120,000kms in 1yr......Superb Taxi

[Mi16 Man]

Yep! That's right......Canberra is lucky. Enough to have a TDI Superb amongst its Silver Service Fleet.

Colin Yap from Skoda Lennock took me for a test drive in an Octavia RS this morning and we got talking about those taxi's - Colin's way of answering my 'reliability' question.

- $4000 in servicing
- Battery went flat when a driver left a door/lighton (along with eftpos/booking system on)
- A driver put petrol in the tank rather than diesel.

No other issues to speak of otherwise.

Nice!

[CanberravRS]

Awesome news that its been so bullet proof.

I hear there are a few of them now and possibly many more to come as there is nothing in the market with the capabilities or reliability.

[theduckster]

woohoo!

It seems that I will be picking up a very reliable vehicle on Thursday!

$4,000 seems a little high for servicing, but I would assume there would be a least a set of tyres in the mix if not even more sets. Good news that the vehicle has been to do 120,000km in a year without too many problems.

[whiteVR6]

There is also a yellow Skoda taxi in Warwick

[aware]

I assume that it is the Silver Wagon? I saw it this morning in Woden before I left. Great to see that it has been so reliable!


The other thing that surprised me in Canberra was the number of Skodas - I've never seen so many in one place. Great to see that many on the roads.

[dArK5HaD0w]

I assume that it is the Silver Wagon? I saw it this morning in Woden before I left. Great to see that it has been so reliable!


The other thing that surprised me in Canberra was the number of Skodas - I've never seen so many in one place. Great to see that many on the roads.

there is also a silver superb sedan taxi that does its rounds around civic. i c it almost once or twice every week.

yeah....i'm seeing more n more skodas in canberra recently. mainly octavias though. few of them vrs models.

[pologti18t]

Awesome news that its been so bullet proof.

I hear there are a few of them now and possibly many more to come as there is nothing in the market with the capabilities or reliability.

Surely a boring old Ford Falcon on gas will do the job just efficiently and with cheaper servicing.
Remember, a taxi's life in NSW can be 5 yrs and 400-500K km.

[gldgti]

Surely a boring old Ford Falcon on gas will do the job just efficiently and with cheaper servicing.
Remember, a taxi's life in NSW can be 5 yrs and 400-500K km.

not as efficiently but probably with cheaper servicing.

[pologti18t]

not as efficiently but probably with cheaper servicing.

Falcons run on LPG. So even though they use more fuel than the Superb they are cheaper per km to run.

[brad]

$4,000 seems a little high for servicing, but I would assume there would be a least a set of tyres in the mix if not even more sets. Good news that the vehicle has been to do 120,000km in a year without too many problems.

The dealer would only know about the mandatory services. Don't forget the Skoda is 3 years/UNLIMITED KILOMETRES so it would be worthwhile to maintain a relationship & service history with the dealer.
120,000km would be 8 services x an average $400 = $3200 plus a timing belt ($800 sounds fair-ish). I doubt the dealer would know about tyres because no self respecting cabby would get tyres from a dealer. Same with brakes - I'd think there were 3 sets of pads & 1 set of rotors. Again, a cabby would go aftermarket.

Fords & Holdens are pretty cheap to run because you can always find a backyarder to do the work cheap & parts can be had at stupidly low prices. In Sydney & Mel the drivers hire the cabs (mainly) but once you hit the provincial areas there are more owner/drivers & they tend to look slightly beyond cheapest price. Look at how many Toyotas are up in Cairns.

[pologti18t]

I would be more worried with the DSG gearbox lasting the distance. A recon'd 4 speed auto for a Falcoooon is about 1200 fitted.
In europe they tend to run manual taxis.

[CanberravRS]

Reason why the Superbs are silver service or limo's is due to the rear space quality. Plus the fairlane/ ltd is no longer made. That leaves a Superb or Statesman/Caprice which mechanically are dogs, and like many dogs have short lives.
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