Occasional starting problems!

[Pete3616]

Anybody had problem with 2014 Octavia  VRS TDI occasionally taking longer to start?? Almost like not giving glow plugs time to do there thing?? Appreciate any help

[aki78]

Software update on the engine controller probably solves this issue.

 

[arnold]

Mines a 2016 and probably every 50 starts it turns over and fires after about 5 or 6 seconds. Funny enough did it yesterday first time for ages. It was more apparent when temperatures were a little cooler.

[Gabbo]

As above, there is a software fix/improvement available for it which some but not all report it improves the situation.

There are several threads for the same issue with peoples experience differing from 1-2 extra révolutions to several seconds dead cranking.

[skodafang]

I have to say in my case the software update did nothing to improve this. I got them to double check and they said it was all up to date.

 

 

[TDIum]

If you just mention it to your service dept when you take it in, they will either be ignorant or pretend to know nothing about it. You need to be specific and give the reference numbers etc for the service note and software update or whatever and insist they look it up. Then they may fix it for you. Muppets. 

[Kires]

Had the issue on our 2013 Octavia 1.6 and had it once on our 2017 Oct Scout 184hk diesel.

[ISQ]

I have a Octavia 2014 2ltr VRS diesel 47,000 miles and have starting issues, I always allow the dash lights to go out before I start,  I thought it was temperature related but have been proved wrong summer/ winter its the same issue. If I depress the clutch and just press start it ticks over for prob 2 - 3 seconds then starts ( sometime longer, but also sometime it starts straight away), if I depress the clutch and press the accelerator pedal all the way down and hold my foot down a little generally it starts first time but not always, if its been run for a short time then re started it always starts first time or after the initial start it fires straight away no matter what the air temperature is. My thoughts are a fuel pressure pressure problem, after its started or run the fuel is fully pressurized so starts straight away, is the pump playing up or is the pressure regulator not working properly. OR due to the fact it starts better but not perfectly all the time when I depress the clutch is it an air intake problem and the automatic choke is getting stuck or something similar. 

its very frustrating I could pay the £75 for a diagnostic check with Skoda but will it show anything? or will it be a waste of money. This is a comonish problem with Skoda so why don't they actually put the effort in to find the cause, I do like the Octavia but would probably not buy another one due to this issue. Any help or advice would be appreciated.

[Miz]

Problem cured on my 2014 2.0 Diesel Elegance by fitting a new battery. 

[Gabbo]

10 hours ago, ISQ said:

I have a Octavia 2014 2ltr VRS diesel 47,000 miles and have starting issues, I always allow the dash lights to go out before I start,  I thought it was temperature related but have been proved wrong summer/ winter its the same issue. If I depress the clutch and just press start it ticks over for prob 2 - 3 seconds then starts ( sometime longer, but also sometime it starts straight away), if I depress the clutch and press the accelerator pedal all the way down and hold my foot down a little generally it starts first time but not always, if its been run for a short time then re started it always starts first time or after the initial start it fires straight away no matter what the air temperature is. My thoughts are a fuel pressure pressure problem, after its started or run the fuel is fully pressurized so starts straight away, is the pump playing up or is the pressure regulator not working properly. OR due to the fact it starts better but not perfectly all the time when I depress the clutch is it an air intake problem and the automatic choke is getting stuck or something similar. 

its very frustrating I could pay the £75 for a diagnostic check with Skoda but will it show anything? or will it be a waste of money. This is a comonish problem with Skoda so why don't they actually put the effort in to find the cause, I do like the Octavia but would probably not buy another one due to this issue. Any help or advice would be appreciated.

 

There is no choke on a diesel & pressing the accelerator pedal has no effect during starting.

You also do not need to wait for the glow plug light, just flick the start switch & the ECU takes care of the glowing, waiting, starter activation & starter deactivation...

If it was a fuel pump/pressure problem, you would likely see additional problems like not being able to deliver fuel when accelerating hard or problems when the tank is low if its a delivery pump problem.

 

Your problem sounds exactly like the other users which is probably caused by injector drift.

The engine will dead-crank for several seconds

There is a software improvement which worked for some but I think this is only a temporary solution & the problem will come back eventually.

 

This kind of issue affects other manufacturers not only VAG as all the injectors & software are provided by only a few suppliers.

For Skoda it is a minor issue, the engine will start & probably most customers will just say "its a diesel, its normal it doesnt start so quickly".

At least this seems to be the default answer from a garage anyway.

 

If you have your car serviced at a Skoda dealer, I would hope they check the fault codes as part of the service so you could always ask about it then (would save your the diagnostic fee).

However, if your car is out of warrenty I doubt they will do much except take your money & then tell you there is nothing wrong & its a characterstic of a diesel engine.

[POWYSWALES]

Unless the engine ever failed to completely start i would never see this as a fault or worth bugging your dealer about, mine does it once every 30 starts maybe, One thing I do know is that even when it takes a few seconds to fire up that is still a lot quicker than most diesel engines 20 years ago. With a diesel engine you are waiting for the air in the cylinders to become very hot to ignite the injected fuel, this is done by the heater plugs and compression of the air, it's not going to ignite the fuel until the tempature in the cylinders start getting to around 600 celcius. You can tell there is nothing else wrong by the fact the stop start never fails to get the engine running again within about 1 second as the engine and cylinders is already upto temp, there is also the fact that if you have not long stopped the engine for example 20 mins earlier, the Ecu will try to avoid unnecessary use of the heater plugs but still your engine fires up just fine taking an extra seconed or two. Unless you are doing bank jobs and every second counts then I don't see the issue. I would certainly not be ringing my dealer up and saying once a week my car takes an extra 2 seconds to fire up, they would think I was seriously bored and had nothing better to do that day.

Edited 6 November, 2017 by POWYSWALES
Edit

[ISQ]

3 hours ago, Miz said:

Problem cured on my 2014 2.0 Diesel Elegance by fitting a new battery. 

I only do short journeys so every month or so I top the battery up so it fully charged, but this doesn't have any effect on the starting problems.

[ISQ]

3 minutes ago, POWYSWALES said:

Unless the engine ever failed to completely start i would never see this as a fault or worth bugging your dealer about, mine does it once every 30 starts maybe, One thing I do know is that even when it takes a few seconds to fire up that is still a lot quicker than most diesel engines 20 years ago, every cold start took a goid few seconds. With a diesel engine you are waiting for the air in the cylinders to become very hot to ignite the injected fuel, this is done by the heater plugs and compression of the air, it's not going to ignite the fuel until the tempature in the cylinders start getting to around 600 celcius. You can tell there is nothing else wrong by the fact the stop start never fails to get the engine running again within about 1 second as the engine and cylinders is already upto temp, there is also the fact that if you have not long stopped the engine for example 20 mins earlier, the Ecu will try to avoid unnecessary use of the heater plugs but still your engine fires up just fine taking an extra seconed or two. Unless you are doing bank jobs and every second counts then I don't see the issue. I would certainly not be ringing my dealer up and saying once a week my car takes an extra 2 seconds to fire up, they would think I was seriously bored and had nothing better to do that day.

I'm not going to bother the dealer as its out of warranty, I will mention it on its next service so they can check any software update, It wouldn't bother me it was every 30 starts,but it practically every time it starts from cold more annoying for the neighbors when i get up early for work. The issue started about a year ago before that it was fine, just seems a bit strange theres no common fix.

[ISQ]

47 minutes ago, Gabbo said:

 

There is no choke on a diesel & pressing the accelerator pedal has no effect during starting.

You also do not need to wait for the glow plug light, just flick the start switch & the ECU takes care of the glowing, waiting, starter activation & starter deactivation...

If it was a fuel pump/pressure problem, you would likely see additional problems like not being able to deliver fuel when accelerating hard or problems when the tank is low if its a delivery pump problem.

 

Your problem sounds exactly like the other users which is probably caused by injector drift.

The engine will dead-crank for several seconds

There is a software improvement which worked for some but I think this is only a temporary solution & the problem will come back eventually.

 

This kind of issue affects other manufacturers not only VAG as all the injectors & software are provided by only a few suppliers.

For Skoda it is a minor issue, the engine will start & probably most customers will just say "its a diesel, its normal it doesnt start so quickly".

At least this seems to be the default answer from a garage anyway.

 

If you have your car serviced at a Skoda dealer, I would hope they check the fault codes as part of the service so you could always ask about it then (would save your the diagnostic fee).

However, if your car is out of warrenty I doubt they will do much except take your money & then tell you there is nothing wrong & its a characterstic of a diesel engine.

Injector drift, i'm not familiar with that, is there any fix thats not going to break the bank? thanks for your reply

[POWYSWALES]

14 minutes ago, ISQ said:

I'm not going to bother the dealer as its out of warranty, I will mention it on its next service so they can check any software update, It wouldn't bother me it was every 30 starts,but it practically every time it starts from cold more annoying for the neighbors when i get up early for work. The issue started about a year ago before that it was fine, just seems a bit strange theres no common fix.

That reminds me of several years ago where I used to live, everyone else on the streets was on benefits and I was the only one in the road working and was having to leave the house at 7am in the ice cold winter mornings, I would start the engine and quickly start to scrape the ice of the windows trying to get them clear, then one morning the Lazy sod over the road that I don't think had ever worked pops is head out and shouts I'm trying to sleep, I was fuming as I would of loved to still have been lying In my warn bed and not getting up till dinner time. 

[Gabbo]

1 hour ago, ISQ said:

Injector drift, i'm not familiar with that, is there any fix thats not going to break the bank? thanks for your reply

 

Injector drift is when the injector delivers a different quantity of fuel than requested by the ecu.

In the case of the starting problem, the injector delivers less (or nothing) & dead cranking occurs until the ECU starts to increase the requetsed quantity and voila..

 

There is the software update which attempts to better "adjust/compensate" the fuel request for the drift of injectors.

This had an effect for some but not all people who had the update.

 

The "real" solution is to replace the injectors but this will only work for a while until the injectors start to drift again & it isnt a solution that Skoda or VAG would ever suggest.

[WallMeerkat]

On 11/6/2017 at 10:51, POWYSWALES said:

That reminds me of several years ago where I used to live, everyone else on the streets was on benefits and I was the only one in the road working and was having to leave the house at 7am in the ice cold winter mornings, I would start the engine and quickly start to scrape the ice of the windows trying to get them clear, then one morning the Lazy sod over the road that I don't think had ever worked pops is head out and shouts I'm trying to sleep, I was fuming as I would of loved to still have been lying In my warn bed and not getting up till dinner time. 

I mind years ago I had a weekend job where I was working 3-11 on the Saturday and 7-3 on the Sunday.

 

This was in Scotland during a cold winter, and I was driving an old diesel Citroen ZX with glow plugs on their way out.

When I parked it up for the night I ended up putting a blanket around the engine to keep it warm, so that it would actually start in the early morning.

 

My Octavia sometimes takes a few seconds to catch, it can be disconcerting, like that old diesel with dodgy glow plugs, or an old Ford Orion I had that hated starting.

I find it helps if I take my time and let the glow plug light on the dash go properly on and off.

[POWYSWALES]

38 minutes ago, WallMeerkat said:

I mind years ago I had a weekend job where I was working 3-11 on the Saturday and 7-3 on the Sunday.

 

This was in Scotland during a cold winter, and I was driving an old diesel Citroen ZX with glow plugs on their way out.

When I parked it up for the night I ended up putting a blanket around the engine to keep it warm, so that it would actually start in the early morning.

 

My Octavia sometimes takes a few seconds to catch, it can be disconcerting, like that old diesel with dodgy glow plugs, or an old Ford Orion I had that hated starting.

I find it helps if I take my time and let the glow plug light on the dash go properly on and off.

I have never seen a glow plug light on my Octavia dash, I thought on the MK3 Octavia it only illuminated if there was a fault or the dpf had failed to do a regen and put the car in limp mode.

Edited 13 November, 2017 by POWYSWALES
Edit

[WallMeerkat]

11 minutes ago, POWYSWALES said:

I have never seen a glow plug light on !y Octavia dash, I thought on the MK3 Octavia it only illuminated if there was a fault or the dpf had failed to do a regen and put the car in limp mode.

 

No?

On mine it flashes up on startup then goes out again

 

From the owners manual:

 

Quote

Glow plug system (diesel engine)

First read and observe the introductory information and safety warn-

ings

on page 14.

The warning light



comes on after the ignition has been switched on. Once the

light has gone out, the engine can be started immediately.

 

[POWYSWALES]

I 

9 minutes ago, WallMeerkat said:

 

No?

On mine it flashes up on startup then goes out again

 

From the owners manual:

 

 

I will have another look when I go out in an hour, maybe it does but for some reason I have never noticed it, certainly not like my old rover were you turned the ignition on, the glow plug indicator lights up for several seconds, then once it went out you cranked the engine and she was away.

[WallMeerkat]

Just now, POWYSWALES said:

I 

I will have another look when I go out in an hour, maybe it does but for some reason I have never noticed it, certainly not like my old rover were you turned the ignition on, the glow plug indicator lights up for several seconds, then once it went out you cranked the engine and she was away.

 

Know what you mean from the old diesel Citroen, the glow plug light on that stayed on for ages in the cold. On the Octavia it's maybe half a second at most, but I find it helps the cranking issue to hold off a second before starting.

[Gabbo]

4 hours ago, POWYSWALES said:

I 

I will have another look when I go out in an hour, maybe it does but for some reason I have never noticed it, certainly not like my old rover were you turned the ignition on, the glow plug indicator lights up for several seconds, then once it went out you cranked the engine and she was away.

 

Glow plugs there days work almost instantaniously so unless you are starting at -10°, -20°, -30° you probably wont see it.

Especially if you get in & start the car directly because of the usual light check (which lasts about a second) the glow plug is already up to temperature by then so wont stay illuminated.

 

I started at -5° last week & there was a slight pause before cranking but only maybe 1-2s.

Nothing like the 10-20-30s of old systems.

[Pete3616]

Skoda looked at my Octy VRS last week regarding the starting problem which they couldn’t find anything.  They are having it back next week to replace the entertainment system because of issues with the hands free (caller not being able to hear me but I can hear them), but I’ll mention the update and see what they say..

[Gabbo]

Ask them check specifically SW update 320F (there is picture in the thread linked above, pg3 or4).

There are probably several updates available after that one for different things but it seems extremely difficult to get an engine softwre upgrade from Skoda...

Unless of course VW are going to get a big fine & then they update it without even asking...

 

I guess they will fob you off with "we cant find anything" and "its a diesel its normal to start like that" which is of course not true but it seems theres not much Joe Public can do about it.

[Greenliner1]

The software fix did not sort my vRS. Temporary fix only in my case. The dealer is at a loss. They’ve suggested keeping the car to observe the behaviour but I don’t have any faith in it being sorted then. Such a shame that a decent car behaves like this, again SUK must be aware of this but perhaps the fix is too expensive to consider - like injectors?

 

There is definitely a link in my case between extended cold cranking following just after or if shut down during a DPF regen, then started some hours later once cold. Just happened again two days ago after I shut down at the end of a regen. 5 second cold crank two days later.