Hi everyone,

I recorded two videos of a strange noise coming from somewhere around or behind the glovebox on the passenger side, although sometimes it sounds like it’s coming from the center of the dashboard.

The car is a Škoda Octavia IV 1.5 TSI e-TEC mild hybrid.

In the first video, the noise occurs when I release the accelerator and the car goes into coasting/mild-hybrid mode, with the engine shutting off and the RPM dropping to 0. At that moment, I hear this strange sound. When I press the accelerator again and the engine restarts, I hear the same sound again.

It sounds almost like some kind of flap or actuator opening and closing.

In the second video, you can hear basically the same sound, but this time I’m manually turning the climate control/AC off and back on.

Has anyone experienced something similar or know what could be causing this?

Edited Wednesday at 22:151 day by Memo_Cro

It really sounds like aircon flap/actuator. If I had to guess, maybe the recirculation or heat exchanger temperature flap.

There is a setting in the AC for automatic internal air circulation activation. Try disabling it and see if it changes anything.

Thanks a lot! I tried disabling the automatic internal air circulation and you were right — the noise completely disappears when it's disabled, so it definitely seems to be related to one of the AC flaps/actuators.

Do you know if there is any workshop manual, diagram or documentation showing the exact location of these flaps/actuators on the Octavia IV?

I already mentioned this issue to an authorized Škoda service center, but they told me that they might have to remove the entire dashboard to access the flap/actuator. Before letting them do something that extensive, I'd really like to know which actuator is most likely responsible and whether it can be accessed without removing the whole dashboard.