Thinking of buying a Fabia VRS

[ultra_joel88]

Its a great forum I find - if there any answers I cant find, which is rare, I pop over to seatcupra.net, which is also good, if a little less well-organised

[jasc1988]

Its a great forum I find - if there any answers I cant find, which is rare, I pop over to seatcupra.net, which is also good, if a little less well-organised

Its a nightmare - so many sections

[BRUN]

whats the handling like on them ?.......Renault on the whole produce pretty good standard cars in the handling dept, and for the last 3 1/2 years ive owned my 'valver' which has the williams widetrack, their isnt much that i cant show up around the bends !.......my mate keeps saying to me, if you sell your car you wont be able to take corners like you do at the moment!

[ultra_joel88]

Handling on the Fabia is average to poor.

Fit a rear anti roll bar, some uprated suspension bushes and it will handle average to decent, coilovers and all that stuff - it will handle "well" but not exceptionally.

The thing with the Fabia VRS is that it doesnt really do anything "exceptionally" but it doesnt really have any pitfalls.

e.g. renault and peugeot make cars that handle well but have a lot of reliability and build quality issues.

The Fabia is a brilliant all rounder - but if you are after a car that will set fire to your ********, you'll need to look elsewhere.

[XLBaconDoubleCheese]

http://briskoda.net/fabia-i/golf-mk4-vs-fabia-vrs-buy/122497/

Check this link for a bit of info on some things. Handling is down to what your use to, but from the sounds of it, your use to so pretty amazing cars in the bends, so your gonna notice whatever you buy. If your looking to mod it, then coilovers, arb, and a map and you`ll be smiling whenever your in it i reckon.

Matt

[BRUN]

im looking for something which i dont need to modify very much, ill be having it remapped, painting the front chrome grille body coloured, and lowering it on some quality springs like Eibach or H&R......and thats all i was hoping would need doing, possibly an Eibach anti roll bar aswell

with regards to the handling, i guess its not 'bad', just maybe not as good as it could have been for a hot hatch ?

[Maffu]

It's got a heavy engine over the front wheels. You can change lots of things to make it better, but just don't expect it to rival a Clio Cup.

[BRUN]

to be honest i no longer push my car like i used to, 90% of the time i just pootle along, however i like the driving experience in general from a car with decent handling, everything just feels better even day to day driving, and i like to know ive got a lot in reserve should i need it

[AndyRAC]

I've got a Test drive in one on Friday - looking forward to it. Anything I should look for?

[XLBaconDoubleCheese]

check the common faults on the sticky, but there really isnt anything major tbh.

BRUN, if i were you id take one for a spin, i personally like my std fabia handling (granted ill be getting coilovers when funds are available), but then iv come from a renault megane lol.

[BRUN]

thanks for the input

[djswivel]

I don't really push my car that hard, and I've found that the Eibach springs make the world of difference. The standard suspension doesn't like even slightly spirited driving, as I discovered when I went round a roundabout sideways at 15mph.

[BRUN]

lol, really?!

their is a large motorway junction roundabout i know of where 50mph is no problem in my current car

[Rob.]

I don't know if this'll help at all on describing the handling, but...

As far as standard fabia Vs. VRS goes.. on a quiet, wide open round about I use everyday my non vrs under steared (it was more than controlable), but in my vrs (though, I'm sure I haven't fully pushed yet). I feel the rear start to move out before it under stears..

all the above said.. my vrs has naff-cheapy-o tyres on it and my older one ran the skoda approved continetals. could just be that.

Dunno if that helped?

Rob :-)

p.s. yeah, briskoda is full of lovely people (were not made of cake though... well, actually, I'm prob 10% cake going by my terrible diet)

['Little' John]

lol, really?!

their is a large motorway junction roundabout i know of where 50mph is no problem in my current car

There's a mid-size roundabout near here which I can get round at 50mph in an unmodified Fabia vRS with no problems, except giving people a heart attack when you go past them on the inside. The handling isn't as bad as some people would like to make out. Admittedly I've never had a car which is supposed to have been a great handler (my last 3 were all Vauxhall Astras!), but to upset a vRS you need to be driving like a bit of a ****head. I've always run out of bottle before running out of grip in the Fabia, and although I'm nowhere near as bad as I was ten years ago I don't drive like a granny yet.

I think a lot of it is down to driving style. If you bounce on and off the throttle and brakes you will be able to upset any car, no matter how good the handling is supposed to be. Drive smoothly, feeding in the power and easing on the brakes and you'd be surprised at how much better the handling is.

[BRUN]

thanks for that, not as bad as first seems then maybe

also, agreed, for proper grip around a bend you need to slow down before it, and feed the power through it properly

[oilburninnut]

I came from a skyline to a fabia vrs sort the suspension,the brakes and fit a jabba rear arb then sort your own skills then the car is way more capable than 99% of the people that drive them.