Hi all,

I decided to change my 1997 Renault Laguna 2.2RN diesel for the Octavia because I'll soon be starting a contract that will involve driving around 110 miles per day. My old Renault has served me well - I bought it in August 2000 with 91K on the clock and it now has 172K and still drives fine. I just decided to upgrade after reading the amazing fuel economy of the Skoda - the Renault gives 45MPG or so, but the Skoda is supposed to return 55MPG+. Initial impressions of the Skoda were good - the guy supplied the car with the fuel light on, so I put in

Hi all,

I decided to change my 1997 Renault Laguna 2.2RN diesel for the Octavia because I'll soon be starting a contract that will involve driving around 110 miles per day. My old Renault has served me well - I bought it in August 2000 with 91K on the clock and it now has 172K and still drives fine. I just decided to upgrade after reading the amazing fuel economy of the Skoda - the Renault gives 45MPG or so, but the Skoda is supposed to return 55MPG+. Initial impressions of the Skoda were good - the guy supplied the car with the fuel light on, so I put in

Stan......Reading your other thread, you have a good tuning box you could sell.......................................PMSL.................Sorry, but could not resist it.

Stan......Reading your other thread, you have a good tuning box you could sell.......................................PMSL.................Sorry, but could not resist it.

You wanna buy it

:eek:

I'll get them, just adjusting the choke.........the "spread" is a bit wide at the moment

Welcome to Briskoda, Jim. As your car is on variable servicing make sure you use the correct oil - spec VW 506 00 for a non-PD diesel - for topping up. It's not cheap! I would be surprised if anyone was clever enough to reset the variable service indicator to delay a service by 1000 miles. 25K sounds a useful service interval and is proof that variable servicing can be cost-effective. I'm sure you will be really pleased with the Octavia once you start putting the miles on.

PS: Repost your technical queries in The Workshop - Octavia forum if you don't get all the info you've requested in this one.

Ive had a 99T Octavia SLX TDI(110) for a year now, put quite a few miles on and the economy never fails to suprise. In france last year I got it to 71.8 mpg on a 20 mile journey. The fuel computer is I am told, very accurate and doesn`t tend to sugar coat the figures. I check mine now and again and it generally agrees with my calculations.

The only real problem I have had to date is a faulty MAF which crippled the cars performance but now I have a new one and its better than ever!!

Happy motoring!

Another TDi Octy :handshke:

Welcome :cheers:

Good choice of car

Servicing: Longlife servicing as you say, should easily see 25k miles between services. I'm a bit old fashioned and still don't fully trust the "longlife" idea so I tend to chicken out at between 21 and 23K miles.

Timing belt (including tensioners) changed at 60K (in fact with the use the car gets I did the last one at 48K)

There are loads of discussions on this but I have seen ASV VAG engines pop at 61k with a stripped timing belt so ain't risking it!

Cost of 60K service and timing belt change and at a Skoda Dealer?? Are you sitting down? Promise??? You'll be lucky to get change from

Hi Jim,

I have a Dragon Performance tuning box from www.mrhoot.com, although I bought it direct from them through ebay and not through their own website.

It produces a very good spread of torque and a vey noticable increase in power. I've installed a dash mounted on/off switch so I can switch between the tuned car and the standard car.

Fuel consumption is hardly changed but perhaps is slightly better with the tuning box than without. The increased low down torque lets you hold gears longer and change up sooner so saves fuel.

All tuning boxes increase fueling but it's how clever they are that sorts out the good and bad ones. The cheap resistor in a box type can produce lots of smoke with certain pedal and rpm settings.

The only problem I have with the dragon box is controlling wheel spin in the wet.

Cheers

Lee