put some new cds in the auto changer in the boot last night in my octy 1 and sat in the car, waited for the cds to load, selected one of the cds and the message mechanic came up and the cd player wouldnt respond. went back to the boot and managed to eject the cassette after a little pause and tried again. same thing happened even after reloading all cds. Tried again this morning and everything is fine.

any ideas, it was near freezing last night, could this be the problem?

It's caused by condensation on the cds / laser lens. a quick clean up of the cds sorts it out.

Its also caused when you put the CDs in the wrong way round, so I've been told:O

JD

great stuff, no it must have been the condensation, i am sure the cds were the right way round. thanks for the info.

If I remember rightly, when you put the CDs in the wrong way round, it gives out the message 'surface', not 'mechanic'. It is most likely to be condensation but just as a thought (and this might only apply to Octy 1s), the pipe that feeds the rear windscreen wash runs over the top of the CD changer. If it leaks - and they often do - they drip on the autochanger multipin and as in my case, it shows itself as a 'mechanic' warning. It is intermittent depending on how often you clean the rear screen (which is quite a bit in this weather) but it eventually results in wrecking the changer. Not wanting to scare you but it's always worth a quick look.

i'm off out to sabotage mine then:) any excuse to get rid of that naff HU and changer

I used to get "Mechanic" and "Surface" all the time irrespective of temperature and lens cleaning.

No surprise that the old HU is now gone and the new one has a DVD in it with over 700 tracks on it, sorted!

found that some loft insulation around our octy's CD changer stopped this... kept it a bit warmer... also helped for sound proofing at same time!

Removing and gentle hoovering of dust helps too.

I had this on my Octy 1 - the cure was a new autochanger unit, fortunately fitted under warranty