I'm interested to know what peoples thoughts are on owning an Octavia VRS? Has it been reliable? Has it cost alot of money to keep going or has it cost nothing other than 'consumables' ? Which looks best the original or the MII?

I have owned my car since July 2009 and so far I have had the following issues:

Ceased rear calipers which caused an MOT failure. All in all about £350 to put right.

Poor running. Came down to a cracked hose. £150 to put right.

Poor running again, Replaced MAF. £150 to put right.

Indicator fault. Replaced the relay. £25 to put right.

Add to this servicing, tyres and brake disks I have spent a fair bit of money on it but despite that I still like the car and it makes me smile when its running right.

It going back in on Wednesday due to an oil problem so more expense to come.

Mechanic said the Skoda's in his experience are the most reliable in the VAG group as well so I'm glad I bought something thats cheap to run

well if you paid that much for them jobs then you are well and truly mad

rear caliper £20 second hand 30 min job to fit 2 bolts and a winding tool

cracked hose £150 lol you are kidding me havent seen any gold plated pipes on the vrs lol

maf £70 brand new £20 second hand

indicator relay £5 second hand

you must have a deep wallet if you wanna spend that much lol

i word of advise if you have a prolem put it on here and we will try and tell you the problem and what you need to fix and 9 times out of 10 someone is breaking one of these

conclusion you must be loaded or they see you coming a mile away lol

got to agree^^^^^

Those repair bills seem excessive to say the least. :wonder:

had mine from new on a 57 plate & had no claims under warranty & everything else seems fine at the moment. Solid, well built, reliable, economical & loads of Torques

Happy Driver

Got mine with 110k on the clock apart from a broken spring, tyres and a battery fuse box it has been totally reliable

i word of advise if you have a prolem put it on here and we will try and tell you the problem and what you need to fix and 9 times out of 10 someone is breaking one of these

conclusion you must be loaded or they see you coming a mile away lol

Bang on, If you'd posted up your issues you could have sorted them for far less. Maf is held on by two screws and a hose clamp so don't know why they were charging you that much mate.

Most of my expenses have been down to modding the car, I'll probably end up keeping it till she dies.

Edited 29 October, 201015 yr by madmike01uk

Had mine 10 months, got it with 89k miles on it, 03 plate mk1. In the time I have owned it I have had to replace the intercooler £120 (from GSF), breather pipes and turbo £1100 to sort out, new dipstick (£8ish from skoda) and then today a coil pack (£25.55 from GSF). Also replaced the battery (£100 from halfrauds) and rear discs (worn out), not sure on cost as done during service with some brake upgrades.

I have also changed the wheels (so I can have the STD wheels for winter & track day tyres), the dump valve has been changed to a 007p, AMD remap & piper cross panel filter. I have also changed the pads for minted 1144 all round, braided hoses all round, with 5.1 fluid. All Tyres have been replaced due to wear/damage and a track day set bought, winter set to be bought soon. Cruise control added by main dealer (£233). MAF changed (£75ish from tps) as a precaution after some tweakery.

Other than the above repairs/upgrades just service costs. Oh and quite a lot of petrol (nearly 10k miles so far and I go to work on the train) and a track day. Economy has varied from 11.6 mpg to 40mpg, mostly around 30mpg. The 11.6 was going round silverstone for an evening.

I prefer the look of the mk1 but that is a personal preference. Love the car and won't be getting rid of it. The big expenditure should be over for a while as the car has been largely reliable. Plenty quick enough for road use and can keep up with much more expensive machinery, including keeping up with an F40 on the evo triangle (it was raining, which is why I left one of the 360s behind). Still working on the biggest performance upgrade (the driver), more advanced training to come, as well as more tours and many more miles to come.

Edited 29 October, 201015 yr by Broken

Had mine nearly two years now, it's on 139k miles, had the usual common faults, clutch pedal clip breaking, MAF, seized rear caliper, water pump hadn't gone but replaced it at same time the cambelt tensioner was done (cam belt had been done but not the tensioner), wishbones/lower arm bushes, oh an driveshaft as cv joint had gone, starter motor, water temp sensor and crank speed sensor

I can say it's been one of the best cars I have owned, (and I've had a few varied including sapphire cosworth, 190bhp Renault 5 GTT, 1.1 Fiesta lol) ticks all the boxes IMO for an everyday car, economical, discreet, sporty, but fun to blast round the back roads.

So far it's been reliable! And still produced 182bhp on the rollers

I've had mine about 6 months and done 7k in it,

I've had the seized rear caliper, but i stripped it down and cleaned it up and put it back together and its been fine since, altho that was half the numpty that replaced rear discs and pads before i got it that hadn't refit seal on caliper,

I did cambelt and water pump but more for peace of mind than anything else altho i did find a loose bolt in engine mounting, same numpty that did brake i think,

I've changed oil and filter twice since i've had it, try and do it ever 5 or 6 thousend miles,

I've replaced front bottom arm bushs as they were all shot with car only doing 6k a year before i got it,

Did thermostat other day aswell,

Did it all myself though so there wasn't any labour costs in it,

oh and starter motor sticking abit aswell, job for weekend i think

Bought mine for £2k in June. 99K FSSH 2 owners. As with every other VAG car that I've owned, the VRS has been troublefree

Still can't believe how cheap they are to buy. The Skoda badge stigma still remains it seems

Had my vrs 3 years! It's now on 123k and I've just replaced the wheel bearings which are the first thing that I've had to spend money on in all that time. Ye I've spent on wear n tear items or mods but it's never had any of the so called "common" problems. It's never broke down or acted up and it gets driven hard! All in all it's been fantastic

Had mine 7 months now and covered 9,000 miles.

It's been to the Nurburgring, around it and back, Scotland Highlands, Silverstone, MK and I cannot knock it.

I bought it from Skoda Dealer and it's been back for a couple of warranty items - such as droplink, rear wiper motor replacing but apart from that it's been fine!

One thing I've really been surprised at is how easy it has been to work on, I've so far done all the work on it myself

well if you paid that much for them jobs then you are well and truly mad

rear caliper £20 second hand 30 min job to fit 2 bolts and a winding tool

cracked hose £150 lol you are kidding me havent seen any gold plated pipes on the vrs lol

maf £70 brand new £20 second hand

indicator relay £5 second hand

you must have a deep wallet if you wanna spend that much lol

i word of advise if you have a prolem put it on here and we will try and tell you the problem and what you need to fix and 9 times out of 10 someone is breaking one of these

conclusion you must be loaded or they see you coming a mile away lol

Trouble is though Clive not everyone is capable or can be bothered doing things like this, it's like getting someone in to your painting when you could do it yourself.

I could do a list of whats been done on mine but I don't have the time lol. I put a few up though for a laugh.

Air con flap knackered (disconnected for now)

Boot struts leaking

rattly drivers window

Rad mounts still knackered

Suspension bushes are an ongoing issue for me and always will be lol

Still havn't found out what my rattly steering is all about

general squeeks and rattles (turn radio up)

Done a lot of the work myself after reading up on here and having no experiaence of repairing cars, but I did like destroying things as a kid which helps I think

And many other things that I can't think of right now, but that said I'm quite attached to my car and as long the engine and gearbox (noisy in first gear mind you ) hold I'll be happy