I am new to the site and have a 3.5 year old OCTAVIA VRS TDI CR170 the car has done 68,000 miles and has upto now been faultless and was the best car I have ever owned. The car lost all power on the motorway last week aat 70mph and the R.A.C confirmed the auxillary belt had snapped. The car was taken to a local garage (not a skoda dealer) and they have shown me that the auxillary belt has snapped and found its way into the timing belt and wrapped itself around the bottom wheel the timing belt is attached to (even though there is a cover around the area) The timing belt looks as if it is covered in black spaghetti where the sreeded aux belt has made its way into the area the timing belt sits. The garage have cleaned it all out and checked the timing but the enginne will not start. They are now running a compression check on the cylinders but have said there may be major engine damage.

Has anyone else encountered this. The car has always been serviced at a Skoda dealer and is only 5mounths out of Warenty, I find it hard to belive that a aux belt could snap and basicly reck the enginne. It seems a bad design if the aux belt can get beond the timing belt cover and cause this much damage!

Sorry too hear about your car, it a shame you did not have your taken to a main dealer as it had full service history i would speak to skoda as soon as passable ask them what is this best way forward.

i agree that the belt should not go round the timing belt when it snapped, who fitted the belt is the question and when.

bill

That is quite horrendous luck.

There's no "may be" about major damage on a diesel if the cam drive fails. It's a question of whether you're lucky enough to escape with only bent valves, or get things like a broken camshaft, chipped pistons, and maybe bent connecting rods and a broken crankshaft as well!

As "bill2" says above, this should have gone straight to a Skoda dealer, since it sounds like a failure of workmanship when the cambelt was changed.

Thanks guys I am a bit gutted. The aux belt that snapped and the timing belt it wrapped round are the original belts and have never been changed