OK so I ran over a raised drain cover and took a lump out of the rim of my 17" sputnik wheel. Put on spare (OK I should have noticed this before) and saw that it was a 16" steelie with a warning label saying 50mph max. Not happy:thumbdwn: (well happier than I was in my alfa gtv where the narrow space saver was only good for 50 miles at 50 mph (no joy on that rainy saturday night (why is it always raining when I need to change a wheel) when I was 85 miles from home and no where was open to sell me a new full size tyre. Limped home and next day was shoked at how little tread was left (good job I put it on the back, even though it meant a double change))

So after all of those brackets the question is this. Can I change the conti tyre on the spare for a proper one that is not limited or is it the wheel that is duff and not up to the forces of more than 50MPH?

Second quibble, no one in scotland has a 17" sputnik lying around to sell me! so it'll be 4 days to get one from englandshire!

The tyre itself is not limited to 50MPH. It's a liability issue by Skoda. Something along the lines that if some numpty only puts two of the wheelbolts back on when changing, or they're not torqued up properly, they'll do less damage to themselves, others and the car doing upto 50, then motorway speeds. Strange, but true

I had a puncture last month on the rear offside and fitted the spare. Mine was an unused Dunlop SP Sport. The only issue I had was I drove more cautiously, as I had a narrower wheel and tyre, 205/55/16, compared with 3 other 225/40/18s. So handling wasn't at its peak...

Steve

its more to do with fact that you have two different tyre sizes on the same axle , the tyres and the wheels are ok and up to the job

Thanks for help guys, I've been talking to Skoda about this and trying to get them to tell me what the widest spare wheel I can have in the boot so that I can then change the other wheels to match it (excessive I know, but it is aimed to let them know I'm keen to get back to the full sized real spare case i had with my mk 1 slx 20v. Honestly they don't have access to cars, tape measures or drawings so I am off to annoy my least favourite folk at specialist cars skoda to try to get them to answer the question, not exactly hopeful.....

The wheel well in the boot should be sufficient to hold the 'flat' main wheel when its removed, so you should be able to fit a full size spare in there if you can get one. I can certainly get my 205's in there...

The wheel well in the boot should be sufficient to hold the 'flat' main wheel when its removed, so you should be able to fit a full size spare in there if you can get one. I can certainly get my 205's in there...

Mine was delivered with a Turanza 205/55/16 from factory.......

If you're that fussed, get another Sputnik, or 17" wheel of the same width, with a 225/45/17 tyre attached, and carry that as your spare. The 16" they supply is more than sufficient though, and a damn sight better than a 125 width space saver, or a can of tyre weld

Steve

bit off topic, but does any one know the price of two steel wheels?

After finding my VRS completely useless in the snow and now having a passat with the same tyres, I want a couple of steelies and some winter tyres to leave sat in the garage come snow time

What size Dan? Something like 6.5J 16" 5x112? Best to keep an eye out as they're std fitment on a bog-standard Golf Mk5/6 and people may be upgrading to alloys.

Steve

yup they'd be ideal, nice and cheap, might try the scrappies

I would - and keep an eye on eBay and E38.

Steve

If your running winter tyres should be on all 4; 205/55/R16 on 6 or 7J 16 rims is the usual recommended size for Golf V / Octavia II if you wanted to add snow chains to the equation.

Very common size on Golf.

i was only going to bother with the fronts, not intending on full on snow driving, just my vRS wouldnt get up the slightest slope