SKODA KODIAQ
One of its Pirellis puts the skids under our Czech honeymoon
WHY WE’RE RUNNING IT
To keep tabs on the career of Skoda’s popular seven-seat SUV offering
As is so often the case, this tale of woe begins innocuously. An orange symbol illuminates on my Skoda Kodiaq’s digital cockpit, warning me that one of the tyres has fallen below the required pressure.
Hoping that nothing serious is afoot, I head over to my local petrol station and hook up the rear-left tyre to the machine. I swear it never takes this long; it should be just a matter of moments before I hear the confirmatory beeps. I look up and, to my confusion, the PSI figure on the machine’s screen is actually falling, not rising. Have I done this wrong? Surely nobody can do this wrong. I try holding the nozzle in a few different ways, but to no avail.
Feeling the impatient gazes of the several motorists queuing for the machine boring a hole into the back of my head, I scram to the next fuel station. This time, for reasons unknown, the pressure rises. Phew.
However, by the time I’ve reached the office, 70 miles away, and done a day’s work, it has gone down again a little. Bugger: there must be a slow puncture. I reinflate it and head home. But now the pressure is really plummeting, and I have to stop to reinflate again. I really must get this sorted out tomorrow.
I’ve always found the concept of smart motorways scary, but at night, in the rain, on a fast-deflating tyre, with no hard shoulder and no exit for another four miles? Now that really does put the fear in me.
There is actually a spare wheel in the boot of the Kodiaq, but I must confess that I’ve never changed one solo and now really doesn’t seem like a great time to start. Rather embarrassed, I call the AA, who kindly put on the spacesaver.
Finally and dejectedly home, the concert I have a ticket for long finished, I arrange with Skoda to have a mobile tyre fitter meet me at work the next day. Driving to the office limited to 50mph is a miserable experience, but at least it’s one that I won’t have to repeat.
I’m wrong. The fitter comes out to our Twickenham base and puts on a fresh Pirelli Scorpion Verde R20, his smart van and uniform filling me with reassurance, and after work I set off to my friend’s place in Manchester for the weekend. I’ve not even reached the M25 when the tyrepressure monitoring system again rears its ugly head, but I’m not too worried. It’s a brand-new tyre, so clearly the system just hasn’t reset properly. I stop to use the toilet later on and find that I’m very wrong indeed.
I’m not one to let frustration get the better of me, but faced with the prospect of waiting for the AA for an hour, then driving for about five hours to Manchester or the same duration back home, once more stuck at 50mph, I feel close to it.
Another fitter meets me the next morning, filling me with zero confidence in his rust-covered plain van, oil-splattered overalls and dangling cigarette. Well, I should learn to not judge by appearances, because he finds through some methodical investigation that not only is the seal of the new tyre not sufficient and its valve not aligned but also that it has been fitted inside out. Yes, really.
He then patches up the valve and refits the expensive Pirelli.
Driving home after an otherwise enjoyable weekend, I’m happier than I ever have been or probably ever will be again to be doing a steady 60mph.
Safe to say that I’ve learned a few hard lessons. But please: never again.