Have now driven the first 300 miles in my Superb Estate 1.4 TSI 150PS DSG SE. 

Extras: spacesaver spare, double height boot floor, retractable boot lid, fold flat front seat, colour trip computer, rear parking camera.

 

Ooh, this car is nice. It's like a huge, white floaty magic carpet. Quieter than a Trappist monk during a sponsored silence, smoother than a timeshare salesman drenched in WD40.  And that DSG! Why have I wasted hundred of hours in my life manually changing gears? Driving a manual now makes as much sense to me as saying "I could buy a colour TV but I prefer to watch a black-and-white one and scribble on the screen with a felt-tipped pen". I never realised driving was so easy! No wonder USAians can all do it from age five.  Hill start? What's a hill start? File alongside double de-clutching, manual choke and starting handles. The car even came with what I am sure were extras I did not specify (or pay for): roof bars and a "multifunction" steering wheel

 

One mild disappointment, one question.

 

The mild disappointment: fuel economy from DSG not great. Daily commute is fifteen miles each way, 50% of time spent in heavy urban crawl, 50% on rural B-roads. Averaging 38 mpg. Was hoping for low 40s. I know I will get much better mpg on a long A-road or M-way run. Wondering if economy will improve as engine loosens up. Yes, this is definitely something a manual box wins at.

 

The question. I have the Amundsen "entertainment unit" or radiogram or whatever they call it. I've saved a few DAB stations as favourites. When I select "radio" I am presented with a horizontal row of station icons, each icon being one of my saved stations.

 

Now, say I select the first of these - "Tragic FM".  When driving, I decide I want to switch to the second of my favourites,  "MidLifeCrisis West Midlands".  But if I thumb the little arrow keys on the left-hand side of the multifunction steering wheel, they don't take me up and down my selection of stored favourites as I want, they take up and down the stations as they exist within the DAB channel.  As far as I can see, I have to take my eyes off the road, glance at the screen and stab my finger at the second icon if I want to select my second stored station. Or use the voice command, but that takes a while, or just thumb my way up and down the full broadcast range until I happen to find the station I want.

 

Is there any way to configure the steering wheel radio station controls to navigate  between my stored favourites before doing a station search?

 

 

 

Edited 15 March, 20188 yr by Awed
Words swapped

In the radio settings you can choose what the ‘arrows’ should do. I.e. presets, stationlist etc. 

 

Economy will be better when it gets warmer and you get some miles on it. 1.4 TSI is more economical with DSG than the manual one...

 

 

Now, both those answers are music to my ears, GaSelle.  I will explore the radio settings. I did look in the manual thinking that might be possible but failed to see the relevant part.

 

Warmer weather should help indeed: thinner oil, and reduced use of air con (until it gets very warm). I used to find a 10% difference between summer and winter economy in my previous car.  Glad to have confirmed that increased usage will improve economy too. 

Page 136 in the Owners Manual

 

(Arrow buttons - select "Preset list")

 

The economy should improve when the engine has been run in; that could take up to 10K km´s. (before you see the best economy)

Edited 16 March, 20188 yr by GaSelle

Found that setting very easily, thanks, and now am all sorted. A big improvement...I like to flip station as soon as news / weather / travel / ads come on.

 

I will keep an eye on the economy as the miles increase and the engine loosens up. Just read Skoda will be offering the Superb with a plug-in hybrid (PHEV) powertrain option from 2019, boasting a 40 mile all electric range. Damn, that will be tempting when I come to the end of my 4 year PCP deal. I could do 70% of my annual mileage on electric power alone. Shame they didn't have that available when I was buying.

 

6 minutes ago, Awed said:

 

 

I will keep an eye on the economy as the miles increase and the engine loosens up. 

 

Can't help on the TSI numbers but I wouldn't be too worried. My 190 TDI has improved 5mpg just due to the warmer weather (unless there is another reason I'm not aware of).

Probably is the external temperature, from previous cars I know it makes a huge difference. So much so that I often wonder if manufacturers have devoted enough effort  to researching the benefits of recycling waste heat into air pre-heaters or similar. 

 

Don't get me wrong about my very slight annoyance at mpg. Firstly, from what I've read here, I'm sure it will improve, but even if it didn't, I'm so pleased with my big white smoothmobile that I'd regard the hit as worth it. Hell, if it had fantastic mpg I'd probably drive it too often and end up exceeding my PCP contract mileage limits. This is the first NICE car I've ever owned. All my previous motors (Volvo 440, Octavia hatch, Citroen Berlingo) have been solid and reliable, bottom-of-the-range, no frills jobs.  Sure, this is still only a Skoda, and not even top trim, but to me it feels like the automotive equivalent of shopping at Waitrose after twenty years of Home Bargains. I'm just loving how quiet and relaxing  to drive it is. The DSG is a revelation.