I've noticed a few strange locking antics from my Elegance:

* Last week, it locked the boot when all the other doors were open

* The week before, I opened all doors, then the boot. When I shut the boot, all the doors locked (possibly because the car locks if all the doors aren't opened in x seconds, and it hadn't noticed that the boot was opened).

It's all random, intermittent, and no doubt unreproducible if I took it to a dealer. My last PD100 did the thing of locking the doors if ou only opened the boot, but you could hear it locking before the boot shut. The current one locks the doors as the boot shuts - which is even worse!

I'm definitely going to be careful from now on.

I'm also wondered if you can cut a spare immobiliser-less key that will open the doors if the locking misbehaves with the keys inside?

I'm a bit confused with this - if the car was unlocked, why didn't you just get out and simply open the boot? :confused:

Am I missing something here??

Steve

Yes, I think you maybe Wardy.

Reread the first post. As I got out and shut the door, the central locking kicked in and locked everything.

It looks like it was just a gremlin though. No problems before or since and VAGCOM is completely clear of error codes.

Hiya, I'm new here but felt I had to join to contribute my 2 pences worth (I am a Yorkshire customer after all....)

in the Fabia car self locking fiasco from my own personal experiences.

I had a problem about a month ago with my 2004 reg 1.2 Skoda Fabia with the central

locking going on and off between 7 to 10 times continously every few minutes. When parking it

would also wind down the windows and lock and unlock the car at random intervals. (anyone

ever seen the film Herby goes banannas?)

I took it to a dealership, they blamed it on 'water ingress' in the front doors that probably got into a locking

mechanism. I read a bit online before contacting the dealership so knew that this was a known problem with Skodas

but also read about drainage hole at the bottom of the doors that need checking every now and again to make sure

there's no blockage.

The dealership managed to look into it a few days later (after kindly letting me leave it in their lockup

which to be fair to them I did appreciate) and the mechanic manager concluded that the sealant on

the doors which held the waterproofing on had worn off after four years, and that one of the locking mechanisms was a writeoff.

They concluded that a fix would be to reseal *all 4 doors* and replace the locking mechanism.

After a bit of online research afterwards I decided that sealing all 4 doors was overkill given that

I only have central locking/electric windows in the front of the car (therefore no electrics in the rear doors?). So I asked the

garage to just to the front doors - the job was completed, problem solved after £200 worth of resolution or so I thought.

This evening I noticed the car locked itself as I was driving, I thought I'd knocked it by accident

with my arm usually placed along the door so I unlocked it, same thing happened a minute after.

I parked up and whilst the engine was running ran outside around the car under all the doors to make sure the above drainage holes

were unblocked! doh! big mistake, and as per first poster on this thread - it locked me out!

After a phonecall to the wife, she got a taxi and was able to bring the spare key down for me, like another contributor has also

commented the centrallocking wouldn't unlock until I used the key in the lock.

Anyway I'm uncertain if this problem is related to the first problem of water ingress or if it's related to the

problems others have had with it locking but I'll be calling the dealership tomorrow - on the assumption they

say it's nothing to do with them I'm seriously thinking of getting rid of the car. Shame though, it's very fair

to say that the first four years of this car has been trouble free, ok it doesn't handle well in snow but we all have

our problems I guess.

Yes, I think you maybe Wardy.

Reread the first post. As I got out and shut the door, the central locking kicked in and locked everything.

It looks like it was just a gremlin though. No problems before or since and VAGCOM is completely clear of error codes.

Yes, I did read it - but as the car must have been unlocked for you to get in and start the engine, why didn't you just get out again and pull the handle on the boot itself to open it? What I don't understand is why you needed to touch the remote again?

Steve

Yes, I did read it - but as the car must have been unlocked for you to get in and start the engine, why didn't you just get out again and pull the handle on the boot itself to open it? What I don't understand is why you needed to touch the remote again?

Steve

I don't understand. I'm still not sure you've understood the circumstances.

I unlocked.

I got in.

I realised I needed to get deicer out boot.

I pressed boot button on key fob as boot won't always open once engine has started.

I put key in ignition and started engine to get things warming up.

I got out car and shut driver's door.

I opened boot and got deicer.

I shut boot and the whole locking system triggered.

That's what happened. Now run your suggestion by me again...

Of course I tried every door again and again but it had fully locked down.

"I pressed boot button on key fob as boot won't always open once engine has started."

This above part is critical to the whole incident I feel. I can't see this as being how it should be. If the doors are unlocked, then the boot should be too.

My thoughts follow Manny's above - the boot button on the fob is designed to allow you one-button access to the boot when the rest of the car is locked. While I understand that the car should override the lock command that's at the end of the 'boot button' process, when it should know the rest of the car is unlocked, and especially that the engine is already running! I just can't see the use of the button as necessary when the rest of the car is unlocked anyway.

Hope this makes sense? I'm not having a go; just trying to properly understand what happened and hopefully avoid this happening to you, and others, again

Steve

"I pressed boot button on key fob as boot won't always open once engine has started."

This above part is critical to the whole incident I feel. I can't see this as being how it should be. If the doors are unlocked, then the boot should be too.

My thoughts follow Manny's above - the boot button on the fob is designed to allow you one-button access to the boot when the rest of the car is locked. While I understand that the car should override the lock command that's at the end of the 'boot button' process, when it should know the rest of the car is unlocked, and especially that the engine is already running! I just can't see the use of the button as necessary when the rest of the car is unlocked anyway.

Hope this makes sense? I'm not having a go; just trying to properly understand what happened and hopefully avoid this happening to you, and others, again

Steve

The boot on the fabia vrs won't always open via the boot button when the ignition is on etc as this is apparently an anti hijack device or something similar. I saw a thread on here about this a while ago and I asked Sparshatts at Fareham who said something about it. TBH I've never properly understood it so I've just got into the habit of using the key fob to open the boot.

I don't see why that would matter though as when the boot door shuts I would have thought the central locking is simply supposed to revert to its previous state, i.e. locked if it was locked and unlocked if it was unlocked.

Once everything was locked down I didn't have a spare key to hand so I had no option but Skoda assist.

Apparently this works with a mobile phone:

Ring someone (on their mobile) who has the other remote key, get them to hold the remote against their phone and press unlock. Hold your phone close to the car and it should unlock.

Never tried it so don't shoot me if it doesn't work!!!

Apparently this works with a mobile phone:

Ring someone (on their mobile) who has the other remote key, get them to hold the remote against their phone and press unlock. Hold your phone close to the car and it should unlock.

Never tried it so don't shoot me if it doesn't work!!!

That was on Top Gear a year or so back wasn't it!?!?!?!

how many time did you press the door unlock button?

with my wifes fab vrs if you only press the door unlock button once it only unlocks the drivers door, if you press it twice it unlocks all the doors and the boot.

The boot on the fabia vrs won't always open via the boot button

My understanding was that the interior release pull button (next to the fuel filler release) would always open the boot, provided the doors were not locked, whereas the button on the key fob would unlock and open the boot and then relock the car's doors when you'd closed it. IIRC, the boot automatically locks when the car is moving as an anti-hijack thing but can be overridden with the interior release.

Chris

Can you still stall an engine these days by covering the exhaust until it stops?

Yes you can...

I hired a campervan in NZ a couple of months back and I had to reverse into a smallish campsite space - with a grass bank behind. The next day, the (brand new diesel Transit) van wouldn't start - kept stalling. Eventually realised that it was because I had reversed too far and the exhaust was full of a mud 'bung'!

So, it is possible to stall a new diesel Transit by covering the exhaust. Wouldn't help you get in the car, but at £1.15 a litre for diesel, it would save a few quid!

Cheers,

Stu

My understanding was that the interior release pull button (next to the fuel filler release) would always open the boot, provided the doors were not locked, whereas the button on the key fob would unlock and open the boot and then relock the car's doors when you'd closed it. IIRC, the boot automatically locks when the car is moving as an anti-hijack thing but can be overridden with the interior release.

Chris

I'm not sure about that except to say the vrs doesn't have an internal boot release by the fuel cap release.

how many time did you press the door unlock button?

with my wifes fab vrs if you only press the door unlock button once it only unlocks the drivers door, if you press it twice it unlocks all the doors and the boot.

I think you've misread the original post. The keys were inside the car in the ignition, hence why the engine was running.

I haven't mis-read your post

I unlocked. (one press of the door unlock or two presses) (once will only unlock drivers door hence why you may not always be able to open the boot, If you press the door keyfob twice it will unlock all doors and the boot, on my wifes fabia if you press the key fob too quickly it only acts as a single press of the button even theough you've pressed it twice, this happens quite frequently on her car).

I got in.

I realised I needed to get deicer out boot.

I pressed boot button on key fob as boot won't always open once engine has started. (Pressing the boot release button on the keyfob will always lock the boot once the boot is closed. not sure if it will try and lock the whole car though)

I put key in ignition and started engine to get things warming up.

I got out car and shut driver's door.

I opened boot and got deicer.

I shut boot and the whole locking system triggered. (as above, when closing the boot it should lock the boot when the boot is closed)

I will try my theory when my wife is next at home and we have our spare key at the ready

My understanding was that the interior release pull button (next to the fuel filler release) would always open the boot, provided the doors were not locked

I think this pull button was on older Fabias, but seems to have been deleted from the newer ones.

I always assumed it was a mechanical link to the lock mechanism - I wondered if it would work even if the battery was flat?

My experience is that the locking seems to misbehave randomly and not consistently - it's hard to reproduce it.