Hi all, I’m picking up my new (to me) 1 year old Octavia this week and the salesman mentioned some Skodas have been having problems with batteries holding charge. Anyone got any experience of this?

cheers!

There was a bad batch of MOLL branded batteries from mid to late 2017.

 

They're being replaced by Varta batteries under warranty.

Thanks for that, the salesman said it had been dropping charge but they'd charged it so all 'should be ok'. Hmm will have to investiagte further!  Thanks a lot

My 2016 battery was apparently not holding enough charge to enable the STOP/START system to work. I was also getting 12V Battery Low warnings. Took over a year for the Skoda dealer to sort this out ,under warranty, after many diagnoses that it was Ok and the battery was charged up. Watch out.

Replacement is a Varta EFL type and still seems to be OK after 2 weeks on short and longer trips.

3 hours ago, Snappa said:

Thanks for that, the salesman said it had been dropping charge but they'd charged it so all 'should be ok'. Hmm will have to investiagte further!  Thanks a lot

 

I had never heard of this problem before.

 

As far as I'm concerned my battery never been trouble free but when my car was serviced last month, the only thing highlighted on the report was low charge battery. ( They offered to recharge it for something like £29 😱 ).  I hadn't used the car for almost 2 weeks prior so advised a good run would probably put everything right.

 

As I say, gave it a good run next day - not sure if that worked or not because I never experienced any problem before.  My car was registered July 2017 so could fall with the range suggested above.

 

Silver1001 - is there any further information on these Moll batteries? If I can find any evidence I'll have them swap it out.

 

Cheers.

Mine was changed under warranty, it went in for something completely different, however they found it was needed changing during the pre work check they always do. Been fine since, but never had the error messages like others described.

On 26/05/2019 at 15:24, Golfmk56 said:

As far as I'm concerned my battery never been trouble free but...

 

Oops - meant to say " battery has been trouble free ".

On 13/05/2019 at 11:17, Snappa said:

Hi all, I’m picking up my new (to me) 1 year old Octavia this week and the salesman mentioned some Skodas have been having problems with batteries holding charge. Anyone got any experience of this?

cheers!

 

So get them to fit a new one .... that would be my request.

The MOLL EFB batteries fitted to the petrols are useless, It may hold charge now but come the winter it will give you trouble if it stands more than a few days. Mine lasted about 2 years before it started and by the 3rd winter it was done.

 

Just have done with it and put a good AGM battery on it. Huge difference when the Varta 096 AGM went on mine. If you have the smaller battery you can fit the bigger 096 at the same time 

 

One of the guys on here did a good write up on it in the Golf forum, pointless repeating it here.

27 minutes ago, flybynite said:

Just have done with it and put a good AGM battery on it. Huge difference when the Varta 096 AGM went on mine. If you have the smaller battery you can fit the bigger 096 at the same time

Exactly what I plan to do when my battery gives up - I already have the larger battery cover in a cupboard waiting for it's day

Mine is working from 2013...And at 70% 

5 hours ago, nkadovic said:

Mine is working from 2013...And at 70% 

Mine is also from  2013. Stands without starting for 3 or 4 months twice a year & always starts as if it had just been left overnight. The SOC was reading 40% but within a few hours the s/s was working.  Luck of the draw when it comes to batteries.

Mine, being a 2016 model, has no SOC indication. Varta EFB battery fitted last month under warranty.

Edited 9 June, 20197 yr by gregoir

14 hours ago, gregoir said:

Mine, being a 2016 model, has no SOC indication. Varta EFB battery fitted last month under warranty.

 

You can get the SoC indication via OBD11 or VCDS.

 

My car has just had a 7 week period of no running period and it started again just fine. It'll get a long run in a couple of weeks when it goes to the West Country for a few days break.