[Mtv]

Quick update on my Octavia.

It broke down while in motion in the middle of the road during rush hour traffic last week on Thursday while being driven. It had been only two weeks since I had picked up my car from the workshop after an ECM replacement, where it spent five long months.

The car was taken to the workshop on a flatbed for the third time in one year. This time round, they were quick to diagnose the issue and repair the car. They claimed it was an injector leak. Something about the gasket leaking. Thankfully, the car was repaired at no cost and returned to me in four days.

I only post on this thread to report the various problems I've had with the car and now I probably sound like a broken record. The car is a joy when it works and I absolutely love it. I don't see myself replacing it even after all of these problems. Every time the car returns home from the workshop after a break down I tell myself I'll sell it if it breaks again. But I just can't get myself to do it.

What a joy it is to drive but a total nightmare to own.

[drsvijay]

Originally Posted by Mtv

Quick update on my Octavia.

It broke down while in motion in the middle of the road during rush hour traffic last week on Thursday while being driven. It had been only two weeks since I had picked up my car from the workshop after an ECM replacement, where it spent five long months.

The car was taken to the workshop on a flatbed for the third time in one year. This time round, they were quick to diagnose the issue and repair the car. They claimed it was an injector leak. Something about the gasket leaking. Thankfully, the car was repaired at no cost and returned to me in four days.

I only post on this thread to report the various problems I've had with the car and now I probably sound like a broken record. The car is a joy when it works and I absolutely love it. I don't see myself replacing it even after all of these problems. Every time the car returns home from the workshop after a break down I tell myself I'll sell it if it breaks again. But I just can't get myself to do it.

What a joy it is to drive but a total nightmare to own.

i just bought a race blue 1.8 Tsi Style plus and now you are giving me nightmares. I had a small problem with a loose screw in the brakes which they were unable to diagnose. i searched and found on the net and asked them to look into it and sorted it out in an hour. So far so other issues. Have driven 1000kms. Its a joy to ride, i have been a manual fan, this DSG was won me over in the first week.

Hoping to have a trouble free ownership.

[Mtv]

Originally Posted by drsvijay

i just bought a race blue 1.8 Tsi Style plus and now you are giving me nightmares. I had a small problem with a loose screw in the brakes which they were unable to diagnose. i searched and found on the net and asked them to look into it and sorted it out in an hour. So far so other issues. Have driven 1000kms. Its a joy to ride, i have been a manual fan, this DSG was won me over in the first week.

Hoping to have a trouble free ownership.

Congratulations on your new ride! Let's hope my case is a one off.

Do keep us aware of whatever issues you face with your car.

[sups]

Need some answers from experts. I drove Elantra manual diesel and Octavia 1.8 TSI AT for a short distance in city limits. I must say that I was thoroughly impressed by Octavia's composure at the rear seat, ease of driving, engine power and I can go on and on. Right after that Elantra felt ordinary for that asking price. I have an option to buy 1.8 TSI AT through company lease who takes care of the maintenance as well. So, willing take the risk of buying a Skoda with DSG gearbox. I have the following questions for experts:

1. How robust is the suspension to drive it through roads full of gravels without slowing down? With the brilliant multi-link suspension, if I need to slow down on rough patches, then its not fun.

2. The ground clearance is relatively low, so is it very likely to scrape the underbody while going over speed breakers?

3. My drive would be around 1700 km per month and mostly in city with 70% time driven by my trusted driver. Probably this needs a diesel, but I and diesel AT is out of reach. So, I have to go for diesel manual if I go for Octavia. However, Octavia diesel misses out on multi-link suspension. My question is will my family at the rear seat miss too much the multi-link suspension in city limits? Understand that it makes a big difference in twisted ghats. Going for diesel will save a lot of fuel bill. The lease companies are not willing to go for Jetta (few left over pieces of 2015 manufactured cars) unfortunately.

4. Can sedate driving in city fetch around 9 km/lit fuel efficiency? I hope normal petrol would do.

5. Which other car within the same price range can give Octavia like composure (other than Jetta) at the back seat?

[drsvijay]

Originally Posted by sups

1. How robust is the suspension to drive it through roads full of gravels without slowing down? With the brilliant multi-link suspension, if I need to slow down on rough patches, then its not fun.

The suspension is good on tough patches, smooth sailing over most patches which is unnoticed inside, though i have not travelled in rough patch in high speed.

2. The ground clearance is relatively low, so is it very likely to scrape the underbody while going over speed breakers?

I havent hit anytime over the speedbrakers, which were usually larger than usual. It has underbody guard anwyay

3. My drive would be around 1700 km per month and mostly in city with 70% time driven by my trusted driver. Probably this needs a diesel, but I and diesel AT is out of reach. So, I have to go for diesel manual if I go for Octavia. However, Octavia diesel misses out on multi-link suspension. My question is will my family at the rear seat miss too much the multi-link suspension in city limits? Understand that it makes a big difference in twisted ghats. Going for diesel will save a lot of fuel bill. The lease companies are not willing to go for Jetta (few left over pieces of 2015 manufactured cars) unfortunately.

Petrol is fun to drive and i cannot imagine a car at this range with this much of tech inside and power in the hood. The AC is very effective, i imagined it to be average. It cools very good and very fast.

4. Can sedate driving in city fetch around 9 km/lit fuel efficiency? I hope normal petrol would do.

I have drive around 1000kms almost in the city and my average is 9km/l. The highways give 14km/l

5. Which other car within the same price range can give Octavia like composure (other than Jetta) at the back seat?

I did a lot of research and settled on Octavia inspite of their scary after sales service taking a big leap of faith.

[adi_petrolhead]

Originally Posted by sups

Need some answers from experts.

Hey there, the questions you have are genuine, but inspite of that fact you need to do some self-help over the forums. The queries you have posted are very well documented in the official review as well as individual ownership reviews. Request you to go through the entire forum and come back with specific queries only.

[sups]

Originally Posted by adi_petrolhead

Hey there, the questions you have are genuine, but inspite of that fact you need to do some self-help over the forums. The queries you have posted are very well documented in the official review as well as individual ownership reviews. Request you to go through the entire forum and come back with specific queries only.

Thank you for your kind suggestion.

I did go through the official review a few times. Whether a suspension (though excellent) is abuse friendly or not can't be answered in official review. It has to come from ownership reviews which are very few here for Octavia.

For others, a bit of repeatation is not bad probably. Anyway, I got all the answers from @anshuman in the forum through pm from his personal experience.

Originally Posted by adi_petrolhead

The queries you have posted are very well documented in the official review as well as individual ownership reviews. Request you to go through the entire forum and come back with specific queries only.

Not sure how I missed your beautiful thread. I take back my earlier post. It did answer most of my queries, but it also dragged me away from owning Octy even with lease option. With Jetta being phased out, there is nothing really available now .

[sawnilrules]

Originally Posted by sups

Need some answers from experts. I drove Elantra manual diesel and Octavia 1.8 TSI AT for a short distance in city limits. I must say that I was thoroughly impressed by Octavia's composure at the rear seat, ease of driving, engine power and I can go on and on. Right after that Elantra felt ordinary for that asking price.

I completely echo what you felt here. Trust me in this price bracket there is practically nothing that comes close to the Octavia.

I have the following questions for experts:

Originally Posted by sups

1. How robust is the suspension to drive it through roads full of gravels without slowing down? With the brilliant multi-link suspension, if I need to slow down on rough patches, then its not fun.

You need not slow down on rough patches unless the roads are extremely bad.

Originally Posted by sups

2. The ground clearance is relatively low, so is it very likely to scrape the underbody while going over speed breakers?

In my 4 months of ownership, I haven't scraped the car even once. So no issues there due to low GC.

Originally Posted by sups

3. My drive would be around 1700 km per month and mostly in city with 70% time driven by my trusted driver. Probably this needs a diesel, but I and diesel AT is out of reach. So, I have to go for diesel manual if I go for Octavia. However, Octavia diesel misses out on multi-link suspension. My question is will my family at the rear seat miss too much the multi-link suspension in city limits? Understand that it makes a big difference in twisted ghats. Going for diesel will save a lot of fuel bill. The lease companies are not willing to go for Jetta (few left over pieces of 2015 manufactured cars) unfortunately.

Well in city drives, the difference between between the multi link suspension and torsion beam suspension is negligible. However, yes as you rightly pointed out that the difference is very much felt on the highway drives. I recently did a Mumbai-Nasik trip and even at speeds around 130-140 the car was absolutely composed. Never did I feel unsettled even for a second.

Originally Posted by sups

4. Can sedate driving in city fetch around 9 km/lit fuel efficiency? I hope normal petrol would do.

It all depends on what time of the day you take the car out buddy. There is nothing called as a ball park figure. There are days in Mumbai where I get fuel efficiency of around 10 or 11 kmpl, and there are also those days where I have got fuel efficiency of around 4 or 5 kmpl. So it all boils down to what time of the day or rather in what kind of traffic conditions the car is being driven.

Originally Posted by sups

5. Which other car within the same price range can give Octavia like composure (other than Jetta) at the back seat?

Probably, my pick, if you have driver to do the duty and won't be behind the driver's seat, than the only other car, which comes closer is Corolla Altis. Again, not at all a drivers car. But yes does the job very well and Toyota's in general are reliable.

However, everything said and done, at that price bracket, what Octavia offers, it puts even the A3 and A4 practically to shame.

[sups]

Originally Posted by sawnilrules

Probably, my pick, if you have driver to do the duty and won't be behind the driver's seat, than the only other car, which comes closer is Corolla Altis. Again, not at all a drivers car. But yes does the job very well and Toyota's in general are reliable.

However, everything said and done, at that price bracket, what Octavia offers, it puts even the A3 and A4 practically to shame.

Thank you for the clarifications.

I almost finalized a Cappuccino Beige 1.8TSI AT Octavia and then stumbled after going through the beautiful thread of adi_petrolhead. DSG failures and other issues reported in the thread have really started to bother me. Even if in my case it will be a company lease, the fact that the car might lie in the workshop for months really makes me think. With Jetta discontinued, there is hardly any choice. As you rightly pointed out, Altis might be the next bet with a lot of compromise except for the reliability part. Having said that, my heart is not ready to part with Octy.

[dhruvritzed]

Originally Posted by sups

Thank you for the clarifications.

I almost finalized a Cappuccino Beige 1.8TSI AT Octavia and then stumbled after going through the beautiful thread of adi_petrolhead. DSG failures and other issues reported in the thread have really started to bother me. Even if in my case it will be a company lease, the fact that the car might lie in the workshop for months really makes me think. With Jetta discontinued, there is hardly any choice. As you rightly pointed out, Altis might be the next bet with a lot of compromise except for the reliability part. Having said that, my heart is not ready to part with Octy.

You should definitely go for the Octavia, DSG failures are lesser now.
Would also say the altis looks and feels a class lower and there is no potential reason to get it over the Honda city, let alone the brilliant Octavia
When you spend that kind of money, you need to feel special, it's not always about reliability.
And come on, life's a risk with any of the Germans, its a toss everyone does because of the lure

[sups]

Originally Posted by dhruvritzed

You should definitely go for the Octavia, DSG failures are lesser now.

Thats quite reassuring. However, how do you know that it has become less?

[dhruvritzed]

Originally Posted by sups

Thats quite reassuring. However, how do you know that it has become less?

A friend's car , a 1.8tsi was involved in am accident, went with him to the workshop twice or thrice.
Talking to the worshop attendants and diagnosing the number of cars with dsg failures, came out that last gen superbs were still there and Octavias were generally for insurance related work or regular service

[khoj]

The Corolla is several rungs above the City in terms of suspension, ride quality, safety(especially now) even when completely ignoring its bullet proof reliability and also leaving aside the fact that it is also a size bigger.

Stranded out on the highway or in the middle of a busy road, without much recourse surely dissipates any premise that one may have of "feeling special"

Originally Posted by dhruvritzed

..........
Would also say the altis looks and feels a class lower and there is no potential reason to get it over the Honda city, let alone the brilliant Octavia
When you spend that kind of money, you need to feel special, it's not always about reliability.
.........

[dhruvritzed]

Originally Posted by khoj

The Corolla is several rungs above the City in terms of suspension, ride quality, safety(especially now) even when completely ignoring its bullet proof reliability and also leaving aside the fact that it is also a size bigger.

Stranded out on the highway or in the middle of a busy road, without much recourse surely dissipates any premise that one may have of "feeling special"

Would say corolla too has six airbags as does the city, Honda reliability is just a rung below, is several times better equipped and reliability is not a thing to sacrifice so much for.
The corolla engine is almost a decade old and feels so
Suspension is thrashy over medium sized joints and noisy along with a poor quality dashboard.
To re-emphamize​ your point of the highway, I've traveled the length and breadth of the country and have seen enough Toyotas break down too.

[gouravsinha]

After going through a lot of TD's and lot of confusion, I finally booked a Beige Octavia Yesterday.

Car considered (Prerequisites - Petrol, D Segment, Sedan)

Toyota Corolla - Well after you take the test drive you really don't like the car's power, Reliability is a Plus here but I just couldn't think of buying this.

Skoda Superb - If I would have stretched I could have got the Superb Manual (seems a lot of guys have this confusion). But a post by GTO was very helpful which said if you are driving on your own get an Octavia (thanks GTO).

Hyundai Elantra - It was always close content between Elantra and Octavia, I liked the Elantra with all its features and great Suspension. After taking a few TD's (which was also difficult as Petrol TD was not available) my wife didn't like the interiors. Her and some of my other colleague opinion was that my current car (Verna 2009) has better quality interiors. So Elantra went out of question

Skoda Octavia - I didn't consider Octavia (or Superb) earlier due to the horror stories of ASS. But it seems a lot has improved (hopefully). But 1 TD of the Octavia and you are sold.

I usually take a few TD (of the same car) before a finalize a car. I test drove Elantra 3-4 times, but with Octavia one was enough and within a day decided to go ahead and buy it but as I decided to book it came to know that a new version is round the corner and bookings for the old one is not been taken anymore.

New Vs Old - Now came the confusion of whether to go for the current model or the new minor face lifted one. The general opinion seems that the old one looks better (same like Elantra - Loved the 5th Gen Elantra's look).

Got a call from the Dealer a few colors are available (Beige, Red and Silver) in the old model, went to see Red was ok but was only available in Onyx model (I just couldn't get my head around the Onyx Model), also wanted a change from my current red car (and also 2 other red cars in the family), Silver was outright rejected (by my Wife). By default when I Buy a car I choose the car and my wife chooses the color . Finally decided on buying the beige one and after getting a discount of about 70k from the dealer came back home to consider for another day.

GST- Then came another confusion current news is bigger cars will be cheaper by 10% after the GST which is due to come on 1-Jul. So even if the new Octavia comes out 1 lac costlier the 10% discount will make it cheaper. But the fact that this is not confirmed also the manufactures might not pass the benefit to the customer plus of lot of others issues related to GST, I decided not to take chance and go for the current model.

Finally after a lot of confusion got another 10k discount and went ahead and booked it on 30-Apr-2017.


Got another 10k discount when I said that I don’t want the navigation card.
Now I can still get the Navigation card if I want , but in the age of Google Maps due you really need it? Also I have been using MMI for last 4 years and don’t find it very useful and when you really need it you have Google Maps.
So does it make sense to get the card of another 10k (they don’t know which map it is but might be MMI)?