Ah but that is different,

yours is more suited to those of the Dai Nippon Butoku Kai,  

Martial training while driving, all falls to hand (finger tip) with your eyes closed.

Edited 26 March, 201511 yr by goneoffSKi

Ah but that is different,

yours is more suited to those of the Dai Nippon Butoku Kai,  

Martial training while driving, all falls to hand (finger tip) with your eyes closed.

 

I had suspected it was more along the lines of an apprentice approaching a model of the dash with a bucket of buttons throwing them at it.

 

Possibly making Bruce Lee noises.

Electronic Handbrakes.  

Ninja Stuff right there.    

Electronic Handbrakes.  

Ninja Stuff right there.    

 

Not in the Accord. It was a plus point to me :clap:  Stupid bloody things

That's outrageous. Hope you told them to shove any chance of future custom and that you will name and shame all over the net.

I got a text from stealer looking for a date for service. I told them to go forth .I've also made a decent report on Lister

(SKODA) COVENTRY ,on here. might be a good place to buy a car, but from my experiences, a good bit pricey on servicing/repairs. Cambelt change- came in at £450, price at indie was £150 lower- they matched. I'd ask if they wanted business.

Edited 26 March, 201511 yr by VWD

Yeah it was the seating that made me sell my Octavia and get a car designed for RHD. No more back and leg ache!

 

The Octavia III is such a terrible RHD conversion there was no way I was going to get one.

 

Out of interest (and slightly off topic) what aches were you getting?

 

I've got a manual MK3 Octy vRS (done 20K in about 18mths), and am visiting a physio this weekend for shooting pains / cramp I'm getting in the rear of my left leg muscles. 

Not in the Accord. It was a plus point to me   Stupid bloody things

Damn right. Skoda still have the plus point that they haven't jumped on the bandwagon for the idiotic, unnecessary things. Or rather VAG haven't allowed them to fit them.

 

In my car I have a real handbrake (on the driver's side), which pulls a cable which activates a drum brake in the rear hubs. A completely mechanical system independent of any other part of the car and that's the way I like it.

Out of interest (and slightly off topic) what aches were you getting?

 

I've got a manual MK3 Octy vRS (done 20K in about 18mths), and am visiting a physio this weekend for shooting pains / cramp I'm getting in the rear of my left leg muscles. 

I had a MKII and after a year or so of ownership I noticed (trying to investigate the back pain I'd developed) that the seatbacks only really came up to my shoulder blades and that the headrest on max only reached the base of my skull, so I was hunching forward. I got a MKIII as a courtesy car and noticed the offset pedals thing others here have mentioned.

 

When shopping for the Subaru, I definitely paid more attention to the seating position than anything else It's quite amusing that a Japanese car is much more suited to a tall chap like myself than a German one.

If it moves 2 inches in a 40mph impact, what happens at 60 or 75....

Without going into major research and maths checks, if an A pillar deforms 2inches (major deflection for its length..) then its has exceeded its Plastic load limit already, so any increase impact is going to see it completely crumple.... half inch deformation is a good chance of remaining (mostly) elastic - so hasnt gotten too close to its limit. It shows that yeah, the Clio iii may have tested better than the Dacia's built on same platform why -  is the material thickness, composition and assembly carrried out to the same standard as when Renault developed it while Dacia build with it...

 

At 80 mph the forces would be four times as much if I remember by kinetic energy equations ie half the mass times the veolcity squared.  Probably any road car hitting a bridge or tunnel parapet dies as Diana, Dodi and Henri Paul found out, amazing Rees-Jones survived but he was in the quadrant of the car least affected by the compression.

 

The structure of the car needs to deform substantial to absorb the kineitc energy of the accident. You would not want a titinium shell that did not distort and just passed the decleration on to the passengers.

 

I am familiar with Young's Modulus and eleastic and plastic destortion and have a 2-1 BSc honours degree also spent several months working for Department of Transport on a Trunk road accident team.  Like Volvo, Renault have been one of the leading proponents of safer car design and whilst the Dacia is effectively a derivative of the Clio Mark 3 and the Mark 4 is even better there is a lot more to road safety than EuroNCAP as an article in the Indy reported af few days ago with even the AA saying so.....

 

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/motoring/features/ncap-stars-lose-their-sparkle-528448.html 

The 'WHAT CAR Car of the year 2015,!!!!  the 3rd Generation Fabia, about sums up Skoda in 2015.  (or maybe 'mediocre car of the year'.)

The Fabia being Skoda UK's biggest selling model remember.

 

So a little petrol engine best kept in town because it can not pull its own weight.

A gruff noisy diesel that is best kept out of residential areas.

The 1.2TSI petrol that is good rather than great, and not as exciting as a Ford Fiesta.

& you can not drive at Big Sharp Edge Potholes because you might notice them,

but obviously other cars shrug them off.

 

The 'WHAT CAR Car of the year 2015,!!!!  the 3rd Generation Fabia, about sums up Skoda in 2015.  (or maybe 'mediocre car of the year'.)

The Fabia being Skoda UK's biggest selling model remember.

 

So a little petrol engine best kept in town because it can not pull its own weight.

A gruff noisy diesel that is best kept out of residential areas.

The 1.2TSI petrol that is good rather than great, and not as exciting as a Ford Fiesta.

& you can not drive at Big Sharp Edge Potholes because you might notice them,

but obviously other cars shrug them off.

 

 

I was amazed to hear it got Car of the Year. We are emerging from a very long recession and development of cars has been at a low ebb and we can hopefully expect a rush of new designs which move things forward.

 

Yes it is a very competent car and one the Skoda dealerships still around will use the Car of the Year status but it still looks relatively expensive and quite dull against the oposition and that applies across the entire range with perhaps the CityGo being the exception.

 

Skoda UK should be offering the sort of deals that shifted the Mk 1s and 2s ie 20% off ie pay the VAT etc as that would bring the high prices down to a more realistic one people can actually afford and that they will noty take a huge devaluation in the first year.

 

No VRS, no inticement for me there as the other models too expensive and/or too dull.   Skoda need to bring back the fun and value in their range IMO.

Must admit skoda appear to have let themselves go, at my last service they found a front coilspring gone and bumpstops perished.

So I got the pricing for the work required doing on the service invoice to be told by the jumped up receptionist that my car is extremely dangerous because of the broken coilspring 'scaremongering', and the bumpstops are also dangerous? I tried not to laugh but I wasn't paying over £300 for it when I could do it myself for the fraction of the price.. Anyway to add insult to injury they also added no history of cambelt change so insisted that would need doing.. Regardless of the fact that I had it done a year ago at that very dealer!!! I explained this and still got the response of no history of work... I shan't be going back in a hurry I think, maybe I'll look elsewhere.

Must admit skoda appear to have let themselves go, at my last service they found a front coilspring gone and bumpstops perished.

So I got the pricing for the work required doing on the service invoice to be told by the jumped up receptionist that my car is extremely dangerous because of the broken coilspring 'scaremongering', and the bumpstops are also dangerous? I tried not to laugh but I wasn't paying over £300 for it when I could do it myself for the fraction of the price.. Anyway to add insult to injury they also added no history of cambelt change so insisted that would need doing.. Regardless of the fact that I had it done a year ago at that very dealer!!! I explained this and still got the response of no history of work... I shan't be going back in a hurry I think, maybe I'll look elsewhere.

 

If you like a good sized car for the sort of money we use to pay for cars pre the financial crisis then I have not found anything close to the Dacia. Deja Vu Skoda 15/20 years ago.

 

I tried the 1.5 DCi which I thought was a bit lumpy and the similarly horsepowered ie 90 hp 3 cylinder petrol nicer to drive, cheaper to buy but still cheap road tax and pretty economical. 

Skoda's are no longer bargain cars. Simple as that.

My Octavia was 16k - 4 months old. That's ridiculous! I had a look at a new fabia when I bought our 2 ex demo monte carlo's. £18000 list price for a top spec fabia. Priced themselves into Audi A1 territory. They need to take stock of where they are and what they are. They make cheap, good quality(ish) cars. Or, they used to...

Skoda's are no longer bargain cars. Simple as that.

My Octavia was 16k - 4 months old. That's ridiculous! I had a look at a new fabia when I bought our 2 ex demo monte carlo's. £18000 list price for a top spec fabia. Priced themselves into Audi A1 territory. They need to take stock of where they are and what they are. They make cheap, good quality(ish) cars. Or, they used to...

 

Dacia is the new Skoda-type brand.  For less than that (16K) one can have the new Duster 4x4.  My ordered Logan arrived in the country yesterday a Laureate with MediaNav for almost half the price of the average Octy and a similar boot.

 

https://youtu.be/Revi2KdgxQs

 

You do the maths

 

They also work with Renault and Renaultsport like at Pykes Peak

 

https://youtu.be/kSjtXRYsG74

My experience of Skoda STEALERS- not nice. I went there for a cambelt change ,as I needed a oil service. I'd have preferred to go to Unit18, but oil needed chaining urgently and when pressed, they matched Ali's prices. Next visit- leaky fuel return pipe, a few thousand miles after the cambelt- they wanted about £300 to replace a 6" bit of pipe. I got bit of pipe- breakdown replaced it - cost of pipe - 50 p.

Previous visit was to have door cards done. "OH- WE only do theses customers report. "not all of them". "AND those that are riveted in, we glue, those that are  screwed ,we replace. It's cheaper". Shades of the Badly Made Car Corporation of the 60/70's.

Edited 2 April, 201511 yr by VWD

Skoda Dealers are at least going to have something nice to look at in the Showrooms, and for the Sales Execs to drive.

 

Hopefully the pricing is as good as it appears now,

and the 2.0 tsi AWD 280ps should be a cracker.

Edited 3 April, 201511 yr by goneoffSKi

Skoda Dealers are at least going to have something nice to look at in the Showrooms, and for the Sales Execs to drive.

 

Hopefully the pricing is as good as it appears now,

and the 2.0 tsi AWD 280ps should be a cracker.

 

Do we know an MPG for this tool?   (Got to be much better than the 3.2l V6 it replaces)

I think the Police might buy a few of them, espeically the estate which I presume there is going to be.

You don't buy a petrol 4x4 with 280hp for the MPG, sonny

^^^^^^^

As Salespeople often say to customers,

and they do not pay for the fuel in the Dealership perk / Demonstrator they drive.

 

These are the same people that will try to put you off buying a Diesel if they want to punt Petrols,

then go sell a Diesel to some senior citizens that only do 50 miles a week and believe they will get 80 MPG while doing that.

You don't buy a petrol 4x4 with 280hp for the MPG, sonny

 

As I have mentioned before it is not the price of fuel that particularly bothers me, I started considering the V6 Superb, but just the fact you may struggle to effectively get more than 30 mpg / 350 mile out of a tank which is just a pain to live with. 

 

With a fuel card I only pay the PAYE tax element (at 40%) on the fuel I use as Benefit in Kind so fuel is about 44p a litre to me, cheaper than bottled water, but I get really irked and stopping for fuel in the morning going to the airport/sea port/client and then needing to fill up on the way home too.  

 

Skoda particularly, have this annoying habit of fitting ever smaller fuel tanks, thankfully the Fabia 2 VRS can be vented to accept 50 litres or so and with lowe 40s MPG you get quite a decent range for quite a relatively cheap car.

True that. I fuelled my Passat 1.9 TDI once a month and then my Octavia 2.0 PD every two weeks. It's now a weekly chore with the Scoob.

My wife and I both love our Mk1 Fabia vRS.  We consider it one of the best all round practical, fun, tough as old boots and economical cars we've owned, but we don't value or like the experiences with Skoda, preferring instead to do the work the car needs ourselves or to use a local garage.  

 

We have just parted company with a merc estate after 5 years of trouble free motoring in search for a replacement with lower miles.  I started looking seriously at late model Octavia vRS estate models, but from what I've seen and read, they haven't come on in leaps and bounds quality wise over the years, are still plagued by niggles, and importantly, have got very expensive compared with...well just about anything!  I wanted a low miles 2008 to 2011 vRS petrol estate but my experiences with Skoda dealers, and reliability/quality niggles (we've had a few Skodas now) meant that whilst we're delighted with the Fabia we wont be buying another skoda any time soon.  We ended up with a low miles Lexus GS300 (245BHP V6 petrol), immaculate, full history, relatively quick, totally luxurious all for LESS than what it would have cost us for an equivalent used vRS estate (ie one in as good condition with the same low miles and the same year). That says it all...Skoda have over valued their brand without actually addressing some of the important issues they needed to.  Part of that lies with VAG for the unreliability and plain crap-ness of a lot of their smaller engines (sorry, but I hate the damned revvy, wheezy over complex little things) and in part due to the failure to improve quality to be worthy of what they're asking price-wise. Throw in a relatively poor dealer experience and the picture isn't looking very rosy despite the media hype and "car of the year" awards (who awards these things anyway?). I dont like the new angular model shapes either.  It looks cheap and nasty as a styling exercise, like a series of angular sardine tins but I appreciate that this is entirely subjective and others will love it. 

 

My experience to date with Lexus dealers is the exact opposite of Skoda. They couldn't have been more helpful when I had a few little niggles to sort, they even did some work I didn't ask for and didn't charge me for it!  Wake up and smell the coffee Skoda.  Ford does better small cars (the new Fiesta is a gem), and for those of us not buying new, give the choice of something like a Lexus (with as much go as a vRS Octavia), I'll take the Lexus every day of the week thanks and relax knowing that I wont have the gauntlet QA issues to come, and have something that delivers massively more car for the money.  

True that. I fuelled my Passat 1.9 TDI once a month and then my Octavia 2.0 PD every two weeks. It's now a weekly chore with the Scoob.

 

Ahhh the 1.9 PD, coupled with a monster 14 gallon tank in my A4.

 

Had the range computer up to 960 miles on one occasion but would regularly show well over 700 miles and get it before needing that fill up.

 

This ridiculous situation to fit ever smaller fuel tank, presuambly to help get the CO2 figure down, creates a impractical situation of the range not getting better but actually dropping in some cases.

 

I will let the range computer to drop to nil miles and do a few miles showing nil but there is always the worry of cavitation etc.

 

Have you got the Boxer Diesel or the Boxer Petrol or something else?

Compare that to a little 1.4TDI heading north .after 300  miles ,car said fuel for 190 miles, so tank topped up  -that would make HIGH  MPG on a right mix of-roads, most of them motorway with Furby wanting to get there in a hurry- Dad was in hospital after stroke, and might not survive. Average was 75 MPH. ( tops -I'd rather not say ),WITH mpg almost equal to 51 MPG. Not impressive- but a 1.4v TDI running for 4 hours etc at high revs uses a lot of fuel - add to that another 150 at changing speeds, to get max out of car, and it leads to maximum fuel use.