Devon-Terry

I had this problem with near-side rear door (Late 2006 model) . Took it to a local VAG group independent garage and they removed the rear seat to be able to finally get the door card off. It was a long job and I think it cost me about £300. They said it is a common fault. I have also had another common fault with the driver door not locking at all. Had to drive home holding the bloody door shut. That one was cheaper as it is usually caused by a short cable fraying and stopping the locking mechanism from working. Today my fuel filler flap has stopped opening. I guess this is all part of the joy of driving an older car.

My wonderful and utterly reliable 2.8 V6 Superb has recently started to give me the odd gearbox problem. The old lady has covered 134K so I'm not too surprised to finally have something go wrong and as someone who has had countless auto boxes I know that much more than 150K is a bonus. When I bought the car I planned to keep it for two or three years and then move it on. The trouble is that they are great cars and mine has exceeded all my expectations so I have kept her far longer than I intended. Ideally I want to keep her going for a while longer whilst I seek a replacement. So one idea is to get the gearbox oil replaced in the hope that she will be able to keep going until I have found my next vehicle. I don't want to do this myself so I am looking for somewhere I can take the car to get this done. I live near Plymouth in Devon so anywhere in Devon or Cornwall would be good but I will travel further afield if I have to. Can anyone recommend a reliable place that should be able to do the job properly? Any recommendations will be greatly appreciated.

For some interesting facts about night vision and colours take a look at the following link: http://stlplaces.com/night_vision_red_myth/ It is quite dry but factual and informative. My wife has a Suzuki with all red dash illumination and she thinks it is much better than the normal white or green. I find it less pleasent than the illumination in my Superb. So it is also something that can be very personal and subjective. I suspect my car has two red led's because of price and marketing as I cannot see how the red colour helps my night vision when my HID's are providing a bright white light. If the red colour was so good then why are the LED's in the door handles not red as well. Perhaps if they are not too difficult to get to then I will take a look and see if I can swap mine for some white LED's.

I noticed that you have what looks like DRL's in the photo. I would like to fit some but have not done so until now as I do not want them to look like a bolt-on as so many of them do. Do you know if the ones on your car were factory fitted or an after-market add-on?

To help with the on-line search take a look at the following link: http://www.svetila.com/en/light-bulbs-lamps-66/automotive-12v-74/tuning-77/cbi-cool-blue-intense-1037/w5w-12v-5w-2825-hcbi-halogen-cool-3210.html I have not purchased these bulbs yet but have used the site for its good technical data. They do ship to the UK and they price in sterling. This will give you the data you need to shop around if you want to or just place an order. My Superb appears to have the Osram W5W 2825 Cool Blue that are shown on the site as no longer in production. I would hardly describe their output as cool blue but it is not the yellow light that the bog standard W5W will produce. I am going to give the bulbs listed above a try when I get some spare time. Having read other threads I will not be trying LED's due to the problems with heat from the other lamps.

Thanks for the reply. The Xedos 9 in its later Miller version really was a great car. I am told that Mazda dealers here in the UK refused to follow the Toyota example with Lexus so the Xedos Brand name became a confusing model name instead. Did they not realise that selling a 30K car with a Mazda badge was always going to be tough when so may buyers are badge snobs. Mazda built a new factory just for the two Xedos models and then made sure that it matched the Mercedes E class and BMW 5 series in every possible way. That is why they got snapped up by knowledgable owners as they lost loads of value and became a terrific bargain and very desirable. It took me about a year to find mine and I got it up to 170,000 before the gearbox (auto) finally started to tell me it was near the end. I had to make some big adjustments to my driving style, especially when overtaking things, after I got the Superb. Living in Devon often means trying to get past caravan drivers on single carrigeway roads with short straights and many bends. In the Xedos I could do this with ease and safety almost all the time. It was a bit of a shock to try the same in the Superb but I have learned to be a bit more patient and get my timing absolutly right. You can probably tell that I care not a jot about the badge but just look for good cars that meet my needs at the time. Right now the Superb is ideal and I struggle to think of what else I could have bought that would give me the same set of features. I did begin by looking at the Mk II Superb but decided that the Mk 1 would be better because of its proper length and space. Having driven it for the last year I am now even more convinced that I made the right choice. So I intend to keep it for another year or two and then replace it with something else. By then at least one of the brood will have stopped using the Dad taxi and I may no longer require so much space. As ever I will be doing my research long before then as I whittle down a short list to an even shorter one.

I bought my first Skoda, a Mk1 Superb Elegance 2.8 auto in December 2011 after much research to find a suitable replacement for my wonderful but aging Mazda Xedos 9 Miller. The Mazda was a fantastic car with a 2.3 litre V6 and a big supercharger that gave it very good performance in a car that never got a second glance. Usual high quality build and probably the best car ever made by Mazda. In the end I went for the Superb Mk 1 because it has a big boot, reasonable performance, and masses of legroom for my tall family. My older son, now 15, is pushing six foot and the younger one is not far behind. As an Essex boy I wanted to be able to make the 600 mile round trip in comfort with both of them able to sit in any seat and not complain. I am also self employed as an IT specialist and spend quite a lot of time driving to sites all over the South West and further afield. So I wanted to have certain creature comforts as well as something I could rely on. So far I am not dissapointed. True the performance is nothing like the Mazda but then I knew it would not be and few cars at sensible money could match the Xedos anyway. In other ways it has been great so overall I am happy with the Superb. Fuel consumption is OK and it is confortable and quiet. The HID headlights are better than I expected as I spent a lot of time looking at the forum before I parted with any money. I can see why people complain about the HID's now my wife has them on her Suzuki Grand Vitara. Mine looked OK until I drove her car in the dark and then the difference was striking. Oh well at least I have something I can try to improve if it ever stops raining. So far it has covered about 20,000 miles and has been rock solid. I am actually looking forward to driving it for another year and just hope that we get a bit more of a summer this time as it feels like I spend almost all the time driving in the rain. Yes I still get stupid comments from those who have never bothered to look at or sit in a modern Skoda but I expected that. The best moment came when I gave a lift to three IT people who had clearly not looked at a Skoda properly. They were gobsmacked at the space and the quality and have not made a single comment since then. So I am a very happy owner of a Skoda and glad to be a member of this forum.