Shadowphax

I always look on the Autorader webiste for cars. The last 2 Fabias I have owned, a W reg SDi and the current VRs were found on there. One was from a 'normal' sell-any-make garage and the other from a nationwide dealer network. There are both dealer and private cars listed on Autotrader so you get to see the prices, specs and local avaialability etc. You can search by Distance from home, price etc etc I'm pretty sure most main Skoda delaers also put their used cars on Autotrader too. The ones around the North of England certainly do.

I had am SDI for 4 years before getting the VRS this spring. The SDI had 195 width types I think so not much smaller than the VRS. The SDI was great in the snow. I never had very high spec tyres on though. The VRS wasn't bad this morning in about 2 inches of snow. It's got Goodyear Eagles on the back and Champiro HPZ's on the front. From what I hear of the Eagles I'm glad they were on the back, but I never had the rear break away at all. It took a bit of gentle throttle control to stop the fronts letting go at the intial start-off but a bit of letting-the-torque-do-the-work got me out of any problems. I'm a great beliver that the higher performance the tyre the worse they perform in snow (not including winter tyres obviously). Any car I have had with any realtively cheap tyres has been great in the snow. The VRS with it's higher performance rubber just needs a bit more care. If you all think that the Fabia VRS is a handful you should try the Octavia VRS PD. My wife has one as her company car on some form of Michelin tyres (225/45 18's I think) and that is a real pig in the snow. The TDI 130 Passats she had previously were even worse. Give me a 2CV in snow anyday. I have even see those things driven when Rangerovers were stuck! I gues that 500kg weight, 45 bhp and tyres the width of rubber bands means the rubber gets through the snow to the black stuff underneath. I once did a journey as a passenger in a 2CV from Yorkshire to Newcatle and back in the winter of 1982 and we were stopped on several occasions by police 4x4's checking we were OK. We were the only thing moving on the A1 for the whole journey there and back. Good luck to you all in the bad weather over the next few days, drive carefully, get there late but get there safe and a Merry Xmas and a Happy New Year to you all.

Nothing else at all. It was just as I was getting out of the car that I was stood in quite a cloud. I guess it could be like the days when you get a lot of steam from your headlights. Only happens once in a while not when the rain is heavy. My missus has an Octy II VRS PD and we've had a few VW TDI's with various engines and I've never seen this before and I should think that most would have a similar fuel cooler setup. I'll just put it down to the combination of rain, temperature and pressure and see if it happens again

As today is the first coolish and damp day I have driven my VRS (as I have only had it since the spring), is it normal for the fuel cooler to steam in wet weather? When I stopped at work this morning, there were clouds of steam coming from the fuel cooler under the drivers seat area of the body. The cooler wasn't too hot (I'd gues about 45-50°C by touch) but there was clouds of 'steam' coming from it. Maybe just the weather conditions causing it? It was strange that the steam seemed to be coming from the cooler and not the exhaust which would obviously normal during wet weather.

I see a few SE Vrs's about but the other day they seemed to be breeding. Only out for 10 minutes taking stuff to the tip and saw 3 in 5 minutes. All different cars not the same ones more than once. Makes my yellow one seem old hat although mine has a few nice extras like sunroof, factory xenons, cruise control and cd changer. Do like the SE blue and leather seats though.

Broadbean, I'm not sure if this will help you as there appears to be 2 versions of the Vrs front bumper/foglight. Mine is the older version and is a 54 plate. I posted someinstructions with pics a while back. These can be found here :- http://briskoda.net/fabia-i/fabia-vrs-replacing-foglight-bulbs/141796/

I have a Fabia Vrs and my wifey has an Octavia Vrs diesel company car. You will notice a huge difference between the 2 cars as the Octavia seems to have either :- • Very high friction pads. • An overly large servo assistance. The Octy needs very little brake pedal pressure to work. In my opinion it is really over-servoed and it is quite easy to get the ABS working when you have to do an emergency stop. I used to work for a brake manufacturer and did lots of testing on cars and the Octy certainly has brakes at the 'twitchy' end of the scale with regards pedal feel. It almost brings back memories of the older Citroens whose brakes worked off the suspension system pressure. The brake pedal was basically a valve that was either on or off. If you coughed in the direction of the brake pedal the wheels would almost lock.

Here's mine. All standard apart from factory fitted xenons, sunroof, cruise control and cd multi-changer. Apologies for image quality as I only used my phone. I wish I had my camera with me as these pictures were taken during our 'summer' last month when it was actually not raining and hot for at least 3 weeks.

I had mine repaired by Chips Away paid for by Kwikfit after they ripped the wheels when having new tyres fitted. Chips Away have franchises in most areas, and the guy that did mine in West Yorkshire was great. He was an owner of an Evo V so knew I wanted the wheels spot on. It's imposible to tell which wheels were done after he rubbed then down, resprayed and then lacquered them. ChipsAway International - SMART automotive repair service

I used to work in the lab at a company that used to make OEM truck diesel filters. Whenever we tested seals and plastic parts in bio diesel, you wouldn't believe the ammount of damage that stuff could do. It used to actually dissolve some seal materials on long term soak tests when the control test in normal diesel would have no effect. I'm worried when they start upping the ammount of bio diesel in the UK supplies as this stuff has the potential to do lots of damage. I've always wondered what the converted chipshop oil stuff is like.

I regularly see about 5-10 VRs Fabia's a day and that's on only a 10 mile commute to work and back. It's probably us tight-as-a-ducks-**** Yorkishire that like fast diesels that don't use much fuel. THE DEFINITION OF A YORKSHIREMAN - A SCOTSMAN WITH ALL THE GENEROSITY REMOVED!!!!!! My missus has an Octavia VRs diesel company car and we see loads of them too.

This is the longest and probably most technical post I have been involved with. The amazing thing about Briskoda (generally) is that the folk on here listen to the replies and don't start shooting off at everyone who posts things they don't always agree with. This really is a great forum with some very helpful people. Big thumbsup for us all on Briskoda.

I've just had another read through all the new posts and there seems to be a lot of commonly held mistakes about brake performance. Here's a quick outline of brake performance :- • Bigger brakes will not stop stop a car quicker. They will allow the car to do more repeated stops without overheating the brakes. They will give a more responsive brake (better feel) due to the braking surface being centred further out. • The tyres are the limiting factor on braking performance on road cars. Without ABS you can lock the wheels at any speed. Tyres that have more grip will allow you to stop quicker. An easy way to think of this is when it is wet you can't stop as quick as there is less grip. Racing cars can stop really quickly in the dry because they have grippy slick tyres but they can't stop at all using slick tyres in the wet but they are using the same brakes! • ABS brakes do NOT shorten your stopping distance. All they do is allow you to steer the car with the brakes fully on as the wheels will not be locked. A really good driver can often out-perform an ABS system and reduce the stopping distance through skillful application of the brakes. But I do mean a really good drivers (test drivers and racing drivers). I have seen test drivers in action and believe me that they are the top 0.000001% of skill level. Often they are better than racing drivers at brake testing because they do it all the time and often under all sorts of controlled conditions. • Bigger brakes allow more energy to be absorbed and converted to heat. Bigger cars have bigger brakes because they weigh more and can usually go faster. Automatic cars often have bigger brakes than an identical manual car as they have greattly reduced engine braking and the brakes are worked harder and more often. • My wife drives an Octavia VRS diesel and I have a Fabia VRS. The Octavia has the bigger brakes and feels like it will stop quicker. However, this is an illusion as the Octy has really grabby brakes due to either having a higher friction brake material or a larger servo so it needs less brake pedal pressure. It is very easy on the Octy to get the ABS working compared to the Fabia. The Octy feels a bit like the old Citroens with the brakes working from the high pressure suspension pump and the brakes being really on or off. I have seen a formula one car up close on a few occasions and the amazing thing about them is not how quick they are but how quick they stop. They literally seem to beat the laws of physics and stop like they have hit a brick wall. This is becasue they have incredibly grippy tyes and huge ammounts of downforce to allow the tyres to grip and put the lareg braking forces down onto the road.

Locking the wheels will almost double your stopping distance compared to a car correctly braked. If you don't believe me try it out on a deserted road. Apply the brakes properly and see where you stop from a fixed braking point. Go back and do it again with your wheels locked (you may not be bale to do this with ABS). You will be amased at how much further it takes to stop. I was allowed to do this on a brake test track when working for a brake manufacturer by one of the test drivers.

Only thing to watch out for is you have to prime the filter. By this I mean empty the old filter (via the water drain tap at the bottom) into the new filter. Make sue you drain a little bit out of the old filter first as it may be water and also ensure you fill the new filter through the hose connection that comes from the fuel tank feed. This way you ensure that the fuel you are putting into the new filter is on the 'dirty' side of the filter and will get filtered by the new filter. If you don't at least partially fill the new filter it will be very difficult to start the car. I actually flattened my battery once as I had been cranking the starter for over 2 minutes without success.

I know some of you guys like to upgrade stuff on your cars, but I can't really believe that the standard brakes are that bad. I should know as I used to work for Mintex, the brake pad manufacturer who are currently part of the TMD Friction group who make virtually all the pads for the VW family of cars. If you guys could see the ammount of testing that cars have to go through to get OE parts certification for brakes you would certainly not think the brakes are bad. Also, people always think that bigger brakes mean you will stop quicker. This is NOT true. What would happen if you stamped on the brakes at 70mph? You would lock the wheels. The tyres are always the limiting factor as to the ammount of braking force that can be applied. Bigger brakes will give you more control/better feel and can take a lot more heat before they fade. Believe me though when I say you would have to be doing track speeds to fade modern car brakes. The manufacturers test cars fully loaded and towing caravans/trailers down Apline passes with the brakes on all the way down. It's not uncommon to see disk tempereatures as high as 1000°C and the brakes still don't fade. In my past I was lucky (unlucky?) enough to be in a Range Rover test car on an Alpine descent test and the brakes were on fire at the bottom. They still worked though. There are very stringent tests that have to be passed on all cars in the EU and all modern cars have really good brakes. Get into a 20 year old car and you would see what I mean.

I've only recently joined the vRS club after waiting for the second-hand prices to come down to my level. The vRS puts a real smile on my face every time I drive it. It has even made me set off to work early just for a bit of a drive around. It suddenly dawned on me that this has happened to me before.....when I had a Yamaha RD350LC. I have owned bigger, faster and more modern bikes since but none have ever come near to the fun of the RD350LC. Back in the eighties I left clouds of blue smoke....now it's clouds of black diesel smoke. Anybody else think the vRS is a four wheeled equivalent? Maybe not the fastest, best handling or most exotic but great fun.

Micklecats, Sorry about the piccies not showing. They did at home but not at work. I have hosted them elsewhere so they should show up now. Thanks for the heads-up. Cheers.

I know this has been asked many times, but I have never found a complete answer on the forums on how to remove the trim surrounding the round foglights on the VRs. The owners manual doesn't tell you and the Haynes manual is not a lot of use either. To pull off the trim, simply feel underneath it and you will feel a cutout on the radiator side of the trim. Grasp this and give a firm but sharp tug forwards. That half of the trim will pop loose and you can them gently work the other side free. The trim came off quite easily without any feelings of 'God I'm going to break this thing'. The pictures of the trim below show where the mounting clips are. FOGLIGHT COVER FRONT FOGLIGHT COVER REAR TO SHOW MOUNTING CLIP POSITIONS My VRs appears to be an older model as many posts mention the 3 screws holding the foglight in place. Mine appears to have a single screw fitted from above so the bumber would have to be dropped to remove the foglights as many posts have already said. The bulb can be removed by unclipping the rear of the foglight housing on the outside edge (towards the outside of the car). The rear of the figlight then hinges on 2 tabs on the side towards the radiator. The mounting screw and clip can be seen in the image below. The bulb can then be got to by reaching behind the foglight although it is quite tight. A mechanics mirror may help to see how the bulb is fitted. FOGLIGHT MOUNTING AND REAR COVER SECURING CLIP My Vrs has Xenon headlights (with the washers) so has the 5 litre washer bottle. This can be seen behind the foglight shown above. This makes it quite a tight fit for your hand. The other side has the intercooler behind but there is more space. I hope this helps anyone who has struggled with how to get the trim pieces off. I haven't posted much but have used the forum for help I needed. I thought it was time to give something back. The towing eye mounting hole is also behind the trim piece on the driver side. It looks to be a long way in but I guess the towing eye is long enough to come through the trim opening.

Being a clumsy oaf, I managed to loose the ball out of the centre of the rear washer jet while I was adjusting it. I've got a whole new washer jet (the black plastic bit with the adjustable ball in the centre) but I am not sure how to remove the old one and fit the new one. It looks like the old one may simply pull out and the new one push in. Is this how they are replaced or does the whole wiper motor/washer assembly have to come out.

Sorry the network at work has been been down for a few days and went down just as I originally posted the ad. Couldn't find it so thought it hadn't got posted on the forum. Reposted just to make sure. Sorry!

Hope everybody takes this as a bit of fun! We all drive Skodas after all. Note the 'modified' Skoda logo at the bottom of the advert. This would look really good on the back of a VRs as it flies past some more ordinary GTi.

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Upload of pictures isn't working at the moment...I'll try to upload later.

Not wanting to upset anyone. We all drive Skodas after all! My wife e-mailed some funny spoof car adverts and this one was among them. Pay particular attention to the Skoda logo at the bottom of the ad!. They should change it to this for all you VRS boys then the people you overtake can get the Skoda finger.