2005 Skoda Fabia vRS review from UK and Ireland

No faults to date - Small vibration rattle from windscreen ticket clip.

Picked up Boris (all my cars have a pet name) a New Fabia vRS on a bright Saturday morning this September

Over the next three weeks Boris and I bonded well. I was covering around 350 miles per day whilst working away. The fuel consumption was amazing; Boris was sipping away at an average 49 mpg.

Whilst the performance was good I found the 5th 6th gear roll on to be okay, but far from exciting, I was not so much as disappointed, but from what had read to date my expectations of a Fabia’s vRS performance, were not being met.

Spent a couple of weeks looking at tuning upgrades which there seemed to be an endless selection all boasting amazing results.

Eventually I took the plunge and called a tuning company in Bicester who spent plenty of time explaining to me what they actually did to the PD130 engine.

The following Tuesday I was at AMD's premises and two hours later the upgrade was completed.

The technician showed me the plot from first run on the Dyno. Surprisingly the Plot showed a BHP output of 140.2 BHP and 240 ft/lbs torque. I queried this output as the car is specified as 130 BHP. I was informed that Skoda is very conservative with output pecifications.

The next Dyno plot I was shown was after the CPU remapping had been completed, quite frankly I was astonished, the upgrade plot showed 179.8 BHP – 299 ft/lb of torque at 2830 rpm.

I was not totally happy with this result, fearing early engine and gearbox damage.

I queried the output and asked was if there was a danger of engine and gearbox damage? I was informed, the PD engines they had tuned for racing without mechanical modification were producing in excess of 230BHP and 350 ft/lbs of torque without any sign of failure.

In all they had modified many hundreds of PD engines new and old without problem, however AMD did state that they would not re-map very high mileage engines (in excess of 60,000 miles) or cars that did not have a well maintained service history.

The AMD Technician also stated as all re-mapping was done live on their Dyno, adjustments to CPU Mapping changes are made individually to ensure optimal running.

Each CPU Re-Map they completed always required individual settings no two engines being the same.

My cars maximum power output had been reduced from a possible maximum output in excess of 195 BHP to ensure optimal driveability and maximum reliability.

Whilst still slightly wary I accepted Boris back, after receiving further assurances that if I was not happy with the modifications I could come back and have the outputs pegged back.

The AMD Technician reiterated that the output he had set was in his opinion the ideal optimal settings for my particular car.

Start-up & tickover was very obviously quieter and much smoother on moving off the throttle response was instant.

So I let in the clutch from virtual tickover and then floored it. “Savage,” that’s the only way I can describe it, boost from the turbo started building from 1500 rpm, at around 2000 rpm I was hanging on as the tachometer shot round without pause to the red line and I grabbed the next gear same again unrelenting thrust all the way to the redline.

After a month I have to say my Skoda is now a genuinely fast, responsive Q-Car. Third gear acceleration out of a tight country road corner is seriously quick with an instant kick in the back with anything over 1800 rpm on the tachometer.

On the motorway 70 mph to 100 + is superb, no noise, vibration just a seemingly endless flow of silky smooth thrust. At 100 mph prodding the throttle again see’s the car rocket away.

At sensible cruising speeds your foot is barely touching the throttle; fuel consumption is 2-3 mpg better. Using full performance see’s the fuel consumption drop to the mid 30th‘s With the performance available I am not complaining.

Boris is without doubt smoother, quieter more tractable, revving smoothly from tickover to redline with ease.

I get a real buzz of anticipation every time I get into Boris, from a £12,500, 5 Door Hatch I could not wish for more., nothing under 16K gets close.

Boris is now booked in for the fitment of a full Miltek Stainless Steel Sports Exhaust System, which adds another 10-12 BHP I’ll let you know what transpires!