Skoda Fabia Engine Problems

Despite the Skoda badge, there’s an awful lot of Volkswagen engineering in the Fabia. In fact, as part of the broader VW family, all modern Skodas have essentially VW platforms, engines and transmissions fitted to them.

It will come as no surprise to many VW owners that the engines and transmissions of the era of your car were more problematic than they should have been. Many Golf and Polo owners have found out the hard way that the 1.4 twin-charger engine (in particular) was prone to problems and early failures of components including the timing chain.

If caught within the warranty period, these components should have been changed by Skoda as part of its warranty responsibilities, but ten years down the track, the picture is a lot blurrier. The way to proceed is to approach Skoda Australia’s customer service department and explain the situation. Perhaps the company will help with the cost of repairs on a pro-rata basis (given the low mileage your car has covered) but don’t count on it. You also have recourse to the ACCC on the basis that the car was not of an acceptable quality or fit for purpose (this would probably need to be independently verified).

Meanwhile, the short answer is that 48,000km of normal use would not be considered to be an acceptable lifespan for a component such as an engine’s timing chain. Timing chains are designed to last the entire life of the engine. But in too many cases, we’re seeing that that simply isn’t the case.

Your situation may be caused any one (or more) of about a thousand faults that is making the car’s on-board computer think that there’s a major problem. In turn, the computer switches the engine to operate on minimal power to make it home without destroying or further damaging any component. A car’s limp-home mode system is triggered by a range of protocols that are acted upon whenever the car perceives a drama. Anything from low oil level to a hot transmission can cause the limp-home system to intervene, and it can be an actual fault or, sometimes, simply an erroneous signal from a sensor that isn’t telling the truth. Have the car scanned and see what error codes are produced.

So far the scandal has only affected diesel models, so you could be able to buy a petrol model with confidence.