Tell me about: Skoda Fabia

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Tesla

Tesla

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Hi all,

Looking at a replacement for my wife's Fiesta. Budget is around £2-3k.

Skoda Fabia (1st gen) petrol (~1.4) in Elegance specification has leaped out at me as looking like good value for money. Are they?

The car shall be mostly maintained at home, is the Fabia OK to work on? Parts costs etc? Any common issues or faults I should be checking for?

Any particular year to make note of, some sort of facelift or such?

Perhaps an alternative I should consider instead?

Thanks in advance.
 
What's her current Fiesta? If it's a MK5, I think switching to a MK1 Fabia would be a side step, if not a down step. While the interior on both tends to be budget due to it's class, the Fabia is particularly budget in terms of plastics.

I would get a diesel Fabia. The 1.4 is a good engine. But it's more to tax than the 1.9 TDI elegance which is more powerful and returns much better mpgs. Then of course there's the VRS option to if you want sporty (130bhp, returns better mpgs than the 1.4 and is less to tax than the 1.4 as well).

The only problem I ever had with mine was the doors filling up with water, which is quite common since the drainage holes can get blocked. Plenum chamber ingress happens too. It shares most of it's underpinnings and platform with the Polo of the same age, so will share common faults.
 
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Thanks for the info.

The Fiesta is an old Mk5 (sometimes called Mk4 facelift). Is the Fabia interior really as bad?
 
Tesla said:
Thanks for the info.

The Fiesta is an old Mk5 (sometimes called Mk4 facelift). Is the Fabia interior really as bad?
Click to expand...

If it's a MK4 facelift, then the interior might be better. I've only compared my old VRS to a friend who had a MK5 Zetec at the time. My VRS had sporty two tone cloth seats. There was a special edition VRS that came with full leather (VW Polo GT of the same generation got it as well and could be an option if the Skoda interior doesn't suit). But the plastics are bland and cheap. There was just something about them and the colour. For someone that is tall as well (like myself) I didn't get on with the cut of the dashboard, driver or passenger side. It's like a great big slab just bolted to the firewall. My seat had to go right back to give my knees room. Whereas the Fiesta had nice contours that allow plenty of leg and knee room.

Best bet is to go and have a look at the MK5 fiesta and the MK1 Fabia and see for yourself. The 1.4 Zetec is not as powerful or quick as the 1.4 Fabia, but it is less to tax and does around the same mpg. Different insurance groupings though if that's something that also needs to be taken into account. Although it shouldn't be that bad if it's going to be your missus car. There's also the 1.4 TDCI Fiesta which does over 60mpg and is around £30 to tax. But it's right down on power compared to the petrol.

Despite all that and my complaints regarding the Fabia interior. I would have another MK1 VRS. There is just something I love about those little smokey, pokey diesels.
 
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I had a very early Fabia Mk1 - a 2000 1.4 MPI (8v - old Skoda pre-VW engine). Also the missus has a Fiesta Mk5 1.25 so well placed to compare. She still has it now and we owned both for several years.

The Good: The Fabia was a very comfortable car - surprisingly decent for a motorway journey for the size of car. It was slow and thirsty around town though. This shouldn't be as bad with the engine you're looking at. It never got a hint of rust apart from that caused by a leaky washer pipe in the boot door. It generally felt like a larger class of car than the Fiesta. It never actually broke down on me, apart from when cells failed in the battery at around 6-7 years old.

The Bad: I can't say it was reliable. I bought it approved from a main dealer at approximately 3 years old with 44k on the clock. I had the convenience ECU and thermostat replaced under dealer's warranty. The suspension had repeated problems - both front springs failed at one point there were clunky noises due to the ARB bushes failin and Skoda eventually recommended replacing an ARB itself (fixed cheaper elsewhere). I can't actually recall a time when the suspension wasn't making some worrying noise or other. The thermostat died a few times which would lead to rich running and high fuel consumption. Interior plastic quality wasn't great. I had the Glove compartment door handle break and so did the handle for the cubby hole under the passenger seat. I had the drainage problems so water ingress into the passenger footwell. Also random electrical faults (which led to the convenience ECU replacement). This was stuff like the central locking randomly engaging and electric window switches randomly swapping which window they controlled or the direction of movement. All the symptoms came back a few years later (as the root water ingress problem hadn't been fixed). The brake light switch failed at one point but that was easy to replace myself. Leaking washer pipe in the boot leading to rear wiper motor failure and rust on the door. Afforementioned battery failure, leading to AA callout (but that could have happened with any car). Boot door opening mechanism kept intermittently failing (I'm not sure if this was due to washer pipe issue or not). There are various other problems I won't mention, as they're only related to the older engine I had.

I'm told later Fabias were more reliable than mine and it was probably first batch teething problems. I may have just had a bit of a lemon.

Assuming both were working OK, I'd definitely have the Fabia over the Fiesta though. Despite the reliability problems I still have a bit of a soft spot for the Fabia.
 
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I can recommend the 1.9TDi engine in the fabia. I owned the polo that shares its chassis with the Fabia for the last three years. The engine itself is brilliant and didn't give me a single problem even at 12 years old. The clutches can be a weak point but don't cost too much to replace. Most the suspension components will most likely be quite tired so look for one that has had work done already as it will save you, especially wishbone bushes. Personally id look at the polo and ibiza too as I prefer their interiors.

The interior of a fabia is no worse than a fiesta in terms of quality.
 
That's good money for a fabia vrs. Great fun, ok spec and cheap to run. Wife really likes here however it's about to be replaced by a mk6 golf gt tdi.
 
N/S/R footwell, check it for damp as it lets water in (well both rear doors will to be fair) and the loom is under that carpet so it's expensive to replace. I didn't have the big problems uriel did but I need a brake light switch (£30), washer pipes went every winter (diy).
 
There was a facelift for 2005. 1.2 3-pot replaced the 1.4MPI. Different dash moulding, bumpers, rear lights on lower spec versions and few tweaks from the VAG empire like one touch indicators (well on the vRS at least).

I like them. Then again I'm biased having owned an 05 vRS from new. I think that car will likely outlast me!
 
I know little about them.

Though a girl at works gearbox died. It was a petrol engine.

Though I think theres risk with any car tbh.
 
Thank you for all of the informative replies.

I've left a deposit on a 2005 Fabia 1.4 16v Elegance. I've yet to view the car but am convinced I'd do well to better it (I've been looking for a few weeks before making this post), assuming all is as it seems. I've had plenty of high-res photos from the owner so fingers crossed.

2005
Elegance spec so AC, heated seats, cruise control, alloys, parking sensors etc.
34k miles
FSH
1 owner from new (who is the seller)
Garaged so am hoping the water ingress issues have not occurred. The seller said there has never been any damp in the car and the footwells are all dry.

Only thing that I can fault is that it's on it's original cam belt. The elderly owner knew the cam belt interval off hand at 60k as printed in his owners manual. However, VAG now recommend 40k/4 years (unsure if legit or a means of generating more service work?).

Regardless, 8-9 years is long enough and I intend to keep the car for the foreseeable future so may as well do the belt and upgrade the water pump to a metal impeller version now.

Should pick it up within the next few days, so will post an update soon.

Cheers.
 
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Bought the Skoda I mentioned above. Couldn't fault it.
Being garaged it's entire life means no signs of corrosion or water ingress and the paintwork is like new!

Will give it a thorough clean (not that it's at all dirty but daren't say "detail") and post some pics when time allows. Paid £2400 and felt as if I got a bargain!
 
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