Hi all

 

Whilst washing the car today I noticed what I thought were tar spots but on closer investigation, they are stone chips. I've had many cars during my driving time but don't think I have ever had one that is showing as many chips as my Octy - nothing had changed in terms of driving distance / type / etc.

 

Has (or does) anyone else noticed more chips than they were expecting - not sure if it's the paint compound or similar, but now I noticed them I can't unsee them.

 

[coin for scale]

Edited 2 June, 20242 yr by Maxi24
Spelling

I see a stone chip to the left of the picture but with picture enlarged that looks like 2 touched up bits or blobs on paint, imperfections. 

Is this your first Skoda?

I've been driving Skodas as company cars daily for 13 years now. All have been c**p in terms of paint work resistance to stone chips and corrosion. Yeti in 2011 had such quality job that big chunks of paint were falling of the doors. At least that was warranty covered and car was repainted all the way around from bottom to door moldings. Few years later boot lid and rear wheel arches started to corrode

It's an improvement nowadays, but still you get what you pay for.

5 hours ago, CJXA said:

Is this your first Skoda?

I've been driving Skodas as company cars daily for 13 years now. All have been c**p in terms of paint work resistance to stone chips and corrosion. Yeti in 2011 had such quality job that big chunks of paint were falling of the doors. At least that was warranty covered and car was repainted all the way around from bottom to door moldings. Few years later boot lid and rear wheel arches started to corrode

It's an improvement nowadays, but still you get what you pay for.

Yip - first one. I've had Audi's, Ford's & others but nothing as bad as this.

19 hours ago, Ootohere said:

I see a stone chip to the left of the picture but with picture enlarged that looks like 2 touched up bits or blobs on paint, imperfections. 

If you zoom in on the first photo you can see that they are chips and not raised (as a blob would be).

Avoid driving behind trucks. When merging, leave enough space if there is a truck nearby, and of course, don't tailgate, as most stones get picked up and flung at high speed towards you. However, due to the unique shape of our MK4s, this is somewhat unavoidable

The YETI issue was a Zinc Inclusion problem and well documented.  Worth a search here or any Search Engine.     A member happened to post with that mentioned on a newer car than a Yeti last week.    Not relevant to the OP,s issue though .

True, but I'm now driving 5th Skoda and completely all previous ones suffered from corrosion already within first 4 years. Rear door edges, rear wing edges, rear arches.

Same story with other company Skodas.

As I said - you get what you pay for. 

Lots of Skoda drivers on here and owners of cars who know if cars which they have as keepers are rusting or not.   There certainly are certain models with common places they rust.  Then many with no rust issues.   

I had more stone chips on the front of my Skoda after 3k miles than after 73k miles in my previous Hyundai, same journeys and driving style. As others have said you get what you pay for and in my opinion these are not quality cars. In fact after driving a Skoda for 2 and half years I've come to the conclusion that they are the British Leyland of our time, some nice ideas but poor build quality and reliability, I doubt I'll get another.

I'm rather mystified by some of the comments here. FWIW, I have no issues with paint chipping or the build quality of this car in general, in fact I think these things are as well screwed together as most others I've had. The standard of fit and finish is at least equal to that of my previous Golf, which was excellent.

To date I've covered only 7,000km in the Octavia, including some long country runs in the company of many large trucks. To answer the OP's question I went over my bonnet area with a fine tooth comb this morning and found absolutely no sign of paint chips - maybe I've just been lucky, who knows?

As time and distance goes on it's inevitable the odd chip or three will occur, as on every car I've ever owned. It helps that we don't have the curse of salted roads in this part of the world, which together with dwelling a little away from the coast means the likelihood of rust appearing anywhere on the car is virtually non-existent. 

 

 

6 hours ago, SouthernComfort said:

 

As time and distance goes on it's inevitable the odd chip or three will occur, as on every car I've ever owned. It helps that we don't have the curse of salted roads in this part of the world, which together with dwelling a little away from the coast means the likelihood of rust appearing anywhere on the car is virtually non-existent. 

 

 

I don't disagree that stone chips are inevitable - my point is that as the car reaches 2 years old (1 year with me), there are more stone chips on the bonnet as there were on my previous Audi A6 after 4 years or Ford S-Max after 8 years. Might just be me but I'm unimpressed.

 

And comments about buying 'cheap' is totally wrong - at new, my car was £39,500 which I don't think can be described as cheap in anyway whatsoever.

I agree that the best part of 40k pounds isn't a cheap car, certainly not by my perception. As an aside, it's always fascinated me how much more expensive Skoda's are in the UK (specifically Octavia) campared withour local pricing. But I digress....

Unfortunately, I can't rationalise why one make/model would attract more stone chips than any other similarly styled vehicle driven under the same conditions. Whilst I'm just stating my experience, your experiences with stone chipping on different vehicles is what it is, and is not something to be argued, I just can't figure why it would happen.

British Leyland? Really..?

On 10/06/2024 at 17:50, SC03OTT said:

British Leyland? Really..?

Definitely. 30 months old with 60k miles and so far (apart from badly stone chipped paint)

Gear selector failure

Emissions sensor failure

Flaky infotainment system for first 18 months

Unstable app for a year (then want £100 to renew)

Window that goes down when you press up

Heat exchange failure on aircon (in the hot summer)

Badly stepped rear tyres after 45k (loads of tread left)

6-8 week lead time to get it into my local dealer for a service or repair

 

But, it does have an umbrella in the door and an ice scrapper in the fuel cap

4 hours ago, PawmMag said:

Unstable app for a year (then want £100 to renew

Its £36 a year for the app….

Edited 17 August, 20241 yr by Neily03

It is a pity that @Maxi24 never came back to update this thread.

Or say when first posting the car was not new when he got it.

I was going to suggest the paint was tested to see if as it was first applied at the factory.

http://briskoda.net/forums/topic/525173-is-this-covered-by-paintwork-warranty

 

 

 

Edited 17 August, 20241 yr by Ootohere

16 hours ago, Ootohere said:

It is a pity that @Maxi24 never came back to update this thread.

Or say when first posting the car was not new when he got it.

I was going to suggest the paint was tested to see if as it was first applied at the factory.

http://briskoda.net/forums/topic/525173-is-this-covered-by-paintwork-warranty

 

 

 

 

Updated just not on this thread - 

 

 

Long story short - bought the car at 12 months old from Skoda dealer. Paintwork started flaking (stone chips then flaking), dealer has 'discovered' that the bonnet had been resprayed before they bought it and have offered to pay for another respray. Challenge now is finding a good spray company near me as the one I had been talking to doesn't do private work, just insurance jobs. Dealer has offered to do it but they are 250 miles away so not easy to deliver the car to them.

@Maxi24

It is not private work if you get a VW / SKODA / AUDI / SEAT / PORSCHE approved repairer and the Skoda Authorised Repairer / Dealership contract the Business to carry out the work.

I would not be paying for the work and waiting fora refund from a VAT Registered Skoda Dealership.

 

Tell the Dealer Principal to arrange the Repaint local to you, or they can arrange delivery of a Courtesy car and collection and transportation of your car to them. 

6 minutes ago, Ootohere said:

@Maxi24

It is not private work if you get a VW / SKODA / AUDI / SEAT / PORSCHE approved repairer and the Skoda Authorised Repairer / Dealership contract the Business to carry out the work.

I would not be paying for the work and waiting fora refund from a VAT Registered Skoda Dealership.

 

Tell the Dealer Principal to arrange the Repaint local to you, or they can arrange delivery of a Courtesy car and collection and transportation of your car to them. 

I'm not keen on the idea of me paying for it and then the dealership compensating me. I'm guessing is because it's not their usual sprayer (or something like that) but will speak to them Monday and explain that my local company doesn't do private work and see what they say.

On 17/08/2024 at 15:44, PawmMag said:

Definitely. 30 months old with 60k miles and so far (apart from badly stone chipped paint)

Gear selector failure

Emissions sensor failure

Flaky infotainment system for first 18 months

Unstable app for a year (then want £100 to renew)

Window that goes down when you press up

Heat exchange failure on aircon (in the hot summer)

Badly stepped rear tyres after 45k (loads of tread left)

6-8 week lead time to get it into my local dealer for a service or repair

 

But, it does have an umbrella in the door and an ice scrapper in the fuel cap

Add to the list coolant leak on HV/aircon and the car having to be recovered as not repairable roadside, not apparently an uncommon fault with VW plug in hybrids. As I said before British Leyland of our time