Hi all,

2 weeks ago, I picked up a new to me 67 plate SE L Executive 2.0 TDI 150bhp from a private dealer. 95k miles on the clock but seemed in good condition, full Skoda service history etc. and a good price. It was a 8h round trip, but seemed to be worth it...

I've done 500 miles since with no issues, and then this morning as my partner was commuting in with, takes it over the medium-sized hill (10% gradient), and while slowing down the other side, it throws itself into limp mode and the dash lights up:

• Glow plugs

• ESC

• TPM

• Warning that "Electronic parking brake not available"

Doesn't go over a certain RPM and will only just get to 40 mph. Gets to work ok, has to park without parking assist as that's now broken, turns it off/on and all the faults seem to have gone.

I head over to swap cars with her, and take it to the garage next to her work as no one else has availability. They've done a diagnostics with dozens of faults showing, all of which cleared except for P06DA00 (but nothing on the dash), advised it would likely need more investigation but should be okay to drive home. They've also noticed the battery is "not clamped down", though other than a cover I'm a bit unsure what's missing. They didn't have any space to look at it until the new year as well.

I drove it the 15 miles home, including back over the same hill with no issues, car feels perfectly responsive as it has been (and with other Superbs we'd tried).

I spoke with the local VAG service centre, have it booked in next week but they couldn't advise anything else until they'd seen it.

I had approached discuss "distance purchasing" with the seller, and they agreed they would cover "reasonable" costs to have it fixed locally in case something went wrong, haven't spoke to them yet as want to go with a strong case.

So I guess here are my questions:

1. Should I even entertain a repair or should I just go down the refund route? As well as it being within the 30 days for right to reject, part was paid by credit card so I'm happy we'd get money back minus some mileage etc.

2. I've not found much on this specific code on this forum, though others have had similar symptoms, all of which seem to have varied from ABS sensors to units, or engine oil pressure sensors to whole Mechatronics. Is this a can of worms that's not worth touching?

3. Not only is everyone else booked up, but I'd prefer an official service centre to look at it. Am I being reasonable to expect this to be covered?

4. I'm not sure the garage could tell which codes were fresh and which were historic (or didn't make a note at least). Should I be getting an OBD reader so I can keep an eye on these myself?

Thanks in advance

Dealer would be able to do a. Full diagnostic on the car. However given the age, a decent alternative would be a specialist VAG independent with a good reputation. They’ll have all the right stuff and be cheaper on the hourly rate.

As to whether you repair or return - I’d say it depends if you like the car. Sounds like the seller is willing to entertain the idea of helping out with costs; the key word there is “reasonable” as that is subjective.

The two main issues with electrical gremlins have always been and will always be:

1. Battery on its way out.

2. ABS sensor has gone duff.

So first thing to do would be to check not only the charge of the battery but also the health of the battery. Traditionally it’s 4 years old, but going on anecdotal info on here, it could be anywhere between 5 and 15 years old - so age is always trumped by getting a decent multimeter on there to check it.

Measured the battery this morning and showed 12.25 V, so I guess that's the first suspect to deal with right?

Yep - generally 12.6 and over is good. 12.4 and below needs looking at. When engine not running and not plugged in.

It’s useful to also look at State of Charge and State of Health. SoC is how charged it is like your phone battery %

SoH is the battery’s capability compared to full charge when brand new.

So - change battery get it coded (the car needs to be told a new battery has been put in) and with any luck the codes clear. Even it doesn’t solve the problem, it looks like it’ll need changing anyway.

See if you can get the seller to contribute seeing as it was clearly on its way when they sold (and if they ever refer to the 3million point check they do presale, then this absolutely should have been 1 of them).

Ended up at 12.6 after a 5mi journey so I guess I can probably strike that out.

Initial chat today with the seller went down the line of "oh well a battery costs us £60 so that's what we'd contribute", never mind that the Skoda quote for an OEM spec one is £400, a few independents have said ~ £180.

22 minutes ago, linkagelecturer said:

Ended up at 12.6 after a 5mi journey so I guess I can probably strike that out.

Initial chat today with the seller went down the line of "oh well a battery costs us £60 so that's what we'd contribute", never mind that the Skoda quote for an OEM spec one is £400, a few independents have said ~ £180.

Then my conversation would have been along the lines of “here’s your car back”.

1 hour ago, linkagelecturer said:

Ended up at 12.6 after a 5mi journey so I guess I can probably strike that out.

Initial chat today with the seller went down the line of "oh well a battery costs us £60 so that's what we'd contribute", never mind that the Skoda quote for an OEM spec one is £400, a few independents have said ~ £180.

I'm pretty sure they won't be able to get a suitable replacement AGM battery for £60!

Of more than a little concern is the report that the battery is not correctly clamped-down.

Standing voltage alone is not a full test of the battery - you need to test under load conditions as well - a reasonable check is to measure the terminal voltage while the engine is being cranked over, should not fall below about 10.5 volts with a good crank.

11 hours ago, linkagelecturer said:

Measured the battery this morning and showed 12.25 V, so I guess that's the first suspect to deal with right?

I assume that was with engine not running?

What is the voltage with engine running?

12.25 volts is approx. 65% SOC - which, with 'Smart' alternator does not necessarily indicate failing battery. Suggest doing a load test to confirm battery condition.

Edited 18 December, 202518 Dec by Warrior193
added information

If it was me it would go back and I’d look elsewhere, purely because if I buy a car I expect it to be tip top and not have to worry over something.

If it was an ABS sensor which I had recently it was very easy to diagnose, firstly there was a fault and secondly I was able to do a live scan and see that one of abs sensor was recording 0kph, others were receiving speeds, £40 later and I bought and replaced it and job done.

Go here and enter your reg https://www.tayna.co.uk/?gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=23075948330&gbraid=0AAAAADtA3JfkKNBjGbzc-58IXDD5RbPbo

Look for Varta AGM battery (probably best you can get) if the dealer won’t pay for it and to have it “coded” in then yeah give it back.

Also for a car that’s at temp the idle speed looks way too high, can’t remember if mine was higher when abs sensor was knackered but car was grim to drive, started off okay but as soon as I got off my drive and drove all the errors popped up

Edited 18 December, 202518 Dec by Danoid

Lion batteries tend to be at the more budget end; when you get a LOAD of stupid errors, it will mostly like be the CANBUS network playing silly buggers and throwing every code under the sun, due to the fact that the battery cannot keep up with demand.

A Varta Battery 096 battery rated at least 70Ah should do you. Get it properly coded in and THEN have a look at the remaining errors; clear out everything and see what returns.

I had a Banner cheap battery fitted to my Superb which failed in the cold weather last year, this was from a Skoda dealership who had reviewed the car before purchase.

With them quoting £280 for a replacement battery, which was then resolved over the phone when the AA arrived confirming that the Banner battery is not Skoda Approved and now I have a Yuasa battery, with the dealer paying AA via my phone.

I would be suspicious that the battery has been unclamped for a reason , maybe the previous owner sold on the car with a inferior battery that would just about pass muster through an Auction , or going in for PX and could not be arsed re clamping the battery

see if you can get another battery and reset the DTC (fault codes) and try the car again.

The fact that the supplying Garage will only offer £60 towards a replacement kind of tells you the real calibre of the people who sold you the car in my opinion.

As mentioned the Can bus systems on these vehicles are ultra sensitive to voltage drops and will throw a shed full of spurious fault codes up and once a replacement suitable battery is fitted they can all cleared down and get your new battery coded in as it tells the "ECU" that the charging regime can be changed to a new batteries capacity.

Hope that you get it sorted - or throw the car back at them if you have no Joy with Battery.

To give a final update for anyone else looking at this issue, at the end of Dec, a local VAG specialist agreed with the P06DA00 error code being a possible cause. They checked the battery health and was fine. The seller agreed to cover the cost of a new engine oil pressure valve and the local garage carried out the work. That seemed to work for around a month until the end of Jan, when it again went into limp mode. Turning the car on and off would sometimes clear the code but not consistently. I also experienced the gearbox juddering while shifting between 2nd-3rd and 3rd-4th, as well as it outright stalling while coasting at 30mph.

After more back and forth with the seller and the local Skoda main dealer, debating whether they had exercised their right to repair or not, we determined it was likely the camshaft or crankshaft speed sensor, which the camshaft sensor fault present in the original diagnostics as P072600 and P032200. The seller eventually agreed to collect the car and they replaced the crankshaft speed sensor, assuring me it was definitely this and not the camshaft. I had the car back after about 2 weeks. Test driving it, the issue seemed to be resolved, with lots of odd driving on steep hills etc to try and get any of the previous symptoms resolved.

And then 4 days after having it back, while reversing onto my drive, the steering wheel goes click and the dash throws a driver's airbag error and all the steering controls are non-functional. I say enough is enough at this point and luckily they agree to have the car back in exchange for a refund. We did have a quibble over the fair usage deduction, with him trying to charge 45p/mile. I pointed out all the hassle we'd been through, that a chunk of the mileage was them collecting/returning the car, and that trading standards had a recommended framework (which you can see here) which should've been around 17p/mile. We eventually compromised on 26p/mile and after 5 weeks (not the 2 promised) I get the money back.

In hindsight, I think my risk appetite was a lot less than I thought. But luckily enough a L&K 190 has just popped up for sale 5 miles away so fingers crossed!

On 4/28/2026 at 2:38 PM, linkagelecturer said:

To give a final update for anyone else looking at this issue, at the end of Dec, a local VAG specialist agreed with the P06DA00 error code being a possible cause. They checked the battery health and was fine. The seller agreed to cover the cost of a new engine oil pressure valve and the local garage carried out the work. That seemed to work for around a month until the end of Jan, when it again went into limp mode. Turning the car on and off would sometimes clear the code but not consistently. I also experienced the gearbox juddering while shifting between 2nd-3rd and 3rd-4th, as well as it outright stalling while coasting at 30mph.

After more back and forth with the seller and the local Skoda main dealer, debating whether they had exercised their right to repair or not, we determined it was likely the camshaft or crankshaft speed sensor, which the camshaft sensor fault present in the original diagnostics as P072600 and P032200. The seller eventually agreed to collect the car and they replaced the crankshaft speed sensor, assuring me it was definitely this and not the camshaft. I had the car back after about 2 weeks. Test driving it, the issue seemed to be resolved, with lots of odd driving on steep hills etc to try and get any of the previous symptoms resolved.

And then 4 days after having it back, while reversing onto my drive, the steering wheel goes click and the dash throws a driver's airbag error and all the steering controls are non-functional. I say enough is enough at this point and luckily they agree to have the car back in exchange for a refund. We did have a quibble over the fair usage deduction, with him trying to charge 45p/mile. I pointed out all the hassle we'd been through, that a chunk of the mileage was them collecting/returning the car, and that trading standards had a recommended framework (which you can see here) which should've been around 17p/mile. We eventually compromised on 26p/mile and after 5 weeks (not the 2 promised) I get the money back.

In hindsight, I think my risk appetite was a lot less than I thought. But luckily enough a L&K 190 has just popped up for sale 5 miles away so fingers crossed!

@linkagelecturer Good afternoon, how are you? I'm interested in learning more about the P06DA00 fault code. What did the repair shop tell you? What solution did they offer, and what's the current status? Thanks

Just now, Adan_Bujeiro said:

@linkagelecturer Good afternoon, how are you? I'm interested in learning more about the P06DA00 fault code. What did the repair shop tell you? What solution did they offer, and what's the current status? Thanks

Hi Adan,

So it appears P06DA00 was never the actual issue as the limp mode reoccurred after the engine oil pressure valve was replaced. The only reason we stuck with it is that it was the only error code that persisted after being wiped.

The garage that replaced said it seemed to be in reasonable condition anyways.

The actual fault was likely either the camshaft or crankshaft speed sensors, though I only had the car for a relatively brief period (<1k mi) after the repair so it's difficult to say if that was the fix.

For me, the symptoms were:

• Going into limp mode and losing all driver assistance systems (TPS, ACC, sensors) which may or may not clear on a restart of the engine

• Stalling even when going at a steady speed in a straight line

• Gears jumping severely between 2nd/3rd/4th, almost like it would attempt the shift and fail resulting in some violent juddering

I would check whether you possibly have P072600 and P032200 present as well as these seem to be much more common. Best of luck!

Okay, currently I only have code P06DA00 (Engine Oil Pressure Regulation (Electrical Fault/Interruption)). The thing is, no fault codes or warnings appear on my dashboard; the fault is only detected when I run an OBD diagnostic.

Take this with a large pinch of salt, but the VAG specialist who did the valve replacement said these engines can run in a high or low pressure mode, which is what the valve controls. They said that the oil flow will still be fine as other sensors will throw warnings before anything happens so can be a bit of a false positive.

Okay, I'll try buying and replacing the regulator valve and then scan again to see if the error disappears. Thanks for the help.

I'll let you know when I've done the repair. Cheers, mate.