welcome the opportunity to demonstrate my driving skills so that you could assess whether I am a 'crap driver'. I assume you are in someway qualified to make that assessment? As an aside, I have over the years taken refresher/advanced driving courses to ensure that I maintain a good level of competence, with one for example, being with an ex-Class 1 Police Driving Instructor. The question of how smart the coding is is subjective and depends on who is reviewing it, what may seem smart to some can be mundane to others. I have various cars that may be considered basic but I am a soul buddy to Peter Wheeler, the former owner of TVR, who produced exiting and potent motor cars (his Speed 12 was considered too fast for international sports car racing and had to be detuned to compete!) , without any geeky bits including abs or ETC, which he considered where unnecessary and detracted from the motoring enjoyment. You use the reference to Dacia Sundaro as an insult, but it was not so long ago that Skoda were producing similar cars powered by Renault family engines which also received derision, never mind that they won their class on the RAC Rally 13 years in a row! I seem to recall that the Dacia Sundaro is currently highly regarded with various international awards.

I have various other vehicles from a '74 VW1303S, '83 Alfa GTV6, '94 Merc 500E, a Clan Crusader (under construction) and an Aprilia RST Mille, all save the Merc have been modified (no need). All those vehicles I enjoy to the full and occasional compete with and indeed the recently demised Octavia did sterling service as part of the family. I cannot see me enjoying the Superb in the same way although I suppose that it will be useful in carting stuff around, towing the trailers and visits to the tip. It may be an issue with my 'control freakery' in a car, maybe I should have listened to my own advice and bought a Transit van as the family hack?

We purchased a 2020 Superb Combi 1.5Tsi SE at the end of January, ordered as a priority due to the Octavia TDi being declared an 'uneconomic repair' I chose the Superb SE as to fitted our needs and has been hailed as the best car in the sector. We had no time to test drive a Superb and besides, the sort of extended test I would need to carry out invariably isn't available, so I trust the 'experts' I am genuinely pleased with the car, its dynamics, architecture and space HOWEVER, I am sorely disappointed with the electronic technology that has been shovelled into the vehicle that is a dangerous distraction from safe and competent driving. You only need to checkout the plethora of 3 letter acronyms in the brochure that are proclaimed as the state of the art without once explaining their function or need. Starting off with A) The adaptive cruise control I have been a fan of cruise in my vehicles for the past 20 years that I use intelligently, switching it in and out to maintain good steady progress over many (sometimes hundreds of) miles that I am fully in control of. Adaptive cruise takes that control away as it has a mind of its own as to whether it accelerate, decelerate or violently brake as it cannot finesse all the surrounding vehicle. I find it both irritating and possibly dangerous that the ACC slams on the anchors as you pass a vehicle legitimately in the left lane. This occurs in speed restricted roadworks where at times all three lanes of a motorway can be travelling at different speeds and where cruise control is a distinct advantage, especially where the roadworks can be 20+ miles long. Today, I entered a long motorway off-ramp in cruise and passed a slow moving wagon in lane 1 of the motorway at which point the car slammed the anchors on to the fright of my wife! God help anyone who could have been following me. This raises a BIG issue for our trips to Europe where we have in the past relied on cruise control to easy the long journeys. Using cruise control whilst legitimately passing vehicles on the left side will result in a stop/start progress Don't the engineering nerds/geeks at VAG realise that their vehicle will be used outside of their normal countries? All I want is a non-adaptive cruise control. DRIVER ALERT! - TAKE A BREAK! It appears that I may have exhibited a too relaxed driving style and the stupid vehicle electronics had determined that I was falling asleep!! I can assure everyone that I was fully alert and driving very safely and making good progress. I have always been considered by others to be a particularly smooth and relaxed driver even when competing in motorsport events and I find it somewhat objectionable to be told that I appeared not to be driving properly by a stupid machine! This is just the beginning as the car has too many gimmicks on the basis of 'cos we can' rather than because it is needed. If there was a Superb (or any other competent similar car) without any of the gizmos I would have bought it, but we are stuck with an electronic nightmare. As an aside, Clarkson's Sunday Times column this week end was quite amusing in that he was ranting at all the nerd advice relating to the tech to be included in his new house, as he says, he is fully capable of turning the heating on and off manually and doesn't need a potentially suspect electronic gizmo that needs a cocktail stick to press the buttons!! So where are his principles in relation to the electronic junk that now plagues modern motoring brought in by the farhtocrats in Brussels?

I understood that Skoda's Service manual/schedule was available on line but all the link does is provide an owner's manual that I already have as a hard copy with the vehicle. The owner's manual is a poor reflection of past manual's and does not provide the general information that our previous Octavia manual has. It would be good to have a service schedule to ensure that the vehicle can be properly maintained.

Good Morrow, I have just joined the forum and look forward to the dialogue on many aspects of Skoda (and possibly other) ownership. Kind Regards Clive