Octy-PHEV

I thought other Octavia owners might have had this problem, but couldn't find anything posted. So here's how I fixed it. The black plastic lowest portion of the rear bumper popped out from being connected to the body-coloured part immediately above, as a result of a light contact with a low barrier when parking. After levering up the tabs, so that they would engage with the slots in the coloured bit, no amount of pushing or thumping on the black bit would get them to re-engage, as the coloured plastic just deflected backwards. I thought I was going to have to take the bumper off, as access to the back of the coloured plastic is hampered by the steel reinforcing strut in the bumper. I managed to do if without by placing a suitable length of stout wood pressed tightly against the black plastic and secured to the ground behind the car, and then rotating an L-shaped steel bar from under the car against the back of the coloured plastic (just under the strut) as each tab position. It gave a very satisfying click when it re-engaged! Hope that helps someone (and it's a reminder to me, in case I ever need to do it again 😁)

When 100% charged, the highest electric range my 2023 Octavia iV has ever told me I have is 41 miles (=66 km). As others have said, that takes into account my driving style on recent trips (mainly level, fairly slow urban driving with the air con off). I do get roughly the range the car indicates with the same type of driving in the summer. With the heating or a few hills though, it drops dramatically.

Is it under warranty? Many years ago I had the battery fail on an 18-month-old Passat. Got it to the dealer by jump-starting it, and they replaced the battery for free. So they can fail early if there was some manufacturing fault.

On my 2023 Octavia iV I get a range of about 40 miles in the summer with the air con off and about 35 in the winter. The most electric range it's ever told me I have is 41 miles. This is on urban trips of up to 5 miles on fairly level roads. However on longer trips on just electric I've often had the car report consumption of 4.7 miles/kWh. That implies that if (say) 10 kWh of the battery is usable, the range ought to be 47 miles. It's very dependent upon gradients though - it's much lower if you have some hills to negotiate.

I found that for the month I was trialling traffic sign recognition on my 2023 Octavia, I was getting lots of phantom 50 mph warnings popping up (also mainly on M4) even though there were no such signs. Presumably it was remembering where roadworks were. But now the trial has expired, the speed indication on the satnav is correct. My conclusion is that 'traffic sign recognition' is doing more than just looking for signs. It seems to be accessing some static GPS-based dataset, separate from normal satnav one. The trial wasn't very effective for picking up variable speed limits on the overhead gantries. It only got about half correct.

I've had to switch off in my 23 Octavia the link between the car's idea of the speed limit and the ACC target. I've had the same as you on the M4: several times my chosen cruise speed was suddenly upped to 70 when I reached the end of a former 50mph temporary limit. To do this you go into ACC settings and switch off "Speed limit preview". But it remains poor that the car thinks so many sections of former roadworks are still 50 mph. If the map data is only updated a couple of times a year (if that), it shouldn't have temporary limits in at all, as they will be long gone before the map is next updated. And why isn't the camera being relied upon more to make use of observed signs, or absence thereof?

I've just signed up for a month's free trial of TSR. So far it has recognised the following UK warning signs: Roadworks Children (school) Bend (left/right distinguished) Side road or crossroads (all rendered as crossroads) Road narrows Other danger ( ! sign) Warning signs it doesn't recognise include low bridge, ridden horses, traffic signals. On the 'binacle' display behind the steering wheel, the warning sign is shown beside the current speed limit for about 7 seconds. On the map on the central infotainment display it appears with the speed limit superimposed on top of it, so is unreadable! I'm still trying to work out how the interaction between the stored map data and the observed signs affects what speed limit is shown. It's always the same on both displays (after a 1 second delay), but they're quite often wrong for short distances. It's often too high (in one case showing 70 on a 30 mph road), so it's not just picking the lower one.

It's common for the 12V battery to fail, but I don't recall any recent mentions of the messages "Electric Drive not working," or "Engine limited to 3000rpm".

I've only got 50 out of 100 for "Night driving/ Rush hour"! What does the app think I'm doing wrong ? Is any driving after dark or in times it considers rush hour marked down as bad? Is it monitoring speed and frequent stops to try to deduce congestion? Luckily this just makes the overall score less valuable to an insurance company or anyone else snooping.

Yes, agreed. That's how I use it. I sometimes go several weeks without starting the petrol engine.

Sorry, I don't understand your comment. My post was just about a 29 mile journey all on battery. What makes you think I use the petrol engine when not necessary?

My daughter and I did the identical 29 mile journey starting on M25, then through rural roads, keeping one behind the other at the same speed. Her 2025 Born did 4.8 miles/kWh. My 2023 Octavia running purely on electric did 4.7. I think that goes to show that there's no penalty in lugging around an unused petrol engine and fuel tank in a PHEV over the extra weight of a larger battery in pure BEV.

I bought a new Octavia last year. The salesman himself advised me to go for a credit agreement to get a £2000 deposit contribution and told me correctly that I wouldn't have to pay it back. I cancelled the deal the day after collecting the car, and was only charged £7 interest. So I'm now £1993 better off than if I'd just paid in full initially.

Yes, it's all still there after pressing the Mode button. No problem fortunately.

I've just had the automatic update from 1940 to 1985. All seems good so far.

The current MySkoda app does now work on Android 8.1. Despite the above message in the summer, it seems Skoda has kept the Essentials app still working until this week (when it's now discontinued again). Perhaps they realised there were still a lot of us with older devices.

Just got a message today saying I had 8 days to upgrade Skoda Essentials on my phone before it stopped working. Was expecting the same PlayStore message I got in July that the new app wasn't compatible with my elderly phone. But, no, it worked this time and it's now installed and working.