nta16

Hi, welcome. If it's a rubber belt VWSkoda UK finally admitted to yearly checks and 15 yr/180k-miles change (that's after many of us paid them for 5yr/50k-mile changes, the robbing buggers). Only doing 5,000 miles a year may not be as good for the car in some ways as you think and can often shorten the life of some things rather than lengthen them, plus there are other parts that can play up or fail so have some checks for the next 5 years at least. As you didn't seem to know about the previous 5yr/50k-miles are there any other service and maintenance items your car might have missed? Do you keep an eye on the state of charge of your car battery regardless of if the engine starts and the lights seem bright enough? Out of date so ignore prices. -

The higher octane petrols also generally have higher levels of cleaning additives which you may feel give additional benefits. As you have a more sporty engine you may wish to take advantage of that by sticking to the required 98 (+) octane petrol, as stated it "can increase the power and reduce the fuel consumption". Why bother having a higher powered engine and not run it on the recommended rating of fuel and have "slight power loss" and "slightly increased fuel consumption" other than only having 95 available as a top up to get you to the next available 98 fuel, or cost, in which case why have a sporty engine.

Yes going in different gears before might help, making sure the revs are right down to idle especially for reverse, sometimes letting the car roll forward or back a very small amount can help for first. Pushing the clutch down twice before selecting gear might help too, bit hit and miss if i's "off cog". Probably not a different grade but wider grade and better quality oil might help when the gearbox is very cold or warm/hot - but these may be very marginal differences if your existing gear oil is at correct level and good condition. Any change in gearbox oil you notice will be pure placebo, any mechanical engineer will tell you this and they are never wrong, as they will always tell you. 😄 They are why travelling Encyclopaedia salesmen went out of business, if you know the old joke. Tony, I change the gearbox oil on my wife's 2015 Fabia at 5 1/2 years old and 38k-miles and she said she did notice the difference and we've been together far too many decades for her to say anything just to please me. If I was you I'd go for something very good like Millers EE Performance MTF 75W "Fully synthetic gear oil with ester technology". It will protect more and for longer. Look for it selling at lower price somewhere. As the box appears to have a 1.1 litre refill you could either go for one 1-litre bottle as residue oil is always left in the box, or go for two 1-litre bottles and use some of the second botte (warmed in water or left out in the sun on a warm day on warm tarmac or concreate) as a good rinse-flush after the last drops of existing oil has drained. I found the gearbox overfilled I presumed from factory so if yours is the same with plenty left in a second bottle you could if you want to and wanted to go to the bother overfill again but I'd not bother, perhaps the overfill makes selecting gears more difficult. 🤣 Millers EE Performance MTF 75W "Fully synthetic gear oil with ester technology" - https://www.millersoils.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/8327.pdf If you do an oil change get the gear oil warm/hot before draining, leave to drain to drops, warm flush-rinse oil if you want, always check you can fully remove the fill plug before you remove the drain plug for obvious reasons. But like forgetting to put the engine oil drain plug back in and torqued before putting fresh oi in these mistakes do happen. On my wife's Fabia the fill and drain plugs were close to each other in position of both depth and proximity. The fill plug was a PITA to get at with the tools I had available. I don't have a pressure filler so I used an always very relucent "glamorous assistant" to till the gearbox from the engine bay using a funnel and garden hose off-cut whilst I laid under the car making sure the 1/2" pipe stayed in the filler hole and to shout stop when the oil started coming out. I also have to take the plastic under-shield off and put it back on which is always a PITA thing for me, I am always a very reluctant "mechanic" on my cars or this VW product (simple jobs on neighbour's cars a lot less so). Whether you do an oil change or not let us know how you get on.

Well done on getting the car to its age. As for coming back, great to see you.

I thought your car was fully serviced but I might have been mistaken. Not having your engine code I had to guess at DKLD to look the part up, whilst doing so I found a thread on Briskoda about 1.0 TSI in UK being known to have throttle body issues which was dealt with by part replacement but as the part is expensive (in UK at least) and may or may not be an issue I would certainly start with cleaning it properly to see if that gives any improvement. To clean it properly it needs to come out and be properly and thorough cleaned, it looks like after you've removed whatever is necessary to get at it you just need to remove the "retaining bar" by taking its "holding bolt" out, Personally I would always use a good make of specialised throttle body cleaner rather than a more generally cleaner as I always expect the correct chemical(s) product to do all the hard work of cleaning for me without causing any concerns about its use on the item. I believe it is recommended to replace the throttle body seal too and given this whole work isn't a difficult job but is, like many perhaps on a car, just awkward, so a PITA to me, I would replace the seal for the no doubt few pounds (for a bit of rubber) to save me wrestling with the stupidly designed engine air filter box again. If you have not already done so recently I would also suggest cleaning the inside of the air box and the inside any air feed pipes you can easily get at, and consider replacing the air filter, if required whilst the stupidly designed air box is out of the car. And if appropriate check or change the spark plugs whilst the stupidly designed PITA air filter box is out of the way too.

Was this swapping the position of coil at No.2 to another cylinder to see if the error code moved with it?

I am a fan of cleaning throttle bodies so they can work within their full range and have it within any parameters for computer programs but I don't think this would be the resolve here, but it might help otherwise at 100K-miles (160,000km) and do no harm as part of servicing and maintenance at this sort of mileage. Rover V8 stepper-motors used to stick so you could be going along at pace (not necessarily high revs) approaching a bend or give-way/stop, lift off for the engine braking you got with those engines and/or apply the brakes but the engine revs remained pushing you along more than you wanted, not great and intermittent so the fun of not knowing when it would happen next. You could clean or replace the stepper -motor but it could return regardless.

That's another part of it that annoys me. I find the ignition cylinder lock a convenient place for the key to be kept whilst in the car, I don't have loads of other keys in with it like some do, but each to their own, I see no benefits only possible additional future issues, but I'm not overkeen on remotes, a keyblade in a door cylinder lock is fine for me. 🙃

Hi Chris, welcome. You might get an answer here (Fabia MK3 forum) or you might be better asking on the 'Skoda Octavia Mk III (2013 - 2020)' forum. - https://www.briskoda.net/forums/forum/235-skoda-octavia-mk-iii-2013-2020/

Thanks, I forgot the push button bit. As we are on the subject and having to fart about with my neighbour's car this morning with such a system, can you tell me other than fashion and having a whizzy gimmick what are the benefits of such a system as I just do get it on the car, I used to vaguely deal with proximity door entry system a few decades back.

Sorry, I had forgotten that for yourself, I think much has already been put here already so unless other viewers post to that thread you might have to look at other Skoda or VW models with the same engine and gearbox of the same age and see what they have discovered. I don't know and I am biased but I think it might be to do with VW programming and might not get sorted by VW as your car is out of warranty, that's if they knew how to sort even if they wanted to but I could well be wrong and this can be sorted and someone has a resolve. A long shot, you could perhaps try posting in the 'General Maintenance' forum or become a Freedom or Freedom Lite supporter and post in the 'Ask a Tech' forum. https://www.briskoda.net/forums/forum/103-general-maintenance/ https://www.briskoda.net/forums/forum/51-ask-a-tech/

To eliminate possible error in display you need an appropriate (with program for VW ) scan tool, this of course only eliminates the display and not any error in the car's information or error in the scan tool but you would hopefully get a more accurate figure if there is an error with the display.

Yes and no, more to do with battery use and probably extremely low mileage which would have meant the use of an appropriate battery charger maintainer for preventative charging or maintenance, perhaps this was done, perhaps it wasn't. You will need to do this at some point in the future even though the battery is new if you use either use of lot of battery power and/or your use of the car is infrequent and/or short journey use. Even a new battery is only a store it can be depleted eventually. There's no reason why a Dealership shouldn't give you a paper print out of a 'complete record' for your car that's whatever's on the computer system which may not be much or next to nothing as it can only have what's been recorded on it. If you've had a few cars and at your age you probably already know that a car that is very low mileage and/or its use infrequent and/or short journeys will possibly come with some issues from this that higher milage cars may not so don't go spending on cosmetics until you've covered all the necessary serving, maintenance and repairs required and allowed for unexpected stuff, I always suggest a full year round driving in all conditions to really find out. The battery is sorted, you are going on to brakes, pads and disc changes are very easy (and I'm not good at mechanics) I've put up a couple of sets of notes in the Fabia section. As part of the braking system tyres need to be looked at, if the car is very low milage there might be lots of tread depth left on them but they've gone hard and deteriorated through age and lack of use not good if you want to drive the car in any sort of spirited way. This is pure speculation now, just an example, it's possible that the owner might have had a change of circumstances or possibly someone else had to take or deal with the car, might explain the missing second key and missing printed paper copy of the Owner's Manual (that's not as good or comprehensive as those of say 1970s BL cars, you're with VW now Germany manufacturers have their own way of doing things, their own numbering systems and holding back on info others freely give). Yes that's a proximity remote (I don't understand the point of them other than a gimmick) those may well be more expensive to buy and program. They take a bit more care and the key that isn't being used best kept out of range or blocked to avoid more frequent battery changing in the remotes. You've put the model as SLI is that correct as I've not seen that before? It sounds like your car might possibly(?) be loaded with stuff for more higher level of model, programs not blocked like on lower models and more features fitted, you might want to go through the Owner's Manual and Infotainment book to see what setting you might want or could do without to save battery power perhaps and set the car to how you prefer things. IF (always check any information you get from any source, including manufacturers and the internet, with a couple of other reliable sources if possible) your model is the same as my wife's 2015 Fabia Mk3 (Hatch) 1.2 TSI (90 SE 5-speed manual) then pollen filters - Mann CU 26 010 / CUK 26 010 / Frecious Plus FP 26 010 MAHLE LA809 / LAK809 / LAO809 cabin filter.pdf How To Remove And Replace A Skoda Fabia Mk3 Pollen/Cabin Filter -

Ian, we had to buy a new remote fob with folding keyblade January 2023, it's not the KESSY thing (proximity) though in case yours is) it was (IIRC) £141 and pence for remote and £41 and pence to code it in, from local VWSkoda Dealership. I preferred not to risk non-original and for the Dealership to take the full responsibility should there be a (very rare but I've seen it on here) problem, German cars have very complex intertwined computer systems and programs. I always suggest alternating the use of the two remote keys, in whatever way or time suits, rather than keeping one as a spare as that way you get more even wear on the remote buttons, their batteries, keyblade and cylinder locks plus you then know where to find the second remote and that it's battery works. For servicing (maintenance) don't forget the rest of the car, tyres and brakes, and other stuff for engine air filter (4 years is too long IMO) and spark plugs (air filter has to be moved for this so might as well replace it too). You may already know the following stuff, but in case not. - The state of charge and health of the battery is very important to the complex intertwined computer programs, just because the engine starts and the lights seem bright enough the battery can still be too low for the computers and they can make you suffer in all sorts of unexpected ways even before the warning messages and lights are shown. I also always advise reading the Owner's Manual and referring to it to save yourself time, hassle and money, if you don't have the paper printed copy you can get a free VWSkoda pdf version to download from here. - https://manual.skoda-auto.com/004/en-com/Models To complete the set, check for missing Recalls (well those admitted to). - https://www.skoda-auto.com/services/recall-campaigns 'Update portal' for a very few things you might be able to update if you want to. - https://updateportal.skoda-auto.com/ HTH.

The most drastic cleaning of all. 🙂 Good news. Don't forget the air coming in too, clean, replace really the engine air filter, VWSkoda's every 4 years is far too long for my wife's Fabia especially as the car is outside 366 of the year. You might find other improvements from this 'drastic clean' too. Good luck.

For a long time now the coolant temperate gauges have been set to show a rock steady 90c this is to reassure drivers the true temperature will not necessarily be that and could fluctuate. It will pick up the temperature from a coolant temperature sensor and it might be that which is fault (or the gauge or whatever controls the bias). If you had a scan tool plugged in recording live data you could see what temperature that picks up from the sensor - or set your dash to show oil temperature (starts at 50c on my wife's Fabia Mk3) and see if that remains steady(-ish) when going downhill. It might not show the same figure as the coolant temperature gauge at anytime but it will I think show unbiased figures. I know less about diesels than even petrol engines, so practically nothing, but I doubt the thermostat was changed unless it's a known issue but you'd soon know as you'd have been charged for the part and the fitting of it on your bill. A drop from around 90c coolant temperature to 40c would need a steep hill into very cold weather exposure. You are better to judge when your engine is fully warmed up by looking at the oil temperature than the (biased) coolant temperature gauge. HTH in some way.

Don't worry it's just me thinking what's a CE and not thinking of colour edition. 🫠 IIRC my wife's "smart" phone measured my, at the time 47 year-old car, from inside with the roof down, at 96db at 60mph. A mate now owns the car and the exhaust noise is less, he changed the timing chain and set the twin carbs up richer, don't know if he reset the valves and timing, it sounds reasonably quiet but I bet it's still above 72db inside the car with the roof down (K&N open air filters, LCB manifold, single silencer, 1.5" (38mm) centre pipe).

My wife's 2015 Fabia with Bolero does this with a USB stick too - I agree very annoying and the technology may well be worse in future and the present old recordings unplayable as the format (or wotever's the correct term) has changed yet again. I'm not sure if albums are still in alphabetical order when using the SD card slot in the glovebox as I just listen to the DAB radio anyway

Hi, welcome. Did you not get any warnings such as below? (all inserts from car's Owner's Manual) - https://manual.skoda-auto.com/004/en-com/Models What? Which/who is wrong? If required buy a new 12v battery and have it fitted and 'coded' in then buy a 12V car battery charger maintainer and use it to recharge the 12v battery if/when required and as preventative measure to stop it getting (too) low, read and follow the instructions in your Owner's Manual and instructions on the charger maintainer. - https://manual.skoda-auto.com/004/en-com/Models

I think we covered tuning inside out last time but just to remind you for brakes you need to have covered good quality suitable tyres. I think we also covered strip out the interior and soundproofing if you want more noise inside. Bad or really excessive tuning you could get a few breaks. 😁 I forget, have you looked at or posted in the 'Performance & Tuning Upgrades' forum for info and idea? - https://www.briskoda.net/forums/forum/212-performance-tuning-upgrades/ Are you still on sky-high monthly insurance (and interest) payments? Unfortunately you are right YOLO, later you both regret the things you done and the things you didn't do, but only you can live your life and it helps to have some good times. ETA: you've put CE again, that confused me again. 😄

Depends when the measurement was taken but 12.57 at the posts a number of hours after charging sounds very good. The rest, not so good. As the garage will have a scan tool plugged in they can check the battery 'coding' too. Below from my wife's car gives you an idea of battery 'coding'. All that matters is: a) the Ah is correct (or perhaps near enough) - 59 and 60 below, b) the serial number changes if you are recording a new battery - from 1111111111 to 1111111112 below, c) important - the battery type is correct, EFB or AGM (called "fleece" by VW) - from EFB to "Fleece" (AGM) below. The manufacturer of the battery is of no importance now, it was for VW's records.

I personally recommend regularly using, how regular is up to the individual, something like Shell V-Power diesel or petrol, but particularly diesel, for the added cleaning packages in them to help and bit with cleaning and as a bit of preventative measure. And/or two tankfuls before and during a service and/or MoT, and a tankful after, so three tankfuls in all. ETA: I saw the good results of using Shell V-power Diesel with my wife's previous car in my rear view mirror, light grey cloud of smoke off roundabout and booting it a bit as apposed to dense black cloud doing exactly the same with the standard fuel. Easy, clean hands work, which is the only way I like to do any work on a car if I can. Car work is usually, filthy, grubby, unrewarding work to me, a necessary chore. New(er) neighbours somehow often had the idea that I liked doing stuff on our cars, they soon learnt differently. 🙃

Hi Rob, no problem. As Warrior193 has mentioned, if the battery is the same type (EFB) and about the same Ah and previous battery was 'coded' correctly then hopefully the new battery is fine, do bear in mind for the future even if the battery is new/newish it's still just a store so can be depleted but if not flogged to death should more easily fully recover with charging. As long as the VWSkoda updates aren't like some from Microsoft hopefully you're alright with that. The strong money is on wheel sensor and with all the VW computer programs being so complex and intertwined (and far too intrusive for me) a small fault in one area can affect a load more, apart from perhaps the start/stop I can see all being connected - be interesting to get it confirmed though.

Sorry, I should 've went to SpecSavers, twice I read that as 109000. Doh! Great point, I never thought of that for one.

As put already VW make things very confusing, if you go to the Dealerships for the Oil & Inspection Service that will give you the service plus they will look for any other chargeable work they can find (required or possibly not, required soon or perhaps in the more distant future) so that covers anything anyway, they do "free health checks" whenever they can whenever the car is in there for whatever reason anyway - and these "free health checks" look for any other chargeable work they can find (required or possibly not, required soon or perhaps in the more distant future) so that covers anything anyway, Most think an engine oil change is a (whole) car service, including those at lease companies. Yes at 109k-miles it might need some stuff doing. 😁