OverTheHill

I've never had an MOT fail due to lights in 30 years of cars and bikes and with this adjustment the lights went down and left, so away from any fail zones. TBH I do realise that I may have adjusted without recalibrating the matrix system, so that's now possibly out of kilter. However, it was hopeless before, so I reckon I'm still ahead of my starting position 🙂 @TheWanderer - totally agree it's amazing how many inbreds will drive around in really poor visibility with no illumination. Pre-dawn, dark car under the trees... moments like that I fell entitled to forget to flip off main beam...

@Ado12345 There are some white circular adjusters at the back of the lamp units. It was nothing more scientific than finding a spot in the local car park, stopping 20 metres from a wall and twiddling the adjusters at night. The beam can be lowered and the cut-off moved to the nearside. Don't get flashed nearly so much anymore. I have no idea what I have done to the auto system, but frankly it's turd and I have not used it in 12 months! The dealership clearly know the square root of foxtrot-all about it either, so I gave up and use it old-skool dip/main.

Would be interested to hear of the outcome. I ended up switching the matrix system off. Even with this operating as a conventional system, the kerbside illumination still floodlit any vehicle to my left and despite several visits to the dealer who denied any problem, I ended up getting out an allen key and adjusting them myself. All fine now, but just another in the catalogue of minor niggles the car has. Drives well, but my last Skoda - car under par and likewise the dealer.

Agreed, the matrix units have a flat component (fine) and use some of the dynamic/matrix emitters to provide the kerbside illumination / kick up to the left. It's the kick up that's causing the issue and this is true in both matrix adaptive mode and locked to dip. For the avoidance of doubt I don't bother with matrix on dualed roads as they don't detect oncoming traffic well with the armco blocking the view of vehicles on the other carriageway. I nearly always drive on dip and still have the issue of excessively high illumination by that component.

Any tips out there for getting the traffic working consistently? I get info at the start of the journey (sometimes), but never when underway. I have checked privacy settings (all as open as poss, sharing everything) and both the car and the online portal show an active subscription. Today I deliberately asked it to set a route that could have used a trunk road that's closed all weekend and it offered that route to me as an option that was clear, with nothing untoward shown on the map either. I was only 5 miles away from the closed road, so would reasonably expect it to be downloaded live data.

2.5k miles in a vRS TSi estate manual. Good: Ride on the passive dampers is a good compromise between comfort & handling, gearchange good, chassis engaging if pressing on. A good ride overall and balances family with a bit of fun like no other big estate in the price bracket. Bad: Infotainment has a poor UI and is a joke compared to my BMW's iDrive. The satnav rarely downloads any traffic data (occasionally at the start of a journey) and today tried to send me onto the A27 trunk road, which is closed all weekend! The matrix headlights can dazzle vehicles I'm passing on multi-lane roads (the dealer has seen the car twice and says all okay). The text on the (decent sized) drivers display is too small, for example the heat levels on the steering wheel are 3 small boxes which are filled to show on/off. The fill is measured in low single-digit pixels, so hardly safe to squint at when you should be driving. The touch-sensitive areas in the roof are overly sensitive and I have called breakdown assist when trying to operate the sunroof or switch on an interior light. Overall: drives well, but minor electronics a disaster area. Enough to put me off another Skoda? I'm afraid yes, this is likely my last one after 3 decent ones beforehand. ☹️

It doesn't feel as quick as the old Mk3 system, but the system is invisible to my eyes, whereas the wires were clear to see before. I guess it's a trade-off. If I want it sorted quick, then I don't have any other electrical load such as heated seats etc on until the screen's above freezing. As other have said, that's the time where I do the side windows and by the time I've finished faffing, the front's good to go. If you're desperate to get going and the sides are good, then aside from reducing load, dial in a few revs (1,500) to spin up the alternator and get some more volts in there.

Will do a phone around to gauge interest and if they have any prior knowledge of the issue. First up was the Chichester Azur lot, certainly a good positive attitude, if not familiar with the issue in itself.

December update - I've been diverted by personal issues for most of November and so unable to get to a dealership. I went this week and the tech did a static (MOT) check on alignment and read fault codes. All okay and so dealer advice was that nothing else that can be done with the tech actually describing the nuisance caused to others as a "feature". Suffice to say I'm not especially amused by this and have written a letter back quoting rejection under the Consumer Rights Act 2015 to see if that stirs them into action. I offered they take it for a night drive (hardly a huge ask 1 week before the winter solstice), but no. Hopefully they have a trained tech who can look into the software of the lights and recalibrate. The vRS drives well, but the minor electronics are an all-round disaster, from lights to instruments and infotainment. If you want a quick estate there are few choices without spending a lot of cash, but right now this is looking like my last Skoda. 😞

The main part of the dip pattern is good, it's the bit that is like a kerbside illumination that's off-kilter. It doesn't point at the kerb; it's almost straight ahead on the offside lamp. If I walk away from the car and squat down, then the light nearest the radiator grille on the offside unit is dazzling. Feels like a simple misalignment, but now I have it booked in for warranty work, I'm loathe to fiddle in case I get accused of being the problem.

A few weeks into regular use on dual carriageways and I'm not satisfied the dip is fit for purpose. The cut-off illuminates road signs to the left really bright and inside vehicles I'm passing. You can see how big the lit area is when going past a big motorway sign. On a 10 mile trip in the evening it's pretty much 50/50 if I get the flash / fog light treatment. As soon as time allows I'm taking it in under compliant. TBH the infotainment has low usability and the plethora of touch sensitive switches around the sunroof area mean I'm just as likely to call breakdown assistance as I am to close the sunroof shade when driving. If this is the new Skoda, then it's my last.

Will be interested to read how it goes. It seems to be the way the kerbside part of the beam is shaped. That big vertical 'lump' seesm to be the source of it. I guess the matrix is a collection of rectagles switched on and off, so it will never be v shaped. Could do with switching one of the bank off and mocving the pattern to the kerb a bit more.

I have Matrix lights on my vRS and when running dip (locked to dip; not auto matrix), the cut-off to the nearside is close to the straight-ahead position and quite big in terms of area illuminated. Instead of the usual wedge shape, it goes up vertically in a big block, managing to illuminate anyone to the left on a multi-lane piece of road, shining right into their offside door mirror and at times illuminating most of the back of their car. Seems to be wrong and seeing as I have had rear fogs flashed at me, pretty annoying for others. Anyone else have Matrix and seen similar on dip? The proper Auto setting seems quite clever and works well on quieter roads, but ironically dip not so good. TIA

I bit the (pricey) bullet and did OBDEleven and the changes went though very easily and no probs yet. The soundaktor is now at 30% and that seems a good compromise between a very well insulated engine and knowing there's work being done (without pretending to have V6).

I left that as-is. Figured the auto-headlights would take care of that. So far, it's no broom-broom noise and a beep on lock. I daresay I'll get bored and want to try something else!

All i can say is that my vRS, delivered last week, has no cover. I wonder what all those lovely electronics will look like after a winter's use...?

Closing this off, I went for OBD11, nice and easy, won't throw any errors and can be rewound easily enough. I went down to 30% noise to give enough of a clue that there's still something going on in front (and don't leave in 4th on A road etc.) and it seems to be a good balance. I also switched on the confirmation beep for locking with alarm as I'm still getting used to keyless and it's just what I'm used to as the last one had it - and have coded my 3-series that way. The folding mirrors are quite a big clue as well!

Looks like OBD11 can code the "Soundaktor" to be 100-0%. https://obdeleven.com/en/supported-vehicles?brand=skoda

I'm thinking coding as first stop - I have done my 3 series with Carly for the basics and also Esys for something bigger. Carly's nice and easy, but as I have an old licence for the BMW, it's all paid for and if I add anything in I think I get pushed to the expensive subscription model. OBD11 looks favourite if it can talk to the right bits. Failing that, I was wondering about finding the speaker, taking out of circuit and bridging the connections with a decent resistor of the same impedance to fool the CANBUS into thinking all still there. Kind of like to resistor that gets put alongside a LED replacement emitter. Or I may just pull the fuse and see if it spits an error 😉

Anyone out there know if the sound generator is still a physical device on the bulkhead, like the Mk3 please? Any tips on easy access appreciated! Last time I managed to disconnect the wires to kill the rumbles. I know you can switch off via Individual, but I want it off for good. It's irritating enough to get the lane assist off before being able to drive properly, let alone being treated to the fake V6 every time I touch the right hand pedal.

Well after a day's driving up to see the in-laws (200 miles of all sorts of roads) a few initial impressions (comparisons are to my last-gen Octavia, also petrol manual vRS). As it's so new, there's no real impression of performance and I have wife & son in along with a load of luggage. Hey ho, but that's why I got the estate, not a 2 seater coupe. 1. Crikey, there's a lot of electronics. Mostly good, but the lane departure is hateful. Yanks the wheel when confused by old markings, tar banding etc. Easy enough to disable with 2 buttons, but I wish it would remember last settings. I guess it would lose a bit of NCAP rating if it did. 2. The broom-broom engine noise generator doesn't help refinement on a long trip and even my 10 year old doesn't like it. You can set to silent in Individual mode, but needs to be selected at the start of each journey. Again, why can't this be remembered? I was hoping I could pull the wires off like last time, but it's apparently part of the sound system now. 3. Refinement - ride and cabin noise are incrementally better than the last generation, so now hitting my sweet spot for ride Also, I didn't go adaptive dampers as I generally set up a vehicle how I want and leave it. Happy with these, but will be interesting to see how it rides unladen. Received wisdom is that the passive dampers sit in between comfort and sport on an adaptive setup. 4. Matrix lights seem very clever on rural roads. I will be interested to see how useful they are on quiet dual carriageways, if they allow me to illuminate my side (if deserted) without causing annoyance to traffic the other side then a real bonus. 5. Handling seems to be more involving when chucking it into corners. Admittedly I've had limited exposure to this as I don't want to be covered in kid's vomit, but a few cheeky roundabouts have felt like the cars comes round all-of-one, not just the nose-heavy front wheel drive push you can get on some front-drivers. Overall, it seems a good upgrade and really happy so far. Looks modern, drives well and the interior is snapping at the heels of the top end of VAG products. Why pay more? OK, a pretty rubbish photo at the dealers, but no chance to grab one since and now it's a bit muddy after a few country roads!

It's on the driveway! Order placed beginning of September (2021) and took delivery today. vRS estate petrol manual with my own selection of goodies. Now to sort out the infotainment / phone thing. I spent so long sat on the driveway idling while sorting it out a lady walking her dog passed me the second time and walked to up check I was all right! I have decided to do what all true men won't admit to and read the manual. Luckily we're off for the weekend, so it gets a run-in.

I ordered Sept 2021 and it's due mid Oct. vRS estate petrol manual. I was specific about colour spec etc as that's part of buying new IMO. I knew I was in for a wait, so being British decided to get in the queue nice and early. Wasn't bargaining on 13 months though!

I had the same debate in my head for a vRS petrol. It seemed that most media articles I read all had differing opinions on whether DCC is worthwhile. The most useful was Autocar where they described DCC as being something you buy to access the stiffer Sport mode, so implying Normal is close to non-adaptive. The article seemed to be based on a comparison between 2 vRS's recently driven. A consistent theme seems to be Sport is possibly a bit stiff for typical (poor) UK roads. I also see a few comments on Comfort being a bit loose. So, my conclusion was that the standard non-DCC was ever so slightly stiffer than DCC Normal. That would suit my lack of interest in playing around with modes and give a useful compromise for acceptable ride on family days and decent handling if pressing on. It will depend on where your priorities are, but for me I think it will hit the mark (although I did manage a hill-climb in my Mk III, it's not a track-day car!). I tested an iV on non-DCC and my impression was of a decent ride. Certainly a sporty setup, but not intrusively so if you accept it's a warm hatch type affair and drive to suit. It's certainly markedly superior to my Mk III vRS with none of the jiggling vertical movement that annoyed on minor roads at 30-40mph. I did worry that the improvement may be due to the battery weight (it was a frustratingly slow drive), but I was assured by staff all models were pretty similar. Anyway, order placed for petrol estate... without DCC.

Ooops! Yep was 2022 🙂 I've been pondering an update on and off for most of 2021, so the timing was more a reaction to wait times than the desire to get something new soon. I was figuring on getting a new car early 2022, so thought I'd best order in the autumn. Ironically, I actually pulled my order time forward from my original plan of November having read typical lead-times! I guess there could always be changes to spec, but in the current climate, I decided you just need to make a call... I'm happy with the spec and about the only thing I would have liked was leather seats (kids > leather > wipe-clean).