Hello,

I have a Felicia 1.6 (2000). It is in nice condition and well looked after car with 70k miles. This is the first time I have tried to put it through it's MOT test and it has failed on emissions and would appear to be running slightly rich, though it runs smoothly idles well.

We have tried to connect the OBD but cannot get any useful information. We have tried two different OBD devices with the same result. The OBD gets power and displays some information such as the ABS system but it doesn't give any information on the engine management. Does anyone know why this can happen? It would be useful to see what the ECU says before spending money on potential fixes.

Edited 31 May31 May by TrentBarton
Missing word

Have a look or search for threads and info, or Google that may well bring you back here, for how much or how little info a 2000 VWŠkoda might or might not give to any scan tool. It also depends on what and what level scan tool or code reader you are using.

Go back to pre-scan tool diagnostics anyway, which you normally need no matter the age of the car and how many modules and sensors it has on it.

Failed emissions, running rich - by how much.

What is the service history of the car particularly recently, did you give the car a good warm up and blow out before taking it for the MoT. Haas the car done much mileage recently and in the past few year, or since a last proper service. Any new parts fitted or work done on the car in the last year. You can check sensors with a multimeter.

My understand is that you should be able to get ECU faults and emissions related codes/ data using the VAG tools but would be interested to hear anyone's advice on that?

Service history of the car is very good. Never missed an annual service since new. It has done about 10k this year where it has had a new fuel filter, oil change, timing belt, water pump, temperature sensor and a few non engine related things.

I have noticed on this MOT history before that the car has had high emissions failures in it's past. I also notice that the engine management light doesn't come on when it should. I am wondering if someone has played with the system to prevent the light coming on (it is an MOT fail in the UK) and this is also stopped the communication to the OBD tools.

CO is currently 6% at idle so high!

You should be able to get emission related codes even with simple non-VAG tools (subject to the reader or scan tool being appropriate to VW, model and year, car battery and tool battery being at a reasonable state of charge and program check for being up to date before use).

I don't know what VAG tool was used in 2000 but it would have been very basic compared to many of today's tools and (IIRC) your car has a 16 pin standard socket possibly (IIRC) only a few of those 16 available sockets are used, and the systems protocols used were more basic. So a lot less information and interaction than on later cars.

As this is your first MoT with this car and it's done 10 in the last year, how long have you had this car and how long did the last owner have the car?

Never missing a service from new is good, particularly a couple of decades back as more was done on a service but this changed over time to basically being very little more than an engine oil and filter change which isn't even a proper service for the engine let alone the car as a whole. More recent years service, maintenance and repairs history may be more relevant for your current issue. 10k-miles this year is good for the car. Your list, as regards the engine, was missing engine air filter and spark plugs as obvious example but they may have been change in previous recent years.

Previous mot fails for emissions doesn't tie in well with regular (timely?) annual services unless these were just oil and filter "services" but something must have been done to get the MoT passes for those years.

What makes you say the engine management light doesn't come on when it should, computers aren't to be fully relied on, they are not always the answer or give incorrect answers, and some of the computer programs have wide margins of tolerance built in to them, so much that a (non-technical) human can feel or detect a fault well before the computers trigger a warning.

I'm not knowledgeable enough to know how you fiddle the light not to come other than removing a bulb -are you saying the light doesn't come on when it should by what the car's Owner's Manual tells you(?).

Emissions could be due to many factors and causes, other than lack of full, and proper, servicing and maintenance thing like lambda sensor and injector(s) or their settings would come to mind before any manipulation of computer programs.

Has the car got or had any sort of "fuel saving" device(s) fitted now or before?

What code reader, scan tool, VAG tool are you using?

How many miles did the car do in the year before last and year and two before that?

When was the engine air filter (and air box) last inspected, cleaned or changed - same for spark plugs?

What petrol do you run it on, and previously if you know?

Generally, not necessarily for this Fail, for the MoT test you need to ensure the tester is testing the car to the requirements for a year 2000 car and engine, not all MoT testers are fully trained or qualified (believe it or not) or know or are used to testing old cars.

As I put other current and past Felicia owners here will know more than me and it's been 3 years now since I used a 1973 car as a daily, and that strictly didn't need an MoT and MoT requirements related to it were less than even a 1980s car let alone a 2000 car so what little knowledge I had I've mostly forgotten.

On 31/05/2025 at 08:57, TrentBarton said:

We have tried two different OBD devices with the same result. The OBD gets power and displays some information such as the ABS system but it doesn't give any information on the engine management.

Not all OBD scanners are the same, there is a topic here were another member bought and tried with an OBD scanner but failed.

https://www.briskoda.net/forums/topic/531622-%C5%A1koda-felicia-obd-port/

Here is my answer:

https://www.briskoda.net/forums/topic/531622-%C5%A1koda-felicia-obd-port/#findComment-5936408

Some modern OBDII scanners they don't support the Felicia's ISO14230 (KWP2000) protocol which uses for communication between ECU,sensors and OBD socket.

You need a VAG-COM scanning.

Another example:

https://www.briskoda.net/forums/topic/485358-obd-2-scanner-that-will-work-with-felicia/

https://www.briskoda.net/forums/topic/470435-best-diagnostic-scanner-for-felicia-pickup/

https://www.briskoda.net/forums/topic/524233-obd-reader/page/2/

As for the bad emissions i would look first of all the Lambda sensor, he is the culprit for many ''bad things'' as wrong emissions, excessive fuel consumption etc, it happened to me in the past.

Hey @D.FYLAKTOS . That is massively helpful, thank you.
I am trying a new Lambda today and hoping for the best. I had wanted to get diagnostics on it first to make sure I am not wasting money but I was struggling.

I have read all of the posts you have put through. Is the summary that for a 2000 1.6 Felicia, it has to be OBD1 or OBD11 with K-Line or VAGCOM but not OBD2?

As about the lambda sensor, learn from my mistake.

https://www.briskoda.net/forums/topic/503246-confusion-with-bosch-lambda-sensors/

Buy the original and not some aftermarket and do not believe the seller ''according to the refference this is for you''.

https://www.briskoda.net/forums/topic/503246-confusion-with-bosch-lambda-sensors/page/2/#findComment-5653435

Whatever your Felicia 1.6 has from the factory search and buy a new one exactly the same.

We have plain OBD or OBD I and not OBD II so VAG-COM works fine with out port, some OBD II scanner devices not always.

OBD11 is a scanner tool but has not those fancy applications that OBD II has.

https://obdeleven.com/skoda

In the past i have found and posted this:

So forget the OBD II (also known as OBD 2).

1 hour ago, TrentBarton said:

I had wanted to get diagnostics on it first to make sure I am not wasting money but I was struggling.

You can use a multimeter.

OBD is On Board Diagnostics

OBD-I (capital i) is OBD (1 / one)

OBD-II (two capital i) is OBD (2 / two)

OBDeleven (my mistake to make the 'e' a capital) is a brand of diagnostic tool / application - https://obdeleven.com/

Then the various protocols and systems get a lot more confusing. - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On-board_diagnostics

HTH.

Just to finish off this thread. I never managed to find an OBD that would communicate with the ECU so took a gamble on a Lambda and it worked a treat. Emissions down from 6% to about 0.2% instantly so there you go!

Thank you to everyone for your ideas and help.