[rohitm]

I have not faced any ground clearance issues or rattle issues so far. I have done Bangalore - Pondicherry and Bangalore - Mysore trips. As the car gathers speed it becomes progressively quieter and smoother as one reaches cruising speed (100 to 110 KMS per hour).

I will post pictures and more details but need to wait until weekend.

Cheers

[luky_13]

Originally Posted by rohitm

I have not faced any ground clearance issues or rattle issues so far. I have done Bangalore - Pondicherry and Bangalore - Mysore trips. As the car gathers speed it becomes progressively quieter and smoother as one reaches cruising speed (100 to 110 KMS per hour).


Cheers

Rohit, congrats on the magnificent machine. How has you overall experience with TAFE been, Pre sales and service etc post sales? I'm considering a Laura, but dealing with Vinayak Skoda currently. I've heard horror stories of the way TAFE has treated their customer in the past.

[gurprs]

hey rohit,
nice to hear about the recent views on driving the laura .
like i posted earlier, i booked one too; though I have opted for the DSG gearbox.
mine hasn't arrived yet was expected it on sunday(day after), but registration not complete so now the dealer has said by to deliver by Wednesday.

wanted to ask you which fuel you using as in speed diesel or standard unleaded, any clues if it does make a difference.?

Earlier, I was using my scorpio with speed diesel, but for Innova the service centre people said to stick to the unleaded one only.

Just wondering what would be the reason and which one would be better for the laura?


regards,

gurprs,
:"if your not living at the edge, your occupying too much space":

[rohitm]

@luky_13: I think if you do your homework right, do the pre-delivery inspection, make sure you get a complete break up of each item adding up to the OTR the dealer should not matter. So if you are comfortable dealing with Vinayaka you should continue. Vinayaka infact has good feedback and review on this forum. I think dealership matters more when you have to get your vehicle serviced!

@gurprs: DSG is brilliant choice. Takes the pain out of bumper to bumper driving! Congrats..

I have only filled the normal diesel and always from the same COCO pump. with nearly 20 KMS/ltr mileage even longer drives do not require you to compromise on the bunk you refill at. I prefer sticking to COCOs and have absolutely no problems with performance/mileage or quantity of fuel.

[rohitm]

Here are some recent pictures of the Car i took when on a outing to Bannerghatta National Park.

[adi_petrolhead]

congrats on the buy! just got myself a Skoda Laura 2.0 TDi CR DSG Ambiente. Please post some pics of your amazing Stanley interiors along with cost and service details from stanley………..

[rohitm]

Hi Adi,

I got it as a part of discount package. So sorry don't really know its cost. Will put up the pictures soon.

[DeKay]

Hi Rohit!
How's the car running now?

Its been a long time since you promised you'll post some interior pictures. I hope you do it soon.
Waiting to see the stanley interior job.

[dezrskb]

Hi Rohitm,
I too have booked a Laura Elegance 2.0 CR TDI MT, Cappuccino Beige. Its on way from Aurangabad, I have been told. I opted for Beige over RB as RB piece was 5mths old and this one and half months. I too opted for MT after lot of thinking though I could afford an AT. I was not sure DSG AT being as reliable as MT yet. Now few questions -
1. I see from your Pics that car is on Stock tires. How bad is the ride quality? I have been advised that Michelin Primacy LC gives you a far superior ride quality. Any opinions? I have to shell out nearly 20K to exchange 4 tires. Any real issues with the tires yet?
2. Have you activated features like Daytime Running Lights, auto lock etc? Could your dealer do it?
3. What about floor mats? Did you change them?
4. How is the clutch? Hard? light?
5. How bad is right side non convex mirror while driving?

[rohitm]

Originally Posted by dezrskb

Hi Rohitm,
I too have booked a Laura Elegance 2.0 CR TDI MT, Cappuccino Beige. Its on way from Aurangabad, I have been told. I opted for Beige over RB as RB piece was 5mths old and this one and half months. I too opted for MT after lot of thinking though I could afford an AT. I was not sure DSG AT being as reliable as MT yet. Now few questions -
1. I see from your Pics that car is on Stock tires. How bad is the ride quality? I have been advised that Michelin Primacy LC gives you a far superior ride quality. Any opinions? I have to shell out nearly 20K to exchange 4 tires. Any real issues with the tires yet?
2. Have you activated features like Daytime Running Lights, auto lock etc? Could your dealer do it?
3. What about floor mats? Did you change them?
4. How is the clutch? Hard? light?
5. How bad is right side non convex mirror while driving?

Congrats!

Let me answer your queries point wise.

1. I have done about 17,000 Km so far on the stock tires. They are ok as general purpose tires. However with wide open throttle they leave lot to be desired. Based on type of driving you do pick your poison.
2. Dealer can do the auto lock/ unlock for sure. Not sure about DRLs. I used a Ross tech VCDS from a mate and enabled DRLS, cornering lights, staging, changed MID from litres/100 Kms to Kms per liter.
3. Yes to 3d kagu, I would highly recommend these.
4. Clutch is fine but if you drive a lot in the city bumper to bumper I would highly recommend a DSG as compared to the MT. Despite Laura having the least of turbo lags among its peer group, diesels with turbos need a fair bit of gear changing in our horrendous city traffic. Not sure why did you drop DSG with the added bonus of 30 bhp and 50 Nm extra. If you have an opportunity to reconsider do that. The 6 speed DSG is fairly reliable unlike the 7 speeds on some superbs and Skoda has been prompt in handling any issues reported on the DSG.
5. Very. I ordered a convex mirror from eBay uk, and find it far better.

Good luck with your new ride!

[dezrskb]

Thanks Rohitm for suggestion,
But your suggestion has triggered some thoughts. I went through AT Vs MT decision process for quite sometime. Every time I decided on one and while browsing the net, I happened to bump into some article which suggested to go other way. So ultimately I decided to go MT way as my daily drive is not strictly in bumper to bumper traffic. But mostly my daily commuting is 1.5 Km one-way x 6 drives on an avg up and down. Mostly I need 3-4 gear changes within this distance. Mostly I drive this distance in 2nd and 3rd gear combinations. My most important problem considering the AT was reliability as I get terrified thinking it failing on me during a long journey in middle of nowhere !!. There has been one instance of 6 speed DSG failing in diesel Laura with one BHPian at least (manson's?). But thinking the comfort parameter, I get tempted towards AT again and again. I know its brilliant and will closely mimic my driving pattern. Yes, my dealer said I could re-consider AT if I wished to do so (I called him just now after reading your post )

[adi_petrolhead]

Originally Posted by rohitm

Congrats!

Let me answer your queries point wise.

1. I have done about 17,000 Km so far on the stock tires. They are ok as general purpose tires. However with wide open throttle they leave lot to be desired. Based on type of driving you do pick your poison.
2. Dealer can do the auto lock/ unlock for sure. Not sure about DRLs. I used a Ross tech VCDS from a mate and enabled DRLS, cornering lights, staging, changed MID from litres/100 Kms to Kms per liter.
3. Yes to 3d kagu, I would highly recommend these.
4. Clutch is fine but if you drive a lot in the city bumper to bumper I would highly recommend a DSG as compared to the MT. Despite Laura having the least of turbo lags among its peer group, diesels with turbos need a fair bit of gear changing in our horrendous city traffic. Not sure why did you drop DSG with the added bonus of 30 bhp and 50 Nm extra. If you have an opportunity to reconsider do that. The 6 speed DSG is fairly reliable unlike the 7 speeds on some superbs and Skoda has been prompt in handling any issues reported on the DSG.
5. Very. I ordered a convex mirror from eBay uk, and find it far better.

Good luck with your new ride!

Could you tell me what changes you made with the VCDS for changing MID units from l/100 to km/l? I asked the service guy to change the country as advised by others, bt he couldn't find it! What n where is exactly is to be changed?

[rohitm]

Originally Posted by adi_petrolhead

Could you tell me what changes you made with the VCDS for changing MID units from l/100 to km/l? I asked the service guy to change the country as advised by others, bt he couldn't find it! What n where is exactly is to be changed?

Not sure if the service centre can do this.
But in case you have a VCDS from Ross Tech with you, Open Controller 17 - Instruments, Go to Coding and change Country Code to either GB or Japan.

[adi_petrolhead]

Originally Posted by rohitm

Not sure if the service centre can do this.
But in case you have a VCDS from Ross Tech with you, Open Controller 17 - Instruments, Go to Coding and change Country Code to either GB or Japan.

I hope to get it done from the service centre itself. Last time we tried but I was not sure about the whole thing so it was an effort in vain. The service guy was nice enough to take me inside the service area, connect my car to VCDS, allow me to make changes

[dezrskb]

Hi Rohitm,
It was not clear to me why you opted for MT. Was it beyond the budget or any other specific reasons? Also if you dont compare it to AT version which has 140bhp, do you feel the MT 110bhp is significantly underpowered? I didn't think so in my test drive. I am not going to race with many cars on expressway but there should be enough power to quickly overtake the slow moving vehicles against oncoming traffic in some highways. Also If I keep it in the RPM powerband of say 2-4K which I can do easily in MT , does it feel sluggish?