Hi guys! I'm laura, came across this site cuz my dad told me to research the problem i've been having with my skoda after he gave the car a look.

I was given the car in January by my grandparents, took a bit of getting used to because i was used to driving a corsa and I have to let the clutch out a long way before it bites.. but it's been fine since then, until around April. I first had a problem when I picked up a friend from the train station and stalled whilst turning the car around, I tried to turn it back on to complete the turn but it refused and I blocked the whole road whilst I waited for my friend! haha, when she arrived, I turned the ignition to show her what happened (with my jump leads at the ready to find a nice person to help) and decided to try stepping on the accelerator and it started! Since then this problem has happened a few times, once when I took the key out and put it back in to start a moment later, it refused to start and also another time stalling at a junction. The only thing that seems to be common with all these times is the car has been stopped at traffic lights or left in the street with the engine running for a while before it happens.

My dad explained to me it may not be starting again because there is too much petrol in the caberetta (not to sure how thats spelt!) but he's checked if there are any cracked pipes and there aren't. I know not to keep trying the ignition as it will flood the engine, but i'm really scared to stall now!

If anyone could shed some light on this? Maybe the car doesn't like sitting there with the engine running and then driving off and it's some crazy way of punishing me, but i'm actually quite scared that i'm gonna get stuck somewhere. breakdown cover is definitely on my list of to do's, but in the meantime, if anyone has any ideas of what to look at that would be such a huge help!

Thanks for reading my post!

Hi Laura

Do you know when/if the car has been serviced? Standard service things like air filter and spark plugs can make a big difference to the way the car runs, and if they're really in need of replacement can be the difference between a car that stalls and doesn't.

(For the record, it's carburettor, and your car doesn't have one, it's fuel injection).

haha thanks! i'm not planning on being a car expert any time soon!

I'll have to ask about the service, but it hadn't ever been cleaned when I got it and it took me two hours to get all the moss off so i'm suspecting the service was quite a long time ago! I really hope that's all it is!

Well, with all these things it's best to get routine and straightforward stuff out of the way before drawing any conclusions. Should be cheap and easy enough to do, you could do it yourself!

hi laura, and welcome to briskoda.

you don't mention which engine size you have? it may be caused by somthing simply like the coolant temperature sensor reading too low.. have a look for paper shop syndrome using the search function..

i would try simply unplugging the temperature sensor to see if it cures the problem