Does anyone else have issues when driving the Octavia VRS when the engine is cold?

The car seems to "mis fire" between 1000 and 2500 rpm and tick over is really rough. I spoke to the Skoda service department about it and they asked if the engine management light comes on, but it doesn't. They said they can't really do anything until the light comes on.

I also spoke to the sales team and they said it was a common problem with the 1.8T 20V engine, but once the engine warms it runs fine.

As the car has only covered 4000 miles, I find it hard to believe that a brand new car can suffer with this sort of problem.

As the mornings are getting colder, I am keen to sort this out, so if anyone has got any suggestions, I will greatly appreciate it.

Cheers All

Mark

well the one I test drove (and bought) must have been outside on the forecourt for many a few cold nights...the disks also had a nice covering or rust on them but this can happen in only a day

but even so it fired up first time no problem and went great straight from the start...souned sweet and idle was nice and steady

so not sure about it being a common fault?

I will be able to tell more after xmas

My 4x4 has developed this problem.

When it is really damp the problem is quite alarming.

It is nearly impossible to drive the car off the driveway, I have to sit and gently rev the engine until it settles down, or else I'd be kangarooing down the road.

My dealer said there was an error logged concerning the throttle control valve.

They cleared it and told me to see how it goes.

After this morning - it is booked in for tomorrow morning!

Apart from a second or 2 of 'diesel' clatter on startup, my car's engine runs smoothly and without any hesitation. The car is normally garaged and has now done 8000 miles in 21 months.

Thanks for all your help, it looks like i will have to book it in to the garage to get it sorted.

Could well be a dodgy coolant temp sensor. VAG have modded these alot over the years. Should be a four pin blue sensor iirc on the Octy down the right hand side of the cylinder head.

My 1.8 slx does something along the lines of what you guys have described when it is cold. If I very lightly depress the accelerator instead of the engine rpm going up it actually drops and the engine sounds as if it is about to stall and then picks up to about 1500rpm (idle is about 950). It did this to me one morning whilst waiting at some traffic lights when I rested my foot against the accelerator. It does not do this when it is warmed up so I am guessing that is some sort of weird ECU/Sensor thing. Does anyone else get this happening to them?

Like Denis i get diesel clatter only, unlike Denis mine has done 17500 miles in 6 months and is just coming due for its first service according to the dash....

Hopefully it will loosen up a bit after the service... maybe I can drive it a little harder then?

It is occationally hesitant when cold but I put that down to the non standard flywheel/clutch setup?

It is occationally hesitant when cold but I put that down to the non standard flywheel/clutch setup?

The problems others are describing seem a bit more serious but I think yours is (like mine) just the 1.8T engine behaving normally ie a bit ka-ka when cold.

I had a recent cold weather related incident which may be similar. The car started but only just. It continually revvved from 1000-3000rpm and while it was doing this the interior lights flicked on and off.

Stopped the engine, restarted and all was fine (like using Windows 98 ).

If, on the first start-up in the morning, I just drive off then it can be a bit hesistant and rough. However I always wait until the car has warmed a little and the engine has settled to around 1k rpm.

Drives fine after this.

I think the hesistancy on starting from cold is something to do with emissions and the vvt sorting itself out. IIRC all 1.8t do this although the recent cold weather could have made the symptons worse. I guess if your car isn't garaged overnight then there might be some dampness. Wasn't dampness something to do with the coil packs failing? So may be you're experiencing the initial stages of coil pack failure. (??)

I should have mentioned that mine has been OK both before and after remapping.