I know that the amount of effort required to close a car door is a subjective matter - but does anyone else feel they have to put 'too much' effort into doing so on their car - Ever since my Octavia RS was new, I have felt that I am having to 'slam' the doors. My dealer says that it's not worth trying to adjust them - as this sometimes makes matters worse! Am I just spoilt because my 3 previous cars were Hondas and therefore got used to 'silent' closing?

Rob

After experience of a lot of Citroens, I have to say that the (well, my.. anyway) Octavia doors are very well engineered in comparison. Just pulling firmly (not slamming) from about 6" (open) gap works fine.

Last car I had where the doors were so good was a Renault 5 (1973)

I find quite often that when I open the door from the inside - just swing it open not particularly violently - it stops half way then comes back usually squashing my leg in the process

Yes - very strong spring detents. Good in some respects in that you shouldn't bang the door into the car next to you in a car park too easily but like you say if you get it wrong it bounces back.

Originally posted by DaveU in this post

I find quite often that when I open the door from the inside - just swing it open not particularly violently - it stops half way then comes back usually squashing my leg in the process

The door check "thingie" has two detents - one for half-open, and one for fully-open. If you don't push it quite hard enough to drop it into the first detent, the mechanism will "spring" it back, a bit harder than you expected

Search in the ICE forum for a thread by funkyjutel. He lined his doors with some sort of aquaseal from B&Q which not only improved sound quality by miles, but also the doors feel more solid and open and close more smoothly.

The quirks with the doors appearing heavy to close and/or springing back, on the Octy anyway, are a common VAG thingy - my gf's 03 Golf is exactly the same. Solid German build quality methinks ...