Haggisking

Car is now sold I'm afraid!

I have the invoice for the cambelt and water pump dated 22/07/2014

Make & Model: As title: 2009 Octavia Elegance Estate - 1.9tdi PD Colour: Grey Mileage: ~107,000 (slightly below this, but still in use for another week) Price: £2250 Description: - MOT due 18/01/2024. - Service due 02/03/2024 This is the top spec. Elegance trim, so comes as standard with: - Rain sensing wipers - Cruise control - Dual-zone climate control - Rear parking sensors - central armrest/storage box - Adjustable boot floor The car is available from 28/03 onwards - unfortunately after this I will be transferring my NCD to the new car, so I will most likely be SORNing the Octavia till it sells. Test drives only with proof of fully comp insurance. Bank transfer on collection please. Happy to provide the reg. no for insurance quotes/to verify MOT history etc. Condition: Used - drives fine, has been our family car for the last 2 years, no mechanical issues I'm aware of (other than the MOT advisories shown above). Some minor cosmetic issues to be expected from a 13 year old car. The main "big" issues are as follows: - A dent to the corner of the bonnet (see photo). This is purely cosmetic and doesn't affect the bonnet opening/latching. - The rear driver side light cluster has a crack in it (see photo). I can't feel it from the outside, so it looks like it has been pressed in at some point and cracked the internal plastic - again, this is purely cosmetic, the light doesn't leak. - The gaiter(?) on the handbrake is broken, but doesn't affect the operation at all. - There is a small amount of kerbing & paint bubbling on the alloys. - Front tyres still have a few mm on, but could probably do with changing in the next 6-12 months (depending on your mileage of course). - Various slight chips, scuffs and scratches around the bodywork, consistent with the age & mileage; too many to list/photograph them all. I've touched these up as best as possible so they aren't really visible from a distance, but they are there and can be seen up close (will include the touch up paint as well). Service History/Receipts/Recent Service work: Almost full service history, although the book is missing a stamp from 2020. Plenty of receipts etc. from before I got it. For the last 2 years I've serviced it myself with Mann filters and Quantum VW 505.01 spec oil (receipts included) - last serviced 02/03/2023. New battery fitted in May 2021 (Varta Silver). New windscreen in June 2021 Service book shows that the cambelt was changed at 66,782 As can be seen from the latest MOT, there was quite a bit of work done on the suspension a couple of months ago. Extras: - Car has a removable towbar + 7 pin electrics (was already installed) when I got it - I've fitted leather front seats from an Audi A6 S-Line - much better than the stock Skoda seats. These are wired in (airbag, seatbelt sensor & electric lumbar support are connected, the heating element is not as the car has no original control for this). - The stereo has been upgraded to an Xtrons Android Auto head unit, including canbus, so displays heating controls & parking sensors etc. this also has a reverse camera. The original stereo and dash trim to install it will be included. - I've done the auto-headlights mod (basically a new switch and extra wire) I'll also include the following extras for free if wanted, as they will be no use to me for my new car: - Lockable Thule Roof Bars - Halfords Towbar mounted bike carrier - Full set of "Car Shades" fitted sun blinds Shipping: N/A Collection: B34 - happy to travel a short distance to drop it off as long as there is a station nearby or you're willing to give me a lift home! Pictures:

Yup, that's what it's wired in with at the moment - came with the dashcam hardwire kit, I've just pulled that for now so it's completely disconnected. It looks like the rear wiper is the one people usually use, so I'll give that a try I've also ordered that solar trickle charger suggested in the other thread you linked to help keep it topped up when not in use Thanks

Hi, Thanks for the reply, apologies for not responding sooner but I wanted to keep an eye on what was happening with it to give a bit more info first. The battery charged fine overnight, hooked it up, all working fine. Reading ~12.8v when connected, 14.4v when idling, so alternator seems fine. Unfortunately it lasted 3 days, then wouldn't start again yesterday (Sunday) afternoon. Charged again last night, again all working fine this morning. Dropped the youngest off at childcare, then an hour later when walking past the car to take the oldest to school, noticed that the dashcam was still on! 🤔 Had a quick skim through the recordings and it has been on 24/7 for the last... I don't even know how many days!! I've tried a full reset of the camera but that's made no difference, it doesn't switch off, so almost certainly the culprit - I've disconnected it fully for now, so we'll see what the battery voltage is later this evening. I guess the best solution now will be to find an ignition switched fuse to connect it to (it was on the cigarette lighter fuse, which I guess must be permanently live). In terms of claiming on the warranty - they want me to send it off to them so they can test it first, which I guess is reasonable enough, but would leave me without a car for a week which isn't ideal, unless I pick up another battery 😞

Went to start the car this evening and it wouldn't turn over - typical low battery symptoms, dash lit up like a christmas tree etc. The battery is only a year old and a decent brand (Varta Silver E44), and while the car hasn't been doing huge mileage, it still gets taken out almost every day (albeit on short journeys) and, on a longer run (20 miles+) at least once a week. It has an XTRONS head unit fitted, and I've heard these can have some parasitic load even when the car is off, but that's been in there basically since I got the car and never had an issue before (even during covid when it could be sat for a week+ without moving). There is one unusual thing I did today, which was use the button on the key fob to open all the windows (just an inch or so to get some air in) since it has been so hot, and left it like that for a couple of hours - could this have had anything to do with it? Edit: I do also have a hard-wired dashcam, but again that has been in there pretty much since I got the car Other than that is there anything else in particular to check for? I have a multimeter, so I can check voltages etc. when the car is running - what should I be looking for to make sure it's not the alternator etc? Currently have the battery out and on a trickle charger - need to take my youngest for a hospital checkup first thing so hopefully it's got enough charge to get us going in the morning! Fingers crossed it is either some kind of drain from leaving the windows open or the battery (still under warranty), since with all other bills going up, could do without having to fork out £££ for the car as well 😞 Any advice welcome, thanks!

Yup, first thing I did was take all the others out and replace with normal wheel nuts, I figure the chances of me getting a flat and needing to change the tyre is higher than the risk of someone decided to steal some beaten up alloys from a 12 year old Octavia 😄

I did... but unfortunately this was by taking it to the tyre fitters 😞

Yeah, the spiral socket is what I tried, but it was a cheap £10 set from Amazon (figured it was something I'm unlikely to use very often). Unfortunately the biggest size was 19mm which is "just" too small, I spent about an hour trying to hammer it on to the nut, but couldn't get it on far enough to actually grip 😕

Went to change my brake pads last weekend and one of my locking wheel bolts has completely stripped the splines - it's basically just a perfect circle in the middle now. I managed to hammer a 20mm socket on the outside, but that is just spinning when I apply any force to it. I picked up a pack of nut/bolt extractors, but the largest one was 19mm which doesn't quite go on - managed to hammer it on about half way, but it just slips off when I apply any force to it - I can't find a 20mm nut extractor anywhere 😞 I took it down to the local tyre fitter over the weekend after spending several hours swearing at it, and they tried pretty much the same as me with no luck, so it's booked in for Thursday to have a socket welded on, but is there anything else I can try before then to save a few £? Frustratingly, the wheel was off a few weeks ago to check the disks and pads while I was servicing it and the nut came off no problem then, so I guess I've just over-tightened it 😞

Audi A6 B6 front seats will fit with a bit of very basic modification - I put some S-Line ones in mine. There's an extra metal locating lug on the rails from the Audi seats which needs removing - 30 seconds with a hacksaw Electrical connectors don't fit - you'll need to either make some adapters or cut the plugs off and rewire them with the ones from your original seats (I did the latter). If you don't currently have electric seats then you'll need to run wiring some wiring. I picked up manual seats with the electric lumbar adjustment, and piggybacked off the cigarette lighte, but if I'd gone for electric seats I would have run it directly from the fuse box. I believe the memory seats require more than just power - an additional control module or something? I didn't bother wiring up the heated seat pads, I believe these also require an additional control module - if this is something you want then there are plenty of aftermarket kits on ebay etc. From my research before fitting these, there isn't really anything else which will fit the rear seats without significant modification.

When I got my Octavia, I ordered a set of "Skoda Octavia (2004 - 2013) Classic Car Mats" from CarMats4u, which fit perfectly and don't interfere with the accelerator at all. Looking back at my emails, they were ~£25 delivered. Seem pretty well made & good quality.

I had to refit mine recently as I had my windscreen replaced and the guy didn't put it back on properly (only noticed when my mirror wasn't dimming!) You need to separate the plastic shell (this is quite stiff and feels like it's going to break), and then there should be 2 metal hooks on the back of the mirror arm. These slide onto the part that's attached to the windscreen from front to back - it will slide on a bit and feel like it's stuck, but doesn't line up fully with the mount, so carry on (I found the easiest way was thumbs on the top of the windscreen part, forefinger on the bottom of the mirror part, and squeeze) it takes a bit of force to get it all the way on, but will pop into place with a nice satisfying clunk. Just make sure you have the wiring in place first as it can be very fiddly to connect after it's fitted!

Forgot to say, make sure it's the S Line seats, the normal ones aren't as good I think, only "problem" is you'll end up with S Line logos on them (you might not care, it doesn't bother me )

The donor car was a 60 plate A6 saloon, so no chance of the rears fitting (although actually, I haven't tried), as far as I'm aware, any C6 (2004-2011) variant will do. In my case (manual cloth Elegance), the following connectors needed to be swapped: Driver side: Airbag (3 pin yellow), seatbelt (2 pin black) Passenger side: Airbag (3 pin yellow) The donor seats came with 4 connectors: Airbag (3 pin yellow) - easy swap, the wire colours match Seatbelt (black, not sure of the connector as it was already missing) - different colours, but I just matched up the ones with the stripe - possibly doesn't matter as I'm guessing it just checks for an open or closed circuit. Seat Electrics (8 pin red, although only 4 wires) - had to do some research on this one, it appears 2 of the wires (pins 4 + 5) are for the lumbar control, and the other 2 are for the rear footwell lights, I didn't bother with the lights, just connected the lumbar to 12V Seat Heating (green 6? pin) - no idea, ignored this one as I don't have the wiring. If you just solder/heatshrink the new connectors on, it's probably quicker, and in hindsight I think this would have been a better option as I can't envision swapping them back. There's also an extra locating pin on the Audi seats which I cut off with hacksaw and then filed down, otherwise they just drop in. You'll lose the rear seat pockets, and the storage under the passenger seat (could probably be attached somehow, but I couldn't get the screw holes to line up).

Managed to pick up some A6 S Line seats over the weekend, and spent yesterday swapping them over, relatively straightforward - the most time consuming part was crimping all the connectors so I could easily swap the plugs back if needed! The electric lumbar adjustment connection was a bit of a PITA to run the 12v to, but after a bit of research, they have a relatively low current draw (the original fuses are 5A), so I piggybacked them off the lighter socket. All fully working, night & day in terms of comfort! They are full leather heated, I was trying to figure out if it was possible to get an aftermarket heated seat kit and just hook it up to the existing pads, but I don't think that would work too well. Happy with it all for now anyway - will see how they are in winter and can always stick an aftermarket kit in if they are too cold! Back seats don't look too bad even though they don't match, so don't think I'll bother with those for now. Now I just need to get rid of the rear Audi seats and figure out what I'm going to do with the old Skoda fronts!

Not a problem - will probably end up sticking some connectors on each set so they can be easily swapped/returned to stock if needed

A potential new solution: Audi A6 fronts L&K rears (and possibly door cards) Yes it will still be a hybrid mishmash of scavenged parts, but I think the leather rears will probably match the fronts better than the current cloth ones.

So I've had a reply and a few more pictures for the A6 seats I was looking at, they are indeed manual and look to be in pretty good condition, there is a bit of wear to the driver side bolster, but nothing major. In terms of connectors, there are 3, yellow (airbag), black (I guess for the seat belt sensor?) and red (lumbar support?) looking at the current connections, I have yellow and black on driver side, so I guess those are a straight swap (or at least easy rewire) but for the red connector, I would need to find a spare fuse and run a 12v connection? Passenger side currently only has the yellow connector, so again, easy swap, could I just piggyback the 12v from the driver side for power or would it need a separate run from the fuse box?

It seems another member has managed to get the golf Mk5 rears to fit That certainly swings it towards the Golf - those seats look the same as the ones i'm looking at, although that thread doesn't say if they've gone into a hatch or estate. Also the Golf set near me is full leather, whereas the A6 ones are half leather. Probably true about the quality being better on the Audi ones though. Choices...

I was under the impression that the estate and hatch had different rears? Can't see much in the way of comparison between the Ambient and Elegance seats, but it does look like the VRS have lumbar support on both driver and passenger side? I take it they have airbags (from what I can tell all MK2 have, but they weren't standard on MK1 VRS?) Although something more local would be preferable, Lancashire isn't too bad, depending on price and condition. Supposed to be heading up to Manchester at some point in the next few weeks anyway, so potentially something could be arranged. I'm guessing you mean the half-leather white/grey and black ones? Or is there a full leather option?

Assuming you mean for an FL estate (or PFL if they are a straight swap)? Any idea how they compare to the standard cloth ones in the Elegance? I think her main complaint was the lack of lumbar support (which is probably why I don't find them too bad since the driver's seat has this).

Nice as Volvo seats are, that sounds like far more effort than I can be bothered with to be honest! Really I'm looking for as clean a swap as possible, but willing to put up with front/rear mismatch as long as it's not too glaring. Thanks for the feedback on the L&K seats, maybe not such a good option then. Seems like the A6 ones are the best option in terms of comfort then? They seem to be the easiest to get hold of too!

I know this has been asked a couple of times, but there seem to be numerous threads with partial info, or don't really come to a conclusion :( Following a recent 5hr trip, my other half was complaining how uncomfortable the passenger seat in my 2009 FL Elegance estate is compared to our previous car. Whilst I don't find them too bad, I'm inclined to agree that they could be a lot better! So far, from research, it appears the options are: An alternative FL estate (either VRS or L&K) - easiest option, should be a straight swap, but are they likely to be any more comfortable? Mk5/6 Golf - fronts should just drop in, but might need to do some rewiring of connectors, rears won't fit Audi A6 C6 S-Line - fronts should be a relatively easy fit after removing down an additional locating lug, might need to do some rewiring of connectors, rears won't fit Audi A3 8P S-Line - same as the A6 Audi A4 B7 S-Line - same the A6 (I'm not sure if these actually fit, but a couple of posts on some Audi forums suggest they seem to be interchangeable with the A3/A6?) In all cases I need to make sure they are manually adjusting, not electric as I don't have the necessary wiring. So far locally to me I've found: A set of leather PFL L&K estate seats, I've messaged the seller to check if they are electric or manual. (Did they even do the L&K in manual?), also, as they are PFL will they fit my FL? These would be the ideal option if so. A set of leather Golf MK5 GT seats (actually same seller as above), have messaged to check if they are electric or manual. A set of half-leather Audi A6 seats which look in good condition Any other options I'm missing? Thanks!

Yes it's this one here: https://xtrons.co.uk/skoda-octavia-reversing-camera-camskot01, As mentioned though, unfortunately the screw holes don't line up properly, so maybe better going for the boot opening one as linked by @Phil-E above - here is mine installed atm: https://photos.app.goo.gl/PSrdv9HuHqEJFG287