[hrman]

Originally Posted by Warwithwheels

How better should SKODA present this? I have never seen a manufacturer who has taken so much care to dedicate a separate header for driving thru' water.

Link to the Owner's manual

There you go. Thanks for posting this. If any owner of a car does not have the time or patience to read through the owner's manual and goes against precautions explicitly stated therein, he has himself and only himself to blame.
And a driver driving automatic cars for five years as your qualification does not condone the fact that you drove through water and caused the mess yourself You should have been aware that your car has the lowest ground clearance.

How easy it is to beat perception and follow herd mentality of bashing up a manufacturer just because they have gone wrong on a few previous occasions. No manufacturer is a saint and there are equally horrific stories of other cars as well. I think its time we took a breath and stopped bashing up Skoda just because its the in thing to do!!

All those who talk about impracticality of stopping on the roads in rains, reversing etc. These are practical difficulties which we may all face. But in the end there is a judgement call which any sane driver is allowed to take and should take. If you decide to go into the puddle, you expose yourself and the car to all allied risks of doing so. If it doesn't play out to your favour, then don't blame the manufacturer of selling a car not suited for Indian conditions.

The Superb in question is clearly a luxury sedan. Its not an SUV or an off-roader. So the treatment and usage is clearly different. If the owner did not know this, then who is to blame?

[johy]

My understanding of the entire affair has been:

• The buyer is harried. Skoda did not help him. Even if they were not obliged to help him, they could have tried to help him - balm to soothe the agony, but obviously they do not seem to care. It would pain anyone paying that kind of money, 26 lacs or 28 lacs does not matter. It would pain if if I paid 10 lacs, for someone else it could be 2 lacs, for another 2 crore.
  
• Skoda has earned a bad name in India. Here and on other forums and more importantly word of mouth. And I think the extent to which they have earned the bad name, they are to blame more than anyone else. Not forums. Not media. Not "Indian mentality" (whatever that means). This incident has further dented their reputation.
  
• I would not trust Skoda after reading and hearing all I have about them. Unless I was listening to my "heart" and buying one of their great vehicles. Yes, there are many in this forum (and why not) who have been bowled over by their fab cars (umbrella included) only to regret it later. Again, it is Skoda to blame. You are selling a car - not an umbrella-carrying contraption_on_wheels.
  
• I would not gamble on a Skoda - would you? That is what it boils down to.

Post script: I think it should be compulsory on the part of the dealers/manufacturers to educate the buyer(s) regarding any car he or she would like to purchase. I don't think it is fair to assume that every gent/lady knows that an electronic-loaded vehicle should not be taken on bad roads, or how the ground clearance/wheelbase/suspension setup is going to affect how the car is going to behave. Not every buyer in the market is a team-bhpian. As a layman, how else would I know that my Skoda would not cross a small puddle of water where the Honda Citys and Marutis are crossing with ease?

[azeemhafiz]

The more I read the thread, the hatred (could be valid) of our beloved members to Skoda becomes apparent.

For a minute, remove Skoda from the equation and replace the same with another brand name or car for example the Kizashi. The reaction that would invoke is most definitely far inferior to the one that Skoda manages to invoke.

There are plenty of Audi and Merc owners whom I know personally that had to cough up more than 15 lakhs in damages after wading through water. At the risk of being judgemental, the emotion that any percieved premium segment car invokes attributed to a one side story in our forum is phenomenal and exponential once you get Skoda into the equation.

Wade through water in any car you will get into trouble. The limit of water that a car can tolerate is different and is NOT proportional to the price tag. My swift can take a hundred times more abuse than my vRS and I am guaranteed that repair costs will be significantly lower. An 800 can stand more abuse than an S class (I have one in my family garage for the past few months with the failed suspension) does that make the 800 better car? May be yes and may be no. But given a choice to me, personally I would take the S-class over the 800.

Lets try and deal with every situation as a stand alone one, yes we do learn from the past experience but maintaining the maturity to not let the past experiences and lesson cloud the debate / investigation into the current situation empowers us to a fantastically healthy debate - One that is more constructive and a lot more helpful to the owner.

All views expressed above are a result of my astute observation and in many ways flawed. I love the Forum to death and deeply admire and respect its members and moderators. Please for heaven's sake do not consider the comments above targeted to the forum or members. Its a mere observation and a recommended principle that could yield a healthier debate and a lot more helpful solutions after giving the problem its well deserved independent diagnosis.

Live long and prosper.

Azeem

P.S - Yes I am aware of the reported Skoda horror stories, especially our fellow member Harish is fighting through. I am a vivid reader of his thread and other reported issues with Skoda. Stating it as a disclaimer before I am reminded

[Warwithwheels]

Originally Posted by johy

....how else would I know that my Skoda would not cross a small puddle of water where the Honda Citys and Marutis are crossing with ease?

How do you know it was a small puddle? Did you come across any pics of the same or where you present there when the superb got stranded?

The owner has explicitly stated that the engine shut down only after trying to cross that water body.

It requires only a little bit of reasoning to understand the fact that the water logging should have been quite deep enough for the water to get into the exhaust pipe.

Again comparing the Superb 3.6 to a Honda City or a Maruti is completely out of logic. The city has a ground clearance of 165mm and M800 stands tall at 160mm above the ground, while the superb 3.6 sits low at 139 mm. This info would have been very much available to the owner thru' product brouchers or test drives at the time of purchase.

Hence it is quite ridiculous to expect the superb to do what a City or a 800 can do (Unfortunately, this seems to be the prime worrying factor to the owner too). There are many Honda CIVIC owners in the forum who cannot take their car over certain bad roads that even a Nano can handle aplomb, even after paying close to 10 times what a Nano would cost. Should they all start waging a war against Honda?

Every car comes with its own capabilities and limitations. Anybody investing close to 3 Million on a car is expected to do some basic ground work about the vehicle to check if it would suit his requirements or not.

What next?? buy a tall and wide SUV like Fortuner or Endy and start omplaining that it wouldn't go thru' the Railway vehicular subway in the neighborhood that even a M800 could go? Naah!

Am sure you are aware that there is legal terminology called ‘Caveat Emptor’ which means ‘let the buyer beware.’ It implies that there is certain amount of responsibility thrust on the buyer too!

[Vikas Arora]

I think the breakdown of car due to water entering through exhaust cannot be the fault of Skoda. However, did Skoda (or VW) guys inform buyers that their cars are extra sensitive to water logging on the roads? Did they tell that any water damage to engine is not covered under normal insurance policy? Again this boils down to the quality of dealerships and we all know that they are not up to the mark ( I compare them to Honda/Maruti).

I bought a VW Vento diesel in June this year and when I asked the dealer as to what extra is covered in elite assure policy, I was told about this water sensitivity thing. He then told me that you should never get the engine bay washed with water in VW cars..Now I take extra care while driving my Vento on waterlogged roads. This type of information must be shared with customers without them asking the dealers.

The car company will always get a bad name in such situations since they know the best about their products and they didn't share right information with the customers.

[apachelongbow]

Originally Posted by Warwithwheels

How better should SKODA present this? I have never seen a manufacturer who has taken so much care to dedicate a separate header for driving thru' water.


Link to the Owner's manual

Thank you for bringing this up. So Skoda has made it very clear that if you do take your car into water over the sill line, be prepared for expensive damage.

So all Skoda owners beware, if you do get damages due water ingestion, Skoda is well within their right of not providing free repairs.

Now my question is, where in India do we not expect potholes or standing water on the roads, especially in time of monsoon? Are Skoda owners supposed to cover their car until the wet season is over? Or are they expected to keep a flatbed truck handy to pick up their car and ferry across flooded/slush filled roads.
And we are all not talking of crossing Pagal Nalla as someone has put it, but merely driving across a few cms of water logged street, which is an everyday affair in all our cities. It seems the Skoda Superb is more delicate than the CNG auto which stall every time it pours

[supremeBaleno]

Originally Posted by Zero Cool

A couple of years back, my 3 months old SX4 got submerged in knee deep water while parked during heavy rains. I did not start the car, pushed it out of the water, drained the water out of the car and then started the car.

When you say you "drained the water out of the car", what do you mean ? Drained water from the interiors of the car ? Or drained water from the engine internals ? If it is the latter, how did you do it ? Asking because I doubt it is something that can be done as a DIY.

[Akshay1234]

Originally Posted by pganapathy

Yes 9.5 or 11 lakhs is a lot for the engine servicing cost but the only question here remains, did skoda cheat the man. That we can only determine by the following.

Well considering the 3.6 cost about 6l more than the 1.8 just for the engine, 4x4 system, suspension and different exhaust it certainly seems this engine is expensive. After all it also comes in the Q7, Porsche Cayenne, VW Phaeton among others.

Frankly I am a bit disappointed, on a forum like this of car enthusiasts, where people pride themselves on the good care they take of their car, and their knowledge of cars, hearing people questioning why they should read a car manual?

Of course a car like this needs some extra care. When I got the vRS, I sat down and explained to my driver what to do, and what not to do. I reminded him this is not an Innova (what he was driving before), he cannot go through waterlogging, he should not ride the clutch at all (Skoda clutches are sensitive), and similar little pointers. Infact once he took 15 mins extra to get home, I asked him why and he said it was to avoid a waterlogged street even though other cars were going through.

If you are paying 20l for a Euro sedan, be prepared to spend a little extra time taking care of it.

[vb-saan]

Actually if any of the cars in front of the Superb had stalled in the waterlogged area and the driver tried to bring it back to life, it would have met with the same fate as the Skoda (whether it is a Suzuki, VW or a Honda). And I don’t think the feedback/response from the manufacturer will be any different. Only difference will be in the repair cost. The repair costs for the 3.6 FSI V6 definitely will be in range of a BMW or an Audi.

I guess we now have 8 pages of discussion (in 2 days) just for the reason that the car in question is a Skoda.

[dkaile]

We have spent 8 pages discussing a problem which is rarest of the rare case even for a Skoda.

A little pro-activeness from car owners goes a long way rather than expecting to be spoon fed by manufacturers just because they own a 'premium' car. A lack of judgment call cannot be made basis to blame the manufacturer for their product.

I feel my MT Superb has same water wading capabilities as my previous Corolla or my humble Santro and anything more than that would prove more disastrous for my Skoda because 1. it is a costlier car and 2. it has more imported/complicated components than my Santro which will need replacing. So as a owner I expect myself to take that wee bit extra precaution and not the lack of it just because I own a luxo barge and can blame everything on the Company.

[AbhiJ]

General Advice : Dont wade in deep water in your 26 lakh slow slung saloon ! You cant blame Skoda here. If I drive my CRV into a pond, I cant go against HONDA saying that its a bad car.

OT: Which insurance policies cover such damage? Bajaj Allianz Drive Assure does I believe. Please confirm.

[chinkara]

I probably crossed the same patch of road in my 8 year old wagon r -- golf course road is on my daily commute. And can certify that while it is prone to water-logging, it is not "abnormal".


And given the manual I think it is clear that the buyer needed to be more careful. There is also a question of skill and awareness. What I have been taught from childhood is that the tailpipe being submerged is not an issue if:
1. Constant pressure is kept on the throttle
2. You are able to manoeuvre the clutch / throttle so that the car does not stall
Perhaps gurus can give better tips, especially regarding automatics.

I have lived most of my life in Kolkata / Mumbai and feel that awareness about these matters is much lower among friends / colleagues here in Delhi than in the other two places. Perhaps because water is not much of a problem here. So I think the chauffeur may also have been unaware.

But over the past 2 years I have seen that with much lower rains Delhi gets almost the same water-logging as in Mumbai /Kolkata. So maybe more awareness among drivers is needed.

[Vikas Arora]

Originally Posted by AbhiJ

OT: Which insurance policies cover such damage? Bajaj Allianz Drive Assure does I believe. Please confirm.

I have Bajaj Allianz Drive assure for my Vento TDI and it does cover damage to engine due to water.

[iTNerd]

I asked my skoda dealer today if the Skoda Shield covers damages from water logging in engine, and the response was positive. I am not sure though if it is model specific.

[shankar.balan]

Originally Posted by apachelongbow

Too much anger against other brands, and people who prefer other brands in this post. Request you to please tone it down.
People may have the same idea regarding your choice in brand and make of car sir, it doesnt mean we go around calling names on your judgement.

ost!

Yes. With pleasure. However, there is no anger at all. Just an irritation and wonderment at the way some of the named manufacturers take our consumer for granted.
However, your point of view is respected and I apologise if I hurt any sentiments here.

But what I certainly will point out is that on numerous posts in this forum, there is much rage and sometimes unfounded comments about Skoda in particular. I never quite appreciated that and shall not begin to do so now.

On my side, as an old M&M customer and one of the early testers of the XUV 500, I have aired my opinion without mincing words. Indeed, I have shared the same opinion directly with the powers that be, at M&M. I believe I have that right, as a paying customer.