Billaboard

Thanks, J R. I thought an extension cable might do it and I've got one here somewhere, if only I can find it. TBH, I don't ever feel the need for diagnostics on the Skoda. I just pop along to the local main agent and have always found them good and not too expensive. Unlike the utterly appalling local main Jeep agent who didn't even have a diagnostics tool. The Rangie uses BMW diagnostics that cost less than the fuel to drive to the dealer, even if I could afford them when I got there.

Posting here, as it may be a problem with the vehicle rather than the socket. This is my second Octavia. I have not been able to get an OBD2 plug to seat and make a good connection in either. A search revealed a statement that the trim locates on a pin and that someone had to whittle the pin down to get the trim seated correctly. This then allowed the diagnostic plug to fit. Can anyone confirm that this might be the case? I obviously don't want to tear down the inside front of the car on a wild goose chase. Background: I've just bought my son a diagnostic BT dongle for his VW Golf. I was hoping to test it on the Octy before giving it to him, but couldn't get it to plug in. It does plug in to my other vehicle and connects, but I haven't tried further as it's coded for VAG cars. I am moderately au fait with OBD2, having used both wired and BT connections on a Jeep and range Rover. The Jeep was a nightmare and I was reduced to writing code to send to the port and see the results before I discovered that a gentleman in Estonia had already done it and provided free software and, subsequently, app. I'd do more poking around, but it's teeming down too hard to be kneeling in the path with the driver's door open.

Don't get taken in by the diesel is dirty cult. When I tried to read all the actual evidence, there seemed to be very little published that was authoritative, but the main established facts seemed to be that 1. Particulates measured at the roadside were about 10 times the level from brakes and tyres compared with properly set up diesel engines. 2. The technology is there to reduce NOx down to acceptable levels either by adjusting the fuel to air ratio and/or sorting urea injection. 3. One of the parts of London with the highest pollution levels is Oxford St, where cars are banned. Of course the government will be in thrall to all sorts of vested interests, factions and fictions. How can these statements of how many tens of thousands will die because of diesel engine exhausts be anything but guesswork? The PD is an efficient and reliable engine. Has anyone calculated the total pollution from creation and use to scrappage of one of these compared with, say, an equivalent electric power unit plus batteries plus electricity generation?

It's 88k miles, but they are mainly spent driving tiny distances taking the people we care for from home to shop to clinic to our house and so on. So 88k killer miles. Each section can vary from a few hundred yards to a mile or so, but mainly the former There is a lot of bumping up onto kerbs and similar and huge times spent waiting outside supermarkets etc. That and 20 or 40 miles a day taking daughter to work. Retirement is not for the faint hearted. Our dealer sold us replacement discs and pads for the last Octavia. They were only slightly dearer than the quotes I got from a couple of other places, and they washed the car. I'll happily get warning wires shorted, but not sure about brake-related lights.

My 2010 1.9 tdi estate has been fine for the 1.5 years I've had it, but suddenly has started demanding cash. 88k miles, so I was hoping to afford the cambelt in the next month or so. Now the brakepads low light has come on and there is a weird rattle from somewhere underneath at the back. Here's the question. My previous 2006 1.9 tdi definitely had a dmf. Although it never failed, it always felt flaky and I could sometimes trigger it to go bang and stop the engine if it got its elasticky bits resonating out of sync with the pulses from the pistons. The current 2010 one doesn't do that and has always felt smooth. I have, in fact, always wondered whether it had a later, better dmf or had at some time been fitted with a smf. However, for the last couple of months I have worried about the clutch. Usually it feels fine but, if I spend a long time creeping forward in a queue (eg in the Mersey Tunnel in the rush hour) at the top of the clutch travel, there is a major judder. I suspect this is something getting hot, but don't really have any evidence. I would have thought the clutch would either judder or not, so wondered if this could be something else like engine mountings. When its there, it's bad enough to alarm the wife. I'm now too old to climb over cars, usually get these "proper cars" from the local main dealer and have been happy with their service dept and charges, but can see huge costs looming. Older readers might remember that I posted in the past about my (t)rusty Disco that caught fire while being welded and its foolish replacement by a Jeep Grand Cherokee to tow my 3-ton boat. Well that remains a money pit, and still no local garages want to go anywhere near it. The local Jeep garage is way, way, way beyond a joke. So, any suggestions about the judder will be welcome.

My "new" car came from the main dealer with only one key. The dealer said they normally would only provide one second key free of charge, but it would not have the remote functions. He said this would cost the sales dept (prices from memory) £70. If I wanted it to be the version with remote functions, I would have to pay the difference. I think he said the cost from the service dept to the sales dept would be £160, so it would cost me £90. I said I'd think about it, and when I returned to the saleroom, there was an old friend of mine talking to a salesman obviously about a purchase. I approached them and we all greeted each other and I made a joke about making sure the car came with all the bits. I was then intercepted by the sales manager who said he believed I wanted my second key. I asked what type, he said of course the full remote type. We set in motion the procedure for having it supplied. A few days later my original salesman rang me to say that the original owner of the car had found the second key and they would post it to me. A few more days passed and I got a call from the service dept that they new key had arrived and to book the car in to code it. I went in last Tuesday, had a free bacon butty and coffee while I waited, and accepted their apology that their car wash was frozen solid, so they hadn't cleaned the car. I now have 3 keys and am very pleased. If you had time, I could tell you about my experience a week earlier at the useless, useless, useless Jeep dealer about my other vehicle...........

Thanks for the replies. I'll ask the dealer about coding out the rain sensitive wiper function, as I don't think I'm likely to ever get used to it. I'm assuming it's not faulty. If they won't do it, can anyone tell me where the sensor is and whether it can be replaced by a resistor, put in a tiny bag of water, or something? The info about the tyres is useful. I'll wait until I need to change them before I do anything. In my sentence about the DMF, or lack of, the word ban should, of course, have read bang. I've now fished the hair out from under the g key.

So I swapped the 2006 1.9TD for a 2010 1.9TD Octavia with similar mileage. I'm at the main dealer again tomorrow for them to activate the new second key, so it might be an opportunity to get any digitally adjustable features changed. I find the rain-sensitive wipers a nuisance and possibly dangerous. I never liked the way on the old car that the wipers stopped when the car stopped, but this is ridiculous. The speed control is useless and I have to have the wipers just on or off. Can the dealer plug in something and tweak the wipers to completely manual? The old car had 15" wheels, the new one 16". I don't like this as I have to do a lot of bouncing up kerbs to load old people into the car, but also the road noise is horrendous on the tyres. At the right speed through the Mersey tunnel, the whine from the tyres is steady, but on the right and left curves, I can hear the audio beat note (like what piano tuners use) between the off and nearside tyres. When I first got the car, I thought a wheel bearing had gone it was so much worse than the old car, but the dealer has assured me it's normal, it's the tyres and that they are safe. Additionally, we had to pinch the spare from the old car as there was just the empty well in the new one, so I have a 15" spare on a 16" car. I assume this will get me home in an emergency. The mpg seems slightly down on the old car, but still OK. The clutch takeup is immensely better than the old car, to the extent that I wonder if this has a normal flywheel as opposed to the dmf on the old one. We did 70k miles in the old one and from day1 I thought the flywheel felt it was about to fail. It would very occasionally get out of sync with the engine as I pulled away, there would be a ban and the engine would stop. The new one hasn't yet ever seemed to want to do that. Did dmf's improve in the 4 years? Is there any way of telling what sort of flywheel the car actually has. We have quite a lot of the service records, but there's no mention of flywheels.

Hmmm, I know of someone who had this. The AA put his car into a garage who part dismantled the engine and then gave up. They then demanded money to release the vehicle. The last I heard it was all in the hands of lawyers who I think retrieved something from the situation. It was utterly unsatisfactory as an experience, though. It wasn't a Skoda.

Thanks, Gazpot, yes it must have been picking up the bluetooth from a nearby Audi, as the tablet doesn't see anything here at home. My other vehicle came with a "Parrot" hands free kit that seems to work, but basically I just ignore the phone when driving. I don't have a smartphone, just a primitive fold-up Nokia so I'll stay in the dark ages.

If that's a petrol model, it might be similar to my experience. Most of my mileage is very short urban driving transporting an elderly relative to shops, to church, to us for feeding etc. Mainly 0.5 to 2 mile hops with huge waits in between. I think I've quoted this before here: Petrol Automatic Omega 7 to 9 mpg Diesel automatic Discovery 18ish mpg Diesel Automatic Jeep GC 22ish mpg Diesel manual Octavia 45ish mpg Nothing has changed my view that the advice about diesels only being suitable for those covering long motorway miles can be shown to be nonsense. A cold petrol engine has fuel poured into it until up to temperature. On long motorway runs the Omega approached 40mpg, with the Octavia 60 to 70. Because of paranoia caused by having a succession of old Land Rovers, I've generally kept a book in each vehicle recording mileage and fuel input. The figures are based on that.

This is just a very basic question, I'm afraid. Just got this car and, as one does, I poked all the buttons on the radio, and the one called "Phone" just gave a blank screen. Today, while waiting outside a supermarket for my lovely wife, I fired up a cheapo android tablet, which under Bluetooth found "Audi MMI 7944". Tried to connect and it just said "wrong PIN". Any advice? What should it do?

My best ever was across North Wales and back on a day when I hit no traffic lights or other hold-ups. I achieved just over 70mpg measured by brimming the tank. That was in my2006 1.9tdi. I don't think my new 2010 one is quite as good. Mind you, I do wonder whether the mileage reading might not be a little bit out to make the speedometer read a bit over the actual speed (as they do).

My local dealer, who I trust, quoted £2k as the value of my old 56 reg estate "if in perfect condition, looking like new", so I'd hope for £2.5k for yours. During the change to the replacement Octavia, we had a succession of smaller Skoda courtesy cars. I don't think I'd buy a Fabia for all sorts of reasons eg the radio sounded awful. I quite liked the Rapid.

Thanks, Octavist, that looks like a sensible approach. It also sounds like something to leave until summer comes, so I will.