2008 skoda Octavia Estate reviews

Skoda Octavia Estate 1.9TDi 2008

After years of driving Ford Focus estates, my new job came with a new car - a Skoda Octavia estate. First impressions weren’t favourable. Firstly, the front doors are very short so if you’re tall, as I am, the driver’s seat is pushed so far back that your shoulder is behind the B-pillar. Getting into the car involves an ungainly fall backwards into your seat. Getting out is equally undignified. Secondly the accelerator is floor mounted - a feature I dislike but which I will conceed may not bother most people. A couple of days later, a few more problems had been come to light. Most of these were niggling features which annoyed me but, again, may not trouble others. The fact that the doors and boot locked themselves as soon as you hit 10mph was incredibly frustrating since my job invovles stopping and removing items from the car and the boot at regular intervals and every time I would find that I had to get back into the car and press the master unlock switch. This feature was turned off for me by my local dealership at the same time as they reprogrammed the car to unlock all it’s doors when I pressed the key fob unlock button rather than just the driver’s door. With the above features modified to my satisfaction I began to quite enjoy the Skoda. It never felt quick but it’s acceleration was reasonably brisk, it’s handling predictable and reassuring (when the ASR system wasn’t causing me to headbutt the steering wheel . . .) and in general it behaved as a car should. Then the low oil level warning light came on. I was a bit surprised at this since the car was less than a month old and had done less than 3000 miles. I pulled over and checked the level. It was low. I topped it back up as soon as I could with the correct grade and kept an eye on it thereafter. This car burned oil only slightly slower than it burned diesel. At the first service I mentioned it. "Oh they all do that, sir, until the engine has bedded in" Well the oil consumption has reduced over the two years I have run the car but it’s still higher than I would expect and it is common across the entire fleet of Skodas run by my company. Once the oil consumption calmed down and the electronic niggles were allieviated, the Skoda became Just Another Car. It was competent but never felt special. And then it broke down. This was caused by a faulty fuel filter which leaked diesel onto the alternator drive belt which promptly shredded itself. In itself, this would be a minor problem fixed in an hour or two but a fragment of the shredded belt got into the camshaft drive belt causing it to skip a notch or ten. Result? A complete new top end; camshaft, followers, valves and guides. Five weeks after I got it back, it threw a rod. Result? Complete new engine under warranty. OK, the car had done 113,000 miles when it threw a rod but that’s no mileage for a modern engine that has been regularly dealer serviced. Also, it wasn’t a one off. Three other cars on the fleet had also thrown rods but they had all done so in the 90 to 100,000 mile range. I’m glad I didn’t buy this car . . .