Well the wife and I went to the Allams today to have another look at the Black Octavia pictured already in this thread. The wife thought it looked a bit "banker" ish and I'm fairly sure she was using that as a synonym.

I also enquired about the L&K 1.8 TSI Hatch that appeared on their site this morning for the same price despite being 6 months newer, having less milage, having the MaxiDot/Pressure monitor/7 speed DSG/drivers electric memory seat/swively xenon headlights/front and rear sensors/BT/MF/leather interior steering wheel and no doubt other bits that the Elegance didnt have.

The wife much prefferred the L&K look over the Elegance and I have to say, the inside of the car looked much nicer. We took it for a drive and were taken a slightly different way where I could use a little more right foot and it responded just as I expected it to. Nice and smooth and quiet cruising at 40 incidcated (probably only 35) in 6th. I did also see it dip into 7th so it definitly had it.

So we went and sat down with Linda and we talked a little. They offered me £400 for my 2001 Y reg 1.6 Focus that sounds ill which was more than I was expecting (webuyanycar offered £105 for a mild comparison. I checked that that price didn't include my Pioneer 8300BT radio that cost me £260 3 months ago and they said yes it did and did I have the OWM one to put back in. Since it didn't have one when I bought it I didn't, the guy at Allams thought about it and said I can keep the radio and still have £400.

So we bought it £12595 (after the Focus £400) for a Aqua Blue 1.8 TSI 7speed DSG Hatch, 13,000 on the clock. Added options were I think just the pressure sensors, BT phone and something else I can't remember. Will need to look at the "as standard" to see exactly what else was added if anything but the L&K does have quite a lot of it already. They are sorting the first service (due in 6 days according to the trip) and replacing the two front tyres which had about 1.5-2mm left before they hit the bump in the tread. They are fat buggers on that too.

They said the interior is grey but it looked like black to me. Not complaining

Picking up next Wednesday

Looks good!

Fair play, nice job

Sounds like a good buy, welcome to the club :-)

DMFs have been an unmitigated disaster from a consumer viewpoint.

Notice how consumers keep reporting failing and catastrophically failed DMFs while car makers, dealers and DMF manufacturers keep continue to appear unaware of this.

The motoring press are begining to wake up to this but, because the money they spend is not the journalists own and because even their long term tests are fairly short term, long term reliability in the real world is not such a major factor for them.

Because petrols tend to have less low down torque they are not quite so hard on DMF's but even here flywheels are no longer an item which can be reliabily expected to last the life of the car - as they might have done for the past 100+ years. Don't you love progress.

Early stages of DMF failure are judder on start off and judder under load at moderately low revs.

I am not sure when, or indeed if, VAG ever really sorted out the carbon build up associated with their direct injection petrol engines so this could be a concern for you.

Any first hand experience out there?

Nice move,

L&K has just about everything.

Only a few options

webuyanycar offered £105 for a mild comparison.

ASM auto salvage on the radio today said they would collect and pay £100.

Bucks/Oxford area

Well the wife has been calling me Gumpa all day and my brother has been asking if the Arthritis or Glaucoma have started to set in lol.

Linda seemed as surprised as I was to see the list price on the L&K was the same as the Elegance. The only reason I can think was because the Elegance had quite a few bits added but even then it was still a lower spec. Not that I care

I suppose I'd better become a bona fide member of Briskoda now then!

My to do list is

Sort the loan paperwork

Sort the insurance

Find a list of anything I might want change that I can't do on the maxidot

Find a PDF of the manual to look at on my night shifts between now and Wednesday. Lots of knobs and buttons that do things.

Sell my Pioneer 8300BT radio

Edited 19 March, 201214 yr by DBT85

Well done sir!

Anyone know if ALL the 7 speed DSGs were dry or if they also made some wet?

Also does anyone know what wheel alignment options the FL Octavia has? I think my Focus only has toe in at the front but I've red a few people say that the Octavia settings from the factory are a bit wonky.

EDIT: Just phone Aviva and the quote for this one is onlt £158 extra compared to £220 extra for the Elegance. Also they said that they would class it as a manual since there is the option of driver selected gears. Odd but I'm happy.

Oddly they said they couldn't send the details to the garage which was odd, Allams seemed confident that they could do that with no problem. They are emailing them to me anyway so I'll just forward that on.

Edited 20 March, 201214 yr by DBT85

Now that looks very nice, welcome to the happy club

Looks like a good buy - welcome to the club

Weird about Aviva's transmission classification though. The usual rule is how many pedals it has. DSG doesn't have a clutch pedal, therefore is classed as an automatic. Especially as you can drive a DSG-tranmission vehicle with an auto-only license. But hey, not that it really matters

Enjoy!

Manual:

http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=skoda%20octavia%20manual&source=web&cd=2&ved=0CFsQFjAB&url=https%3A%2F%2Fmediaportal.skoda-auto.com%2Fresource%2Fdocumentation%2Fmanuals%2Fen%2FOctavia%2F05-2011%2FManual%2FA5_Octavia_OwnersManual.pdf&ei=nM5oT8r1KYah0QXP0qyaCQ&usg=AFQjCNFE6M_D9kOmvj-ID-odT3oXqNtJ_A&cad=rja

Thanks for that JRW. Just what I needed for my run of night shifts!

Looks a like you got a pretty solid deal there, and car looks great

On Tuesday I called Aviva to sort the insurance out to start from Wednesday and I still don't have the electronic documents to be able to send to Allams to get them to tax the car. Also my boss has changed some shifts around which means that I can now collect the car on Monday at 16:30 rather than Wednesday at 10:00.

Instead of calling Aviva to try and change the date again I just called Skoda and got their 7 days complimentary insurance to start on Monday. They've already emailed the docs to the dealer so now it can get taxed. Quite why Aviva were unable to send the documents straight to the dealer I don't know.

Anyway, I'm looking at trying to drop a Columbus in in the next month or so. My birthday is in the middle of April so hopefully some funds will be forthcoming to help with that!

My list of things I want to change or check are

Check the gateway before I buy a Columbus to check whether it needs to be updated or changed. Since the car is only 18 months old I'm hoping it wont need to be replaced.

Then

Needle staging - on

Coming home - On & Fog

Cornering lights - On

Large MPH - On

Seatbelt chime - Off

Any other suggestions?

In other news this week my brother exchanged contracts and completed on his 3 bed house and my dad bought a 6 month old Octavia Elite Nav 2.0 Derv. Been an expensive week for the family!

All sounds good. As it's an FL there will be no gateway issues with you fitting a Columbus.

DBT85

any pictures of the inside of the car ?

All sounds good. As it's an FL there will be no gateway issues with you fitting a Columbus.

I'd heard similar but was going to check anyway, if you are certain then that's fantastic.

DBT85

any pictures of the inside of the car ?

I didn't think to take any lol. There will be plenty on Tuesday though.

I did find some of another members car in this thread which looks to be identical inside from what I remember.

I'm ot sure that you can turn the seatbelt chime off and personally I don't understand why anyone would.

Get single press unlock enabled, having to press it once for the drivers door and then again for everything else is a pita.

Enjoy

I'd heard similar but was going to check anyway, if you are certain then that's fantastic.

100%.

I'm ot sure that you can turn the seatbelt chime off and personally I don't understand why anyone would.

I turned if off immediately. My logic being I'm perfectly capable of putting it on without needing to be reminded. It's also annoying if I need to move the car a few feet on the driveway, for example.

I turned if off immediately. My logic being I'm perfectly capable of putting it on without needing to be reminded. It's also annoying if I need to move the car a few feet on the driveway, for example.

Im with ya on that

I like your logic. I always wear it anyways and then as you say , if you only need to move the car a few feet, that chime wrecks me head !!

100%.

Brilliant thanks

I turned if off immediately. My logic being I'm perfectly capable of putting it on without needing to be reminded. It's also annoying if I need to move the car a few feet on the driveway, for example.

Same here. Often we'll move the cars around because one of us is out first in the morning and I don't want to be beeped at when doing so. I always put my belt on when I'm actually driving as to not do so is just lunacy.

Nice car...and nice use of the disabled bays too at the dealership. :think: