Bassthang

This little snippet on Euro car parts site may answer my question: "Most heater motors are powered by a basic electrical circuit that utilizes a multi resistor or a solid state resistor to control different fan speeds (low, medium & high). If the resistor malfunctions then only circuit remaining is the high speed setting." But then, this is the same site that reckons my 2015-registered car was built in 2016!

I need to replace the blower in my 2015 Octavia estate. I found a great video that showed how to get at it, so no problem there. I can buy what looks like a brand new exact replacement (same make and number) for about £100 online, but it comes without the the regulator board. That costs another £100! Does anyone know if there's a way of testing which is faulty? I'd expect that it might be a case of putting a voltmeter across the wires going from the regulator to the motor and seeing if there's a voltage, but modern electrical gear never seems to be that simple! That is, I can imagine the regulator board being able to detect a short in the motor winding and shutting down to protect itself. It may be that I have to just bite the bullet and buy both. . .

Thanks, I'll look into this! "pay a garage just to fit a new battery and probably do it wrong." - that's something else I'm worried about! What are the repercussions of a botched battery fit or coding? Just a failure of stop/start, or a reduced battery life?

I've just been looking into this tonight, as my battery is apparently on the way out. I wondered why the stop/start was only sometimes working (although this behaviour suddenly began after it came back from a service a year ago, which originally led me to think the mechanic knew a way to turn it off). It was erratic for most of last year. I could never guess when it was going to work or not. As time went on, it seemed to work less and less and it's now been several weeks since it last did a stop/start. I didn't mind too much as I always manually turned it off anyway. But when I took it to another garage last week to have some work done, I was told that the battery is probably on the way out. It starts OK manually, even in the cold. It takes a couple of turnovers to get going though, and I suppose with stop/start that's just too long a delay, which may be why the stop/start seems to be disabled permanently now. I was shocked when they reckoned on £200+ for a new stop/start battery! I've found various articles that seem to be saying a stop/start battery is best left to a garage to fit, as it's not as straightforward as in the old days. Cirkey! Here we go again. . . Soon we'll have cars that you have to take to a main dealer to top up the screenwash or get air in the tyres. . . So I'm interested in hearing how people have got on, DIY installing stop/start batteries. At the very least, it may need some re-coding. Is this something that an owner can do easily, or is it hidden away in the system where only a knowledgeable mechanic or enthusiast can find it? I've also read that the battery has to be fully charged before fitting it. If I bought a battery from (say) Halfords, would it be ready-charged? (Sorry to ask such an obvious question, but I haven't had to install a new battery for years!) I might just take it to a garage to get done, but if I can save a few quid by doing it myself, then I'd like to have a go. I haven't yet checked whether I've got an EFB or AGM in my 2015 Octavia 1.6 diesel, but I imagine that the procedure will be the same for both.

Hi all. I've just found this thread after doing a little searching. I have a 2015 Octavia diesel estate 4x4, and the aircon was fine until just a month or so ago. Then it started to smell like the inside of a 1970s vacuum cleaner bag. 'Oribble! The strange thing is, the car had just had its first service of my ownership (I bought it in September) when the smell started to occur, so the timing makes me suspect that something was not done right when it was serviced, but I'm trying to make certain before I go back to the garage about it. It may be just an unlucky coincidence. After all, it should have had the pollen filter replaced during that service (it's one of the items I was billed for). I've never had the aircon on any previous car do this, even when I haven't used it for a long time. The aircon in this car is always active (the dealer recommended this, as a way of staving prolonging the life of the aircon - I'm not sure exactly what his reasoning was, but he seemed knowledgeable on a great many car issues, so I'm inclined to believe him). One more possibility: I always park the car on my sloping front drive, which is quite steep. The car is always backed onto the drive so is left pointing downhill. After it rains, when I open the front doors, water pours out of the sills (although it never seems to get inside the cab - carpet is dry). It may be that there is some water ingress somewhere due to this. I might try parking it facing uphill for a while. Having said that, this "vacuum cleaner bag" smell doesn't resemble any damp smell I've encountered, so I'm more inclined to think it's bacterial.

I've just found this thread. Very interesting! I've just upgraded from a 2005 Octavia 1.6 FSI to a 2015 Octavia 4x4 1.6 diesel. I was hoping for better MPG from this than I got with the old petrol version, but it's not much better. I miss my old 2003 VW Passat (2.0 TDI) that seemed to run on the sniff of fuel! I was wondering if I'd made a mistake getting a 4x4 (not by choice - there are very few affordable diesel, CAZ-compliant, pre-2017 Octavias with real handbrakes out there right now and time was running out). The salesman reckoned there wasn't much between the MPG of the 4x4 and the normal diesel, but then he would say that if he thought I was wavering! It's still a nice, comfy car to drive (as was the old petrol one), although it still feels a little "reluctant" to move, compared to the old 2.0 Passat, which could pull away in almost any gear with no effort.

Thanks for putting me right on the "breather". That just shows the depth of my technical know-how - doh!

I'm pretty sure that I'd pushed it in as far as it would go, and it would go no further, so I don't think it was failing to push past any valve or other mechanism in the pipe. But I could have been wrong. I'd also tried withdrawing it back from that position slightly, to see if that would make a difference. I'll give it another go, though. . .

Finbar Saunders would love this thread. . . :¬)

Thanks for the replies. So far we've got one vote for shoving it in hard and one for having it further out. Looks like it's just the luck of the draw! At least it doesn't seem that the car has a mechanical fault though. Phew!

I've just acquired a 2015 Octavia estate, 1.6 diesel, 4x4. Both times I've tried to fuel up, the pump has clicked constantly, forcing me to keep the trigger just slightly pressed. It now takes ages to put in even a small amount of fuel. I've done a general web search and found advice ranging from "This happens with lots of cars, you just have to put up with it" all the way to "Such-and-such component is faulty, it needs to be replaced". Components have included a valve and some sort of charcoal filter. Some of the comments were probably referring to petrol engines, so I don't know which are relevant. However, one thing about this car is that it was very dirty in places. We were told that it had been valeted, but when we picked it up we could see straight away that it had just had a quick surface wipe in places. Much of the inside of the car was still dirty and we found artefacts from the previous owner. When I opened the fuel flap, the whole area inside was thick with dirt and grease. It was still like this the first time I fuelled up, but I cleaned it all out before the next fuelling. There was a lot of crud on and around what looks like a breather tube. I would bet that this may be the cause of the problem. I got as much as possible away from the surface of the tube, but haven't tried cleaning down inside the tube, in case I make it worse (for instance by dropping something other than fuel into the tank). Has anyone else had this problem? Are there any recommended ways of safely cleaning the breather tube (if that's what it is)? Or is it more likely that there is a more serious problem to deal with that might require a garage? There was a warranty with the car, so I might be able to get it done on that. Or is this just something that we have to put up with? Both times were at the same petrol station, but different pumps. It may be that other stations have different pump nozzles that won't have this problem with this car. The photos show the fuel cap area, before (or rather, during - I forgot to take a photo before I started) and after cleaning.

I've just been reading about the emissions fix elsewhere on Briskoda and on other forums. It's all a bit confusing, with lots of people giving contrary opinions. The most interesting discussion I've found so far is on a rock climbing site! https://www.ukclimbing.com/forums/off_belay/vwskodaaudi_emissions_recall_-_any_experiences_of_the_fix-655762

Something like these?

Just to update the thread: the car needed both rear shocks/springs and a handbrake caliper changing when I took it in for a service (and because of the noise from the rear shocks when they iced up). The garage told me it would cost so much to do this that they recommended just getting rid of the car and getting another one. This was back in January! Since then, I've spent most of my time looking for a replacement (a process compounded by needing Clean Air Zone compliance, but wanting a diesel engine, 6 gears and a proper handbrake - all on a modest budget - that limited the choice!). I even considered estates like the Astra, Mazda6 and Peugeot 308SW. In the end I found a 2015 Octavia with 4x4 that pretty much fitted the bill. It's still only 1.6 litre, but the diesel engine and 6 gears really does make a difference. The fuel consumption is still higher than I'd like, but at least it's only £30 tax - and even the insurance is cheaper than the old petrol model. I'd heard from a few people that the 4x4 mode on these (it's not a Scout) and some other cars is not a full 4WD but just a temporary one that kicks in when needed, so that sounds exactly right for our situation (living on a hill that's always icier than everywhere else around here).

Thanks for the info. Interestingly, I thought the sound was OK from this system, but yesterday we tried playing some of my partner's favourite music on it - Muse. She suddenly announced that the sound quality was bloody awful. To my ears, most Muse is incredibly badly produced with some questionable decisions made about distortion, tone and so on (not to mention the modern mania for having everything maxxed-out all the time, to leave the listener shell-shocked), so to me it didn't sound any worse than normal. The day before, I'd tried Fleetwood Mac's "Tusk" with the car stationary on the drive, and it sounded great! I think I need to test it out with more 70s-produced music. Hmm. . . War of The Worlds, Deep Purple, Yes, Genesis, Rainbow, Jethro Tull. That'll do for starters. . . :¬)