Bassthang

I need to replace the sidelight bulb in my 2005 Octavia. The manual says I need to remove the entire headlight assembly, which seems easy enough (just three steps in the manual). However, it then says that the headlight should be checked by a specialist after it has been replaced. So, we'd be talking upwards of £50 garage fees to replace a £2 bulb! I've had a poke around and it may be possible to replace the bulb by carefully feeling around in the back of the headlight assembly, but of course it could be fiddly, not seeing what I'm doing. So I'm interested in how everyone else does it. Is it OK to extract the whole assembly, without having to take it to a garage to have the alignment checked? Or is it easy enough to do it in situ? I had a similar problem with a Passat, but that was even worse: the manual said that to change a bulb you had to first remove the front bumper, then pull out the headlight! This is crazy coming from a German manufacturer, given that in Germany it's a legal requirement to be able to change bulbs at the side of the road. I took it to a VW dealer, where one of the mechanics simply swapped the bulb from behind. It took about 2 minutes! I'm hoping it will be just as easy with the Octavia.

Thanks Paulski. This sounds like my sort of car!

Not sure, but I've set my AutoTrader saved search to filter out anything not ULEZ (which isn't always the same as CAZ, but close enough). That is currently just giving me 2litre models (which I'd prefer, as my old Passat was that size). I'm getting a bit confused with it all now. . .

Thanks for the detailed reply, Phil. So, basically you're saying that the newer petrol engines are better (for the same size engine) than the older petrol engines? That's good news, as it opens up more possibilities to consider. I admit that I really like diesels: the ability to pull away in almost any gear is very handy (although perhaps it encourages sloppy driving!), but at the end of the day, it's reliability, economy and ease of driving that are top of my list, so I should look into all the options. Regarding the journeys: I tend to do shopping trips of about 35-40 miles round trip on quiet, country roads, but we also make one or more longer journeys (often on motorways) in a week, so that should give the DPF chance to regenerate at high revs (sorry if my terminology or understanding of DPFs is incorrect, but this is new to me). I avoid driving into the city as much as possible - I hate it! - but I need a CAZ vehicle as I do at least one trip into the Brum CAZ each week for rehearsal/recording. If it weren't for the CAZ requirement, I would have a much larger selection of cheaper vehicles to choose from. As it is, it's a bit of a balancing act!

I currently drive an 05 Octavia Elegance estate, 1.6 litre, petrol engine, 5 gear manual. My previous car was a 2 litre TDI 6-speed diesel Passat. Compared to the Passat, this Octavia is very underpowered. I have to rev it a lot more, and it's hopeless going up hills. The fuel economy is also nowhere near as good, with 35-45 mpg on most journeys, and not much better on long motorway trips. But during the pandemic it's been fine for my uses. However, when we start travelling around again (usually to hilly places like mid-Wales), I'd like something that can cope with the hills and that I don't have to rev up too much to pull away at lights. What I don't know is whether the poor performance is because it's (a) petrol-engined (b) only 1.6 litre or (c) because this example is not running right and needs some attention. I'm looking at replacing it this year, and the obvious thing to do is to find a 2litre, 6-speed diesel version, as that should deal with (a) and (b) straight away. These are somewhat harder to find than the petrol and 1.6 versions though - and more expensive. So my question is for those who drive Octavias: is a 1.6 litre diesel better than a 1.6 petrol? Or is it the better gear ratios of the 6-speed models that improve the pulling-away performance? Or should a 1.6 petrol be performing better than I'm seeing, and maybe I've just got a bad one? I'm looking at other makes of estate car too (Mazda6, for instance), but I've started to like the Octavia, and I have heard that Skoda's reputation for reliability is good (whereas VW's has plummeted recently). I'm also limited by a distrust of electric parking brakes (another reason to spurn VWs which have gone over to electric parking brakes with many reports of serious problems - there are recent Octavias that still have a proper manual handbrake on them).

I think the problem that the original garage staff were worried about was the amount of rust. They reckoned that fitting the new shocks would be a problem because the mounting points were so rusty, meaning extra work (maybe welding) to complete the job. I must admit that this vehicle is VERY rusty! Having driven VW Passats for the last few years, I was surprised at how much rust was present all over this car. I knew VWs were good from that point of view, but I thought that over the years the other manufacturers had caught up. Maybe that was one of the cost-saving measures of earlier Skodas. I'll ask around and see if I can get some better estimates. I'm thinking of moving on (and another, newer, Octavia is on my shortlist), but if I can get this one fixed up for not too much money (it also needs work on the handbrake), it will buy me more time to find a better successor. It's CAZ-compliant, so still potentially sellable.

My 2005 Octavia had an horrendous chuck-chuck noise coming from the back as I drove home last night. When I got home I found that the back plate / shield had rusted and torn off and become caught inside the wheel. I was able to extract the piece this morning, but of course I now have a car with no shield on one wheel. I've been reading these comments and see that fitting a new one is probably not something I could safely attempt myself, as it involves the removal of the discs. I'm in the process of finding a new car anyway, so I don't want to spend lots of money having a garage fit a new shield (or, more likely, four shields, as you can bet the others are similarly rusted and falling apart). I approached a garage a few months ago about replacing the rear shocks and they advised me to just get rid of the car, as the work would cost much more than the car is worth. Is it OK to drive a car with one of these shields missing? Hopefully it'll only be for a week or two until I can find a replacement.

This may seem like an elementary question to ask, but I've been a diesel driver (two Passat TDIs) for the last 20 years. I now have a petrol-engined 05 Octavia Elegance, and I'm finding it a lot harder to come to terms with. It may be that I'm simply having problems because I need to re-learn how to drive a petrol-engined car, or (more likely, I think) there are problems with the engine on this one. Hopefully it might be something as simple as needing a basic service. When I put the key in, the "engine" and EPC lights in the rev counter both come on and stay on until the key is turned. The somewhat vague user manual seems to be saying that these should go out after a few seconds, but other Octavia users I've spoken to reckon that this is normal behaviour. The car also beeps six times when the key goes in, but I can't find anything in the manual that tells me what this means. There are no errors appearing in the central information display. It may be that this is just a service interval reminder. I have no idea when it was last serviced - the last one recorded in the book was 2013! The car is quite underpowered. We have a lot of hills where we live, and whereas the old diesel just flew up the hills in almost any gear, this one really struggles unless in a very low gear. When I pull away, the revs take a sudden nose-dive when the clutch bites, no matter how careful I am with the clutch and accelerator. Again, this was never a problem with the diesel, and this may be just a matter of me re-acquainting myself with some basic driving techniques that I've not had to use for a while. It's been fine driving around our local (semi-rural) area, but last night I was on an urban journey which involved sticking to 30 on a long, straight road, due to traffic management, and I noticed for the first time that the vehicle felt like it was faltering every now and then, instead of running smoothly at a constant speed. Fuel economy is nowhere near as good as I'd hoped. The onboard system reports 40mpg average on the journeys I normally do (slow and urban at the start, then long stretches of rural roads at higher speeds with few junctions), but I have noticed that I'm putting fuel in more frequently than I did with the old diesel, which reported similar mpg. The fuel gauge needle seems to waver up and down (possibly due to the angle of the vehicle), whereas that on the old diesel was steady and consistent, so this may be colouring my perceptions of how much fuel it's using. My guess is that it simply needs a good service with changes of air and fuel filters, and maybe new spark plugs, but there may be something else going on. Before I take it in to a garage, I'd appreciate any opinions of other users (especially anyone who has experience moving from a diesel to a petrol vehicle).