richardjh

well this weekend is one year since a collected my octavia 2l tdi dsg l&k est. Funny how car choosing goes; the previous year to that i had seen a new octavia in a car park and thought to myself "i like that a lot better than the mark I, i might buy one of those when i change again."

well for my next car i knew i wanted to stick with an auto and with rising fuel costs and the mileage i do i thought the dreaded diesel made sense.

so in the summer of last year i started looking, not at skoda initially, but at a passat. then i got distracted by looking at a volvo v50 d5. lovely diesel motor, but an expensive car for what you get and my impression of the demonstrators i tried was that they werent screwed together all that well. in the end just couldnt justify spending that much on a car considering the mileage i do.

Finally in november i had a test drive in a diesel octavia dsg. hmmm, i thought this is ok. sales guy then showed me the stock system of what was available. and a week later i ordered one that was already being built as dealer stock. Other than forgetting the navi cd for the mfd2, merritts of aylesbury provided me with a good service, with the car being ready when agreed.

i had been very happy with my petrol corolla auto and initially found it hard to get use to the extra noise of the diesel. Also, during the first few thousand mile the DSG was very notchy, which for a while made me think i had made the wrong choice. I had really got use to the lazy driving style of the corolla slush-matic auto box. Now i wouldnt want to go back. I am one of those cursed people for whom the sound engineering makes is very important and i now love the crispness of the dsg gear change.
I use the tiptronic mode quite a bit, particularly when crawling in traffic, but i have yet to manage to change gear smoother than the computer!

Yes, the diesel is more noisy than the petrol, but once i had adjusted my driving style i love the torque of the engine. with the gearbox in manual mode you can driving around town in a high gear and it just keeps pulling, even with the revs just above tickover. Though the sound is intrusive in the cabin oddly i have never found it annoying, and frequently find myself quite likeing it.

So was skoda the right choice? The level of equipment i got for my money is fantastic; it would have costed something like 5k more for a similar specced passat and some hideous amount if wanted four circles for a badge. Being a techy i love the toys; the tinting mirrors (all of them!) are great in defense of gentlemen in their white vans who seem to want a tow from you and the rain sensing wipers seem to work quite well. The light assistant, though must be blind, because i dont want lights on for bright sunny days and when it is overcast and raining i think headlights would be a good idea and it doesnt. does that computer just guess?

The little technology details are also great; forgot to switch your wipers off after coming home?, then it is frosty overnight. you dont get reminded of this oversight the following morning when your wipers tear themselves from their icy embrace on starting the car.
my impression of build quality is that it is slightly below the corolla (my first car bought new). though so far i have had nothing major go wrong (famous last words!). i panicked once when the oil light came on, initially i thought it was oil pressure. eeek! No, as many of you tdi driver know these diesel lumps like a drop of oil during their first few thousand miles of running. Back onto the noise thing again, it definitely has a lot more rattles than the toyota and those factory fit dunlop sp01a tyres are rubbish; they are noisy and wear out far too quickly. I am now changing over to michelin primacy hp

looking to the future, and thanks to this great website i want to add the bluetooth handsfree kit and later replace the mfd2 with the 'columbus' navi system. yes, i admit it i like my toys. As we head into another winter then only major thing i wish i could have on the car is one of those auxilliary heaters you can get in properly cold countries. strange really why you cant order it in the uk; why would car manufacturer pass up the opportunity to sell another factory option?

roll on the next 25k...

forgive my little ramble. what else is there to do on a wet sunday afternoon!
cheers
richard

mdk1

Glad youv'e had a good year with your car

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Mike.

Mine Skoda Roomster 3 TDI in matallic Anthracite Grey MK**LJK

Swmbo's Skoda Fabia 2.0I Elegance in Dark matallic Blue MK**LJK

StevoTDI

Great car... Glad there is people enjoying it

runboy

Thanks for the update. Nice cars the DSG L&K - I can't wait to see what Skoda do with the new Superb next year - hopefully they will keep the L&K badge. Then we have the new Octy to look forward to - again I hope they have a high spec model as they are great value for money.

We looked at the VW Jetta TDi DSG when we were looking around and the extra money you would have to pay on packs to get the same level of euipment was silly money.

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2007 Octavia Hatchback, 2.0TDI DSG L&K in Black Magic.