I am after some advice please on coolant and specifically colour. I am looking at buying from Skoda, a 2 owner 2023 Superb with under 20,000 miles. The coolant looks brown to me but they have assured me this is normal. My current 2010 Superb has bright pink coolant.

Anyone with a Mk3 Superb or 2023 era Skoda able to confirm this coolant looks normal, please?

Edited 28 May28 May by GreenGeorge

Looks wrong to me as well.

Having added Liquid Sealant / Rad Weld type colour.

Or mixed / topped up with the wrong coolant / anti freeze / rust inhibitor.

Current VW coolant (from 2019) is G12evo (following on from G13, of course!) to me 12evo looks pinkish but VW call G12+, G12++, G13 and G12evo violet (G13 looks pinkish to me, not seen the other two).

What they are not is brown - but the coolant you have looks an off (dirty?) pinkish to me, as Ootohere has put perhaps mixed with something else, I'd not expect that from a two year old car, or two years after a (good) coolant change. Two owners on a 2023 car(?).

HTH.

Edited 29 May29 May by nta16
typo

19 hours ago, GreenGeorge said:

I am after some advice please on coolant and specifically colour. I am looking at buying from Skoda, a 2 owner 2023 Superb with under 20,000 miles. The coolant looks brown to me but they have assured me this is normal. My current 2010 Superb has bright pink coolant.

Anyone with a Mk3 Superb or 2023 era Skoda able to confirm this coolant looks normal, please?

As everyone else, I'd think a visually pink or orange colour (even coolant at 10 years old), absolutely not brown.

That coolant colour could possibly be a result of system being topped up with G13 - which, IIRC is purple - I believe I have seen references to this colour change before.

I believe that G12 & G13 are compatible with each other, so there shouldn't be any issue.

From what I see in posted image, coolant doesn't appear to be contaminated.

If still doubtful, request dealer to carry out a complete coolant change as a condition of sale.

We are only looking at images on a screen and the coolant is in an expansion tank that seems to have a bit of a tint to the clear plastic so this will effect how the coolant looks inside, taking a little coolant out would show it's true colour to compare (be it pinkish, violet or purple) to a sample of G13 or G12evo, or other G12 - or compare the expansion tank to another 2023 Superb.

I'm not sure there would be any or much noticeable difference in colour in mixing G13 with any of the G12s but if they are from different suppliers who knows but I doubt it but I've also not seen those mixes so can't know for sure.

@GreenGeorge something I forgot - the coolant is a bit below the 'Min' level, I'd want to know why. This is a subject that might best be covered by looking in, and/or asking in the Superb Mk3 or Mk4 forum with those photos to see how they compare for 2023 owners.

Thank you all for your advice. We decided not to go ahead with that car and agree the coolant being at or below minimum was a concern with no disclosed work on the cooling system recently.

I did look at other cars on the forecourt and they appeared to have the same colour coolant but to my mind it looks wrong.

We are going to stick with out 157k Skoda Superb estate for now. We have had her since around 50k and is ell maintained by specialists and has nice pink clear coolant! The EGR vaalve has just faile dthis week so we will get that replaced and see where we are.

Thanks for reporting back.

Personally I would prefer a 2010 car to a 2023 car, when I used to drive two neighbours cars, a 2023 Nissan Qashqai and a 2005 Kia Picanto, I much preferred driving the 2005 car without many of the driver "aids" and any "assists" ( I preferred driving it against my wife's 2015 Fabia too but obviously not a popular sentiment here) I also drive another neighbour's 2016 Corsa automatic which is fine but it only has 8k-miles on it.

I think 2017 is about as new as you want to go, certainly with a VW product, but it won't be as well made as a 2010 (then a 2010 won't be as well made as from the previous century).

You can't keep old cars going for ever but for longer than most think, and economically when compared to all costs for buying and running a new car, but of course it does depend on how well the old car was looked after in the past and how well it continues to be, that doesn't have to be excessive either.

Good luck.