I recently bought a 2012 Skoda Fabia 1.2 Greenline with about 120,000 miles to replace the one I had, which was recently written off. Other than some minor niggles here and there, it drives fine, and there are no warning lights on the dashboard (engine, DPF, or otherwise). However, the MPG is atrocious. Driving on the motorway at 60 mph, I’m lucky to get about 50-something MPG, whereas I was very easily getting well above 70 MPG in my previous 1.2 Greenline.

The tyres are fine. I plan to replace all the filters and fluids over the next week, but I don’t think it will make a huge difference. I’ve booked it into a garage that claims to be a "VW group specialist," but I’d rather have an idea of what might be wrong before taking it there

The lady who owned it before me, for about a year, mostly made short drives with it. I’m hoping that hasn’t caused any irreversible damage.

Edited 18 January, 20251 yr by Rothamsted
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You would be surprised how much a decent service woiuld make to your car just replacing filters and cleaning can improve MPG, you might also try a good fuel injector cleaner but suggest you do this before changig the fuel filter, if as you said the previous owner only used the car for short trips it might be an advantage to take a few motorway trups and hold the car in 4th gea so engine is reving a bit more than in 5th gear to give it a good clear out, this might be worth doing before taking it to a VW specalist as it just might save you a load of money 

 

An Air Filter can make a bit of a difference, can you not just check it and see if it is filthy? Are the tyres the same as your last car and the pressures?    Had this car had the Fix?  The defeat device one, and had your previous car?      It had not done that many miles in the years before the last owner.   Are you aware of the car regening much,?

41 minutes ago, Murdockman said:

You would be surprised how much a decent service woiuld make to your car just replacing filters and cleaning can improve MPG, you might also try a good fuel injector cleaner but suggest you do this before changig the fuel filter, if as you said the previous owner only used the car for short trips it might be an advantage to take a few motorway trups and hold the car in 4th gea so engine is reving a bit more than in 5th gear to give it a good clear out, this might be worth doing before taking it to a VW specalist as it just might save you a load of money 

 

 

According to the car’s documentation history, it was fully serviced in July 2023 (including the air filter and an oil filter /oil change). While the service is about six months overdue, it doesn’t seem late enough to cause an issue like this. I plan to service the car myself next week and will report back on the results.

I’ll also try the fuel injector cleaner, which I hadn’t considered before. Since I have a long commute to work, I’ll take your advice and rev it up during the trip to see if it helps.

Thanks for the suggestions.

44 minutes ago, Ootohere said:

An Air Filter can make a bit of a difference, can you not just check it and see if it is filthy? Are the tyres the same as your last car and the pressures?    Had this car had the Fix?  The defeat device one, and had your previous car?      It had not done that many miles in the years before the last owner.   Are you aware of the car regening much,?

 

The air filter is going to be replaced soon, so we’ll see what impact that has. The tyres are admittedly some cheap, no-name ones, but they’re quite new, so I’m a bit reluctant to change them just yet. The pressure is set to the level advised by Skoda (2.5 bar, I believe).

I’m not entirely sure what you mean by “fix” and “defeat device.” Are you referring to a DPF deletion? As far as I know, that hasn’t been done. My last car was also bought used, and I don’t think it had been modified either and it ran just fine.

Even with my previous car, I never really noticed the regen process, although it must have been happening, as the car ran great. I’ll keep an ear out for it this time.

Hopefully, with some servicing and long motorway drives, things will improve. Thanks!

It was not a DPF delete, it was New Engine Management because of the VW Emission Scandal.

Available first for the 1.2 diesel before the 1.6 TDI CR.   For some 1.2 they said it was not available.

 

Check the VIN on yours, but if done it will not show,    did your previous car not get a Skoda Recall after 2016?   Which you did not require to have done.

http://skoda-auto.com/services/recall-campaigns

 

I will bump a thread on it. 

Edited 18 January, 20251 yr by Ootohere

55 minutes ago, Ootohere said:

It was not a DPF delete, it was New Engine Management because of the VW Emission Scandal.

Available first for the 1.2 diesel before the 1.6 TDI CR.   For some 1.2 they said it was not available.

 

Check the VIN on yours, but if done it will not show,    did your previous car not get a Skoda Recall after 2016?   Which you did not require to have done.

http://skoda-auto.com/services/recall-campaigns

 

I will bump a thread on it. 

 

Sorry, I misunderstood what you meant. I had never heard of that recall. I just checked and my previous car did not have the software update (Dear Customer,
the service action for your affected VIN is already available. Please, do not hesitate to contact your service partner to complete this action.) but the new one did (ŠKODA Partner has confirmed to us the service action (Diesel EA189) had been performed for this VIN). Do you think this is what's causing it? I was going to ask if there is a way of "un-updating it" but suspect that is not possible.

It may be a reason for less efficient / economic running.   

The 1.6 TSI CR had a Flow Device fitted to the air filter and new software, some had issues after and some had it rolled back and a remap.

 

The FIX seemingly killed some 1.2 and was suspended, and then reintroduced.   (Caddy vans were the issue mostly, maybe because fleet vans were done.)

No idea if anyone spend money to get that rolled back.  

28 minutes ago, Ootohere said:

It may be a reason for less efficient / economic running.   

The 1.6 TSI CR had a Flow Device fitted to the air filter and new software, some had issues after and some had it rolled back and a remap.

 

The FIX seemingly killed some 1.2 and was suspended, and then reintroduced.   (Caddy vans were the issue mostly, maybe because fleet vans were done.)

No idea if anyone spend money to get that rolled back.  

 

That's interesting. I went back to older posts in the forum about 'the fix,' many of them featuring you, Ootohere, and I regret not doing more thorough research before buying a Skoda. It seems I was fortunate that my previous one escaped this issue. My new one, however, had a new EGR valve fitted just a year ago, which aligns with what other owners have been reporting online. I'll ask around and see if I can have it remapped. Thanks a lot, you might have cracked it.

Edited 18 January, 20251 yr by Rothamsted
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I'm leaving this update for the benefit of those who might stumble upon this post in the future. I replaced all the filters and the oil, and added a fuel injector cleaner to the diesel a couple of days before changing the fuel filter. I also started to better understand the "efficiency points" of the car in terms of speed and RPM. Overall, the MPG improved a bit, and it was worth doing all of this. The next step will be buying better tyres.

Unfortunately, I haven't had much luck finding a garage capable of reversing the "dieselgate" update. They either suggest a standard tuning "for better performance and economy" or explain that their official VW Group software only allows them to install the latest updates.

Does anyone know of a garage, preferably in the south of England, that can reverse "the fix"?