I’ve only had my Superb a couple of weeks now and so this is by no means anything based on long term ownership.

 

However even in the short time Bof The Skoda and I have been together there are a few simple things that really blow me away. Particularly as I’ve been a serial car owner over the past few years and have always had prestige brands as the main car. The prestige brands could certainly learn a thing or two from Skoda!

 

So far the things I like are:

 

the technology/infotainment/Apple CarPlay just works. Every time. First time. 

 

The fact the virtual boot release kick-under-the-car-to-open-the-boot thing has worked on every occasion, without me looking like a demented druggie whose trying to kick the **** out of a car but keeps missing. 

 

The way everything else else just works, it’s almost as if the design sign off was by someone who has to use the car on a daily basis as opposed to a pony-tailed snowflake buffoon who puts form over function (especially the terrible twin screen design in my last car, a Velar, which looked great in the showroom but you try and change anything on the move - impossible to do safely without a co pilot)

 

The way I can open any door or the tailgate (estate) in the rain and water doesn’t drip down from the roof straight onto the seat bolster or into the boot. Should be a given but this is the first car out of probably 20 cars since a Passat in 1994 where this doesn’t happen. And that list of 20 includes Mercedes, Jaguar, BMW, Porsche, Aston Martin, Range Rover. They should all sit up and are note!

 

The understated nature of the car which makes me feel incredibly smug knowing what excellent value for money it provides; it simply under promises and over delivers.

 

There are a couple of things I’m less impressed with though, namely

 

over sensitive parking sensors

 

Canton sound system seems to lack adjustability - have spent ages RTFM* and sat in the car trying to find a way of adjusting the bass up and treble down but the only thing I can see is a Canton screen with gives you the option of “canton”, “speech”, “rock”, “classical” and one other. These do all sound different but aren’t adjustable. The Canton overall is OK but no better than that.

 

The heated steering wheel on/off isn’t as easy as it should be. Would be better to have a button on the wheel to turn it on and off with, instead of having to go into the HVAC menu on the screen. 

 

 

So this is my mini list, what’s yours?

 

*the manual seems to suggest it is adjustable but following the manual sequence does not take me to menus that the manual suggests it will...

 

 

42 minutes ago, FatWolfie said:

 

The understated nature of the car which makes me feel incredibly smug knowing what excellent value for money it provides; it simply under promises and over delivers.

 

 

 

 

I disagree, the Superb is poor value compared to the Passat as I've been watching the market near me for quite some time after getting rid of my Superb II before Christmas

 

I went to look at a year old Passat SE business. It had heated seats, front/rear parking sensors, ACC, the new style infotainment with apple carplay, full LED headlights, colour maxidot, keyless start etc. etc. all as standard and all for £18,500 with 15K on the clock

 

 In a lot of Superbs III's I looked at they were all missing one of more of these features and to get them all you would end up getting a sportline spec or similar and most of them were over 20K. 

 

I procrastinated enough for the dealer to then knock another £500 and then I pounced on the Passat, now that is Value. 

Edited 8 May, 20197 yr by SuperbTWM

Well, @SuperbTWM I guess it all depends on your perspective.

 

without wishing to come over as a humblebrag type (in fact just the opposite, rather hacked off at my stupidity), compared with my usual car purchases the Superb is exceptionally cheap at £30,500 that I paid for my new L&K 150 with some toys.

 

I have lost more in depreciation on the last 2 cars (18 moths) than the Skoda actually cost, hence in my opinion it represents fantastic value for money for a new car...

 

I genuinely wish I’d discovered how good Skoda’s are a few years ago! At least I’ve now seen the light and moved away from the prestige badge driven shiny shiny treadmill..

 

 

Edited 8 May, 20197 yr by FatWolfie

@FatWolfie It’s still good value in general I suppose and the current Superb is better quality comparatively speaking than its ever been IMO, I would of quite happily had one if the price had been right

 

My SII although a facelifted 2015 model was still a 2008 car IIRC and you could tell where they had penny pinched. E.g the stereo in a 2001 golf was noticeable better than what was in my Superb and the door cards were really basic.  

 

I’m pretty sure now though they are more comparable to the likes of the Passat with the exception of some slightly newer tech in the passat. I like how they have integrated the radar into the front better and the ACC buttons on the steering wheel is a better idea than the stalk.

 

 

Pros: big, grown-up road manners, traditionally handsome, remarkably good performance for a small petrol engine, easy to drive,  simply excellent infotainment, decent ride, good quality interior, inexpensive to buy

 

Cons: bottom of the VW Group hierarchy, less refined than it could be, plain interior...and like most traditional barges its value will probably get caned at handover time because it’s not an SUV.

 

Summary: better than you expect, but not as good as the raw material suggests it could be.

Pros: Second hand bargain. What car offers so much space and refinement for so little? 

Crisp styling, great ergonomics, solid build, beautifully refined 1.4, good economy, standard ACC, comfortable seats, good equipment, I could go on.

Cons: Errr, creak from armrest?

Summery: Genuine feel good factor to drive, own and look at. The nicest car I've ever owned.

I’ll list only cons as I’m generally very happy with the car overall:

- I like adaptive lane guidance on highway but not in the city and having to click, click, scroll, click on inforainment to (de)activate it while driving is not a thing I enjoy.

- I’d expect a bit more room for the wife between two car seats in the rear.

- Less fingerprint-catching material on center console.

13 hours ago, FatWolfie said:

have spent ages RTFM* and sat in the car trying to find a way of adjusting the bass up and treble down but the only thing I can see is a Canton screen with gives you the option of “canton”, “speech”, “rock”, “classical” and one other. These do all sound different but aren’t adjustable. The Canton overall is OK but no better than that.

 

Its under Canton equalizer > Individual - this unlocks Bass, Mid, Treble sliders

 

Love the included technology. I have just about every option except the sun-roof. A Passat with the same spec is about another 10K here.

 

In Australia Skoda have a 5 year warranty standard. Nice. 

 

I hate Auto-stop (that it can't be permanently disabled) and the road noise on coarse chip surfaces at 100 kmhr+ (but working on that one)

 

Edited 9 May, 20197 yr by digifish

13 hours ago, SuperbTWM said:

the Superb is poor value compared to the Passat

 

Australia - I was tossing up buying a new Passat B8 or new Superb III. The Passat here for the same money as the Superb lacked - DCC, has a less powerful engine with less torque and no leather.

 

The only difference I could see was the badge and minor cosmetics. 

Thanks @digifish . The Individual setting is the one bit I didn’t look in as assumed it was a short cut to “individual setting” that covers everything. 

 

The manuals lack lack of clarity may be something I should now add to “things I don’t like” 

16 minutes ago, FatWolfie said:

Thanks @digifish . The Individual setting is the one bit I didn’t look in as assumed it was a short cut to “individual setting” that covers everything. 

 

The manuals lack lack of clarity may be something I should now add to “things I don’t like” 

 

Yeah, its my biggest gripe. Tersely written with WAY too many back-track references to other sections.

 

The PDF version is better FWIW. You can search it at least.

Last three cars have been a Passat (SE) Octavia (SEL) and the Superb (SEL Exec) all with the 2.0 Tdi (148hp, 148hp 150hp versions).

 

The Octavia was as good as the Passat and had more usable room, the Superb is palatial.  Why anyone would want a saloon with a big boot that you can't get anything of any size through the opening beat me.

 

Marking it down because you found one second hand Passat with just the extras you wanted but couldn't find a Superb with them is unfair on the Superb, it reflects what Superb users order on their new cars.  Second hand I want a car to have as few unnecessary extras so there is less to go wrong - look at prices for 5+ year old Audi A8s! 

 

Likes: Economy (800 miles plus to a tank), effortless cruising, audio system, heated screen, auto switching of headlights for RH driving

 

Dislikes TPMS false warnings, ACC picking up vehicles that have just turned off the road

15 hours ago, FatWolfie said:

There are a couple of things I’m less impressed with though, namely

 

Over sensitive parking sensors.

 

Interesting observation. Having had several Skoda's over the years and moving to a Mercedes-Benz E-Class,  it's the Skoda's parking sensors I miss.

 

The Merc has a panel of LED's on the dash for the front sensors and another on the headlining above the rear window for the rear sensors, which is a neat idea, but they don't turn red, or activate any audible warning until your really, really close to the paint-removing object. No where near sensitive enough for me.

 

Jumping into the wife's Kodiaq makes me realise how the progressively increasing tone in our Skoda is miles better.

Yeah, know what you mean @silver1011 about the Mercedes. I had an E class Estate for a while which had the lights system. The lights alone were a waste of time....I did have the reversing camera though and that was what I mainly used, although of course not much use when going forward 

 

2 hours ago, FatWolfie said:

Thanks @digifish . The Individual setting is the one bit I didn’t look in as assumed it was a short cut to “individual setting” that covers everything. 

 

The manuals lack lack of clarity may be something I should now add to “things I don’t like” 

There probably was clarity when the docs team written the manual in their native tongue but unfortunately things appear to have been translated poorly or just lost in translation.  

18 hours ago, FatWolfie said:

 

The heated steering wheel on/off isn’t as easy as it should be. Would be better to have a button on the wheel to turn it on and off with, instead of having to go into the HVAC menu on the screen. 

 

 

Thanks for that, I wondered how it worked. I’ve only had this superb a couple of weeks and the last one didn’t have it. 

 

Compared with the previous Superb, what I don’t like is the fact that the touch screen has been extended to replace the buttons down each side of the screen. With physical buttons, you can at least rest your hand on them before making the selection. With ‘touch’ buttons, you have to be very accurate, which is not that easy with the car moving up and down over bumps in the road. It also means having to take your eyes off the road for longer. 

14 minutes ago, daveo138 said:

 

Thanks for that, I wondered how it worked. I’ve only had this superb a couple of weeks and the last one didn’t have it. 

 

Compared with the previous Superb, what I don’t like is the fact that the touch screen has been extended to replace the buttons down each side of the screen. With physical buttons, you can at least rest your hand on them before making the selection. With ‘touch’ buttons, you have to be very accurate, which is not that easy with the car moving up and down over bumps in the road. It also means having to take your eyes off the road for longer. 

...and you always have to go to the home screen to make menu navigation choices, now that there's no physical shortcut buttons.

I think they ran out of blank buttons for the heated steering wheel, hence it having to be in the touchscreen menus.

 

Given the heated steering wheel is now available across more Skoda models than ever before, then hopefully they'll address this with the next major redesign of the Climatronic system and its control panel.

On my 2019 L&K when you activate / deactivate the drivers heated seat it also activates / deactivates the heated Steering Wheel.

 

To just select the heated Steering wheel you can press Menu on the climatic control button and then select the heated steering wheel (On/Off)

You guys and your first world problems!  Heated steering wheels indeed.

Love

The massive boot

Rear leg room

The Canton system

ACC

DSG

 

Hate 

The creak over speed bumps

The occasional slight buzz on dash when revs hit a certain number 

Coming from a MY11 Volvo S60 D5 Momentum. Now MY17 4x4 190hp Superb hatch with 18" wheels.

 

Pros:

+ Infotainment with apple car play is really good.

+ All parts of driving assistance works really well.

+ Feels and handles smaller than it is, boot is huge. 

+ Alcantara leather in seats. Was hesitant on this one after reading quite a lot. Just love it. Some people reported it "sticky" and that you can´t move around without lifting your butt, this is not the case for me. It looks really good too. Much better than on images. 

+ Good looking, love the Moon white metallic. Good build quality and materials both exterior and interior. Maybe a slight - for the leather wheel which shows some wear after 45000km. 

+ All the small quirks like cooling box, umbrella in door and so on.

 

 

 

Cons:

- Seats are nowhere near the comfort of Volvo. A bit to firm. I´m 6´4" and struggle get comfortable since I´m used to a lower driving position.

- With regard to above it`s super annoying that seat memory won´t stay in lowest position and has to be adjusted every ride.

- Canton sound is a bit disappointing. It´s good but I just can´t find settings that work in low and high volumes, driving fast and slow. Premium sound in my Volvo was better.

- Start/stop could be smoother.

- That you can´t close the boot from inside.

- Road noise insulation could be better.

- Little disappointed about MPG, quite far off reported levels.

- Really poor quality of rear breaking discs. Pads and discs worn out after 45000km.

 

 

 

All in all happy with my first Skoda and it´s excellent value, although I feel that just simple cheap adjustments would have done a lot for the experience.

 

Edited 9 May, 20197 yr by Jeppelito

 

Hate

Forgot rear discs.  Shocking.

Love 100% with absolutely no hates at all .... and I've previously owned a few premium German products .   The Superb 280ps Sportline Combi is in my opinion the best all round car available today (well not quite as it's now the 272)  from price / space / performance / build quality perspective .   Perhaps I'm just getting more easy to please now I'm retired but then again , the family do tend to call me Victor Meldrew a lot more these days .

Have to adjust previous comment.

 

Had new tires put on today. Got them for free from the dealer I just bought the car from so did’nt choose myself. Got a pair of Dunlop sport maxx GT and ride feels even smoother and road noise reduced quite a lot compared to the worn sportcontact 5 that was previously fitted. The decreased road noise increased quality of canton sound aswell.

 

Also another thread suggested turning off individual driving profile which sorted problem with seat not staying in lowest position.

 

Happy days! 

Edited 9 May, 20197 yr by Jeppelito