I changed the battery and it worked fine for 1000 km. But the warning lights came back later.
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I own a Skoda Octavia 1.8 TSI which I purchased in 2019. The car has completed 4 years and nearly 31,000 kms in Nov-2023. I never had any issues with the car till then and it has been performing extremely well. On a fine day the next month (Dec-2023) when I turned the ignition on, the car did not start. It showed ESC and ABS warning lights. Along with that it also displayed that the battery voltage is low. I presumed that it should be the low battery that resulted in all the other warnings. I called up the Skoda service centre and they also said it should be the low battery. The service centre is ~300 kms away from where I reside and there was no way I could replace the battery from the Skoda service centre. The stock battery with the car was ‘Varta’ 12 V 72 Ah. The closest match I could find in the market was Amaron Pro (AAM-PR-574102069) with specs 12 V 74 Ah. I consulted the Skoda service centre and they said that the Amaron model is ok. I went ahead and replaced the battery then and there. The car was not responding initially for a few minutes after replacing the battery. However, after waiting for ~15 minutes I tried turning on the ignition again and this time it responded. After a while, all the warning lights went off. Everything went smoothly and the car completed another 1000 kms after the battery replacement.
However, a few days back (22-Jan-2024) I encountered a major issue with the car. I was returning home from the city and all of a sudden the ESC and ABS warning lights turned on. Followed by this the steering wheel warning light also turned on. The car was running smoothly, however, after some time I found that the steering wheel had become very hard. Luckily I have almost reached my residence and managed to park the car in the parking area. By then the steering movement has become even harder. I turned off the car and turned it on again. The following warnings popped up one by one.
The next day I turned the ignition on and the same warnings popped up. I did not attempt to drive the car as all the warnings were still on.
I am unable to figure out what went wrong.
There was another incident which happened with the car a few months back. I was driving on the highway and while overtaking the tyres fell off into a large pothole which I could not avoid. There was a loud noise from the underbody near the wheels hitting the bottom. The drive went smoothly after this for a few kilometres, however, there was some abnormal vibration from the dashboard area every time I lifted my foot from the accelerator pedal. This behaviour continued for a day, but things got back to normal the next day. However something very unusual persisted, there was a sound of pulsation from the wheels and its pace used to increase with the speed. I reported the issue to the Skoda service centre the next day. Upon inspection, they could not find anything abnormal. They could not even identify the noise of pulsation from the wheels although it clearly persisted. The front tyres of the car were worn out significantly and they said the pulsations should be from the worn-out front tyres. They recommended the replacement of the front tyres. Since it was costing nearly Rs. 22000 (2 front tyres) I decided to wait for 2-3 months and then go for replacement. Back home I lifted the tyres one by one on the jack and rotated each of them to check for any unusual noise. I found that there is some noise from both the rear wheels with the brake disc surface touching the wheels unevenly.
I do now know whether the pothole indent has anything to do with the warning lights which are appearing now.
I have doubts about the following directions.
- The worn-out tyres could be causing the warning messages from the speed/ABS sensors attached to the wheels
- The shock from the pothole incident might have damaged/misaligned the bearings
- Could it be the battery replacement and its compatibility (74 Ah against 72 Ah) which resulted in these warnings and failure?
- The common case of normal sensor failure or cut wires/cables
As the service centre is 300 km away it won’t be possible to drive the car to the workshop. I think the car has to be taken to the service centre on a flatbed.
Kindly advise if there is any way I can diagnose or fix it.
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