Hi guys.

I will like to found the solution for very big problem with Skoda odometer.

The car is year 2000 and we have not many problems with this model.

There was some factory faults which almost every Felicia owners have.

But what is going on with distance meter is mission impossible.

The original odometer is start to stuck some years ago at distance meter which measure distance in kilometers.

This is common fault with this instrument so we decide to replace with new one in oficial Skoda car service.

My first observation after odometer replacement was that we got different odometer model. It was not the same model like original before.

So i check the speed readings and was normal. The problem is that we did not check distance meter for years.

After years  of driving this car we found that distance meter shows too small kilometers. We found interesting explanation when distance number is converted to miles the distance readings are correct!

How is that possible? Odometer with km/h speed meter and km distance meter shows miles instead of kilometers?

Any explanation for this puzzle?

Thank you.

You will have to tell us more about the history of the car from new. We need to establish for sure that all parts related to speedometer/odometer are genuine. Gearbox, speedometer drive, speedometer. Tell us the code of the old speedometer and of the new speedometer.

Edited 14 March, 20188 yr by RicardoM

@Johnglx - My immediate thought is that you've got a UK market odometer head. You should be able to confirm this if you can drive for 1 minute at 60kph, and the head registers 0.6 or 0.7 as distance covered. (miles = 0.625 * kilometers)

Hi RicardoM.

 

Thank you for reply.

The reason for odometer replacement was common distance meter failure when counter start to stuck from time to time.
The distance reading was not accurate because both counters are not working all the time, they stop counting.

The reason for that failure is small gear crack in counter.
I found this information later on the internet.

We did not know that complete odometer will be replaced in Skoda car service.
We expect only speedometer will be replaced because it is possible,
but this people on Skoda car service are idiots.

 

The replacement was made in official Skoda car service in Slovenia.
They did not check new odometer accuracy when replacement was made,
because this people are not professionals as they think and i avoid Skoda car service here.

After replacement they keep old odometer and they cheat me.
I demand old odometer before service was made, but they keep it.

All parts on this car are original.
No any other part was replaced on this car except complete odometer.
I have no codes for old and new odometers.

I can help only with some pictures.

 

Thank you.

22 minutes ago, KenONeill said:

@Johnglx - My immediate thought is that you've got a UK market odometer head. You should be able to confirm this if you can drive for 1 minute at 60kph, and the head registers 0.6 or 0.7 as distance covered. (miles = 0.625 * kilometers)

Hi kenONeill.

 

Yes this odometer count miles instead of kilometers, but distance scale is in km.

How is that possible, because complete odometer was replaced.

@Johnglx We need to establish a common technical language because something is not right in your description. Please correct it if necessary. See photo below.

18 minutes ago, Johnglx said:

The reason for that failure is small gear crack in counter.

Not really. The "small gear" doesn't crack. It slides to the side and doesn't engage properly. It is an easy fix and doesn't require buying a new speedometer.

28 minutes ago, RicardoM said:

Not really. The "small gear" doesn't crack. It slides to the side and doesn't engage properly. It is an easy fix and doesn't require buying a new speedometer.

Sorry you are right, there is no crack maybe gear holder can crack i do not know right now what i found on internet.

The problem is that this simple failure official Skoda service can not repair because we have idiots here.

This car was owned by my father, he decide to replace complete how can i say, what speedometer, odometer, what word is for complete part?

I was not agree with him with part replacement, because there is no professionals here.

43 minutes ago, RicardoM said:

@Johnglx We need to establish a common technical language because something is not right in your description. Please correct it if necessary. See photo below.

Odometer and trip counter are counting the same distance, that is OK.

Both counters measure miles instead of kilometers.

Can you tell me the name of complete part?

Is it speedometer clock cluster?

Edited 14 March, 20188 yr by Guest
correction

It's possible to change the speedo from kph to mph by getting a new mph card.

In the OPs picture, the new instrument COULD be an mph one with a kph card.

A lot of effort to get the thing wrong, so obviously Skoda were already ' simply clever '

37 minutes ago, Johnglx said:

Can you tell me the name of complete part?

Is it speedometer clock cluster?

Instrument cluster.

37 minutes ago, Johnglx said:

Both counters measure miles instead of kilometers.

Are you 100% sure? Did you test it as Ken suggested?

Edited 14 March, 20188 yr by RicardoM

28 minutes ago, punyXpress said:

It's possible to change the speedo from kph to mph by getting a new mph card.

That is not the issue of this topic. Read again OP.

Edited 14 March, 20188 yr by RicardoM

23 minutes ago, RicardoM said:

Instrument cluster.

Are you 100% sure? Did you test it as Ken suggested?

Hi.

I make a trip 80km long the counter shows 50. We usually make shorter distance driving so to see this fault is not so easy.

1 hour ago, punyXpress said:

It's possible to change the speedo from kph to mph by getting a new mph card.

In the OPs picture, the new instrument COULD be an mph one with a kph card.

A lot of effort to get the thing wrong, so obviously Skoda were already ' simply clever '

I will never buy Skoda my father did and he make a big mistake.

I am very disappointed with Skoda Felicia quality.

2 hours ago, Johnglx said:

Hi kenONeill.

 

Yes this odometer count miles instead of kilometers, but distance scale is in km.

How is that possible, because complete odometer was replaced.

I'm also going to reference @RicardoM photo of the instrument cluster here.

 

The card immediately behind the needles is just a piece of printed plastic. What we're actually concerned with here is the mechanical system behind that which drives the odometer scales and speedometer needle.

 

Now the speedometer needle, irrespective of the card markings will move to the same place for a given velocity. For 50kph/30mph the needle will point to 9 o'clock regardless of what the scale card shows. Similarly, presuming the rolling diameter of the tyres is constant, tyre revolutions per unit distance will be constant. What needs to change for mph/kph calibration is the reduction gearing from the speedo drive to the odometer scales.

 

So, if you bought a complete cluster, someone has fitted a kph card with an mph odometer.

 

Skoda (Czeck) have previous here; they once supplied a batch of 5-speed RWD transmissions (Estelle/Rapid 130 series) with a 4.4:1 CWP rather than the normal 3.9:1. Fortunately, the rally boys actually wanted these!

7 hours ago, KenONeill said:

So, if you bought a complete cluster, someone has fitted a kph card with an mph odometer.

The complete cluster is order and buy Skoda car service not me.

Where did they order and buy this spare part i have no idea.

 

If the odometer is made for mph how is possible that speedometer show correct speed in kph?

There is no chance to buy kph speedometer and mph odometer in original complete instrument cluster.

Maybe factory fault is here?

Quote

 

 

Edited 14 March, 20188 yr by Guest

 

8 hours ago, Johnglx said:

I will never buy Skoda my father did and he make a big mistake.

I am very disappointed with Skoda Felicia quality.

Why is that?

What car are YOU driving?

1 minute ago, RicardoM said:

 

Why is that?

What car are YOU driving?

Skoda Felicia 1.6GLX.

You said you are very disappointed with Skoda Felicia quality.

I asked: why? Provide examples.

5 minutes ago, RicardoM said:

You said you are very disappointed with Skoda Felicia quality.

I asked: why? Provide examples.

Can you tell me how can you regulate rear lights, what type of mechanism is on your car Felicia 1.3?

If you have hydraulic transmision like me here is the first fault.

Edited 14 March, 20188 yr by Guest

The next fault is rear glass seal, very bad quality.

Front third stop light breaking apart because of bad and too hard material quality, can not stand out back door vibration.

Want some more?

1 hour ago, Johnglx said:

If the odometer is made for mph how is possible that speedometer show correct speed in kph?

There is no chance to buy kph speedometer and mph odometer in original complete instrument cluster.

Maybe factory fault is here?

The speedometer will work the same for both a km/h only one and a dual km/h and mph one check out mine below thats a UK version. 

As someone else said above at about the 9 o'clock position you get 30mph and 50km/h.

You can see how rubbish UK speedos look from this image, why they put the km/h on the inside when its a finer scale and needs more space than mph I will never understand, you could still read mph well enough if that was the inner scale. Sorry slight off topic, but its easily seen in this image.

3 hours ago, Johnglx said:

Want some more?

1. I think you don't realize that Felicia is a loved car in this section for good reasons. See this topic.
2. You don't realize that we are talking about an 18 years car! Time takes its toll. I wish I'd see cars made today after 18 years... Rubber and plastic... wow... what a disaster...
3. Rear lights are not regulated. What are you talking about??
4. Felicia was a small, low price car. What car are you comparing it with in terms of quality? Mercedes?

Your dad made a good choice. Probably he didn't swim in a pool of money when he bought a Felicia. You don't like it? No problem. Make 25,000 Euro and buy a new, better car. How old are you, anyway? 18? 21?

7 hours ago, Johnglx said:

If the odometer is made for mph how is possible that speedometer show correct speed in kph?

There is no chance to buy kph speedometer and mph odometer in original complete instrument cluster.

Maybe factory fault is here?

I doubt very much that the issue described by you is related to a factory fault.

My opinion is that the speedo drive is faulty or the bowden cable transmission is slipping (yeah, the cable is marginally short). It is just a coincidence that real kilometers driven equals 1.609 x odometer kilometers.

 

Moreover, it is not clear from your original post if your dad had the car from new and had this odometer problem from the start. All you have told us was that at one time the odometer stuck (read slipped) then you changed the entire instrument cluster just to realize (after a few years!) the odometer is not showing right.

@Johnglx - OK, I'm going to assume 155R13 tyres but most Felly sizes will give similar answers.

 

Sidewall height = 155 * 0.8 = 124.4mm: now convert this to inches by dividing by 25.4 gives 4.89", and add wheel radius of 6.5" for 11.39" rolling radius. This gives a tyre circumference of 71.5". So if you draw a line down the tyre wall and out onto the road, then push the car until that line on the wall touches the ground again and measure how far the car has moved it will be just under 6 feet. This is a constant dimension, whether the speedometer calibrations are in miles per hour, kilometers per hour, ells per fortnight or whatever, and the speedometer actually measures how fast the road wheels are rotating.