Remind Yourself That Diesel Skodas Can Be Fun With A £2700 Fabia vRS

While we drove Skoda's latest – and uncomfortably expensive – sporty model earlier this week, there's a vastly cheaper and more fun way to buy a diesel vRS
Remind Yourself That Diesel Skodas Can Be Fun With A £2700 Fabia vRS

Earlier this week the other Matt drove the brand new Kodiaq vRS, Skoda’s first vRS SUV and the first in the Czech brand’s stable to get the 237bhp twin-turbo 2.0-litre diesel engine. It’s a fine car, but Matt found it hard to justify the, ahem, £42,870 pre-options price.

As you probably already know, though, Skoda has previous when it comes to diesel and vRS. While its first car to bear the red and green badge was the 2001 Octavia vRS, with a 1.8-litre 20-valve turbocharged petrol engine, by late 2003 Skoda had introduced a Fabia vRS to match, powered by a surprisingly free-revving 1.9-litre TDI PD diesel.

Remind Yourself That Diesel Skodas Can Be Fun With A £2700 Fabia vRS

It had a claimed 130bhp, but we know of a handful of former owners who had theirs dyno-tested when standard and found they were coughing up over 140bhp. Although it was, on paper, a boring engine taken from sales-rep-tastic iterations of the Octavia and Superb, in the short, lightweight Fabia it was a giggle factory.

I should know; I owned one of the 1000 limited edition examples that came to the UK in 2007. With red brake calipers, Race Blue paint and really lovely black leather upholstery trimmed with blue piping, it wasn’t any faster than the standard car, but it was the best-looking. The way it pulled through second and third gears made mincemeat of early-2000s petrol hot hatchbacks. By the time they’d hit their stride the Fabia had already cleared off. It was great for getting the drop on unsuspecting ricers in town.

Remind Yourself That Diesel Skodas Can Be Fun With A £2700 Fabia vRS

Sadly only one of those Race Blue specials is for sale on Auto Trader UK right now; a 79,000-miler priced at a distinctly unrealistic £7000. Again, trust me on that. But you can get the same lightweight, eager six-speed gear shift and silly small-car, big-torque feel in a normal one, and that’s where we’d put our money.

Here’s a tidy-looking red one from 2006, with a few marks here and there but a straight-looking body. It’s covered a reasonable 89,000 miles with a partial service history, but it does have a good MOT pass record so seems to have been looked after.

Mine, pictured at the side of the Evo Triangle
Mine, pictured at the side of the Evo Triangle

It’s clearly wearing out, though. There are MOT advisories noted for play in the front anti-roll bar on both sides as well as tired CV joint gaiters, but for a few hundred notes a local garage will sort those out for you – along with the loose rear damper dust covers noted as well. The front tyres were worn close to the limit but they’ll have been replaced by now.

Dynamically the Fabia vRS was never brilliant. The steering was woolly, the suspension hated big bumps and there was never much feedback to speak of, but that engine and the constant 50mpg returns made it a real pleasure to live with. Today you can buy a really leggy one from as little as £1500, but with our tidy example up for £2695, it’s worth spending a little more. As everyday brisk hatchbacks go, this is a heck of a compromise.

Comments

Anonymous

Remapped the 1.9 TDI can easily reach 160 - 170 HP

12/15/2018 - 12:33 |
34 | 0
saulsgarage458

I kinda like the vrs Fabia because it’s a cheap diesel but it is on its way out 😢

12/15/2018 - 13:14 |
0 | 0
Peanut_guy

Everyome talks about Fabia amd Octavia, but you forgot the Superb with its 2.0L 280 bhp and in the previous generation the 3.6 VR6 !

12/15/2018 - 13:32 |
16 | 4

that one’s also much more expensive

12/15/2018 - 15:02 |
16 | 0
Anonymous

I remember when my dad nearly bought one but he took a 100hp model wich still was fast. Also another forgotten skoda is the mk2 vrs fabia with its 1.4l engine ones with under 100k km are und 10000 euros

12/15/2018 - 17:34 |
0 | 0
Anonymous

My wife had 3 of these. The later models with the later engine code did indeed usually have circa 150bhp (she took hers to a well-renowned uk tuner and it was putting out 152bhp stock in their rolling road. She also owned a black one with anthracite wheels that are kids dubbed ‘Darth’, that was putting out somewhere north of 230bhp, could spin the wheels in 3rd and could cause the standard clutch to slip if full throttle was engaged in 4/5/6 gear (so an excuse to have an updated clutch!)
Very underrated imho, but can be made to handle better with the fitting of a rear anti-roll bar, updated suspension bushes etc.

12/15/2018 - 20:02 |
0 | 0
slevo beavo

I had one. Was pretty quick in a straight line but even with a LSD it struggled round the corners. Could still stick to the back end of a new jcw mini or a ep3. Higher mileage example are now suffering from the common camshaft wear injector seal wear. The standard KKK turbo isn’t the most reliable unit. Most switch to the Garrett versions from the VW range. Also the O2M gearbox isn’t the strongest out there.

Picture of my special edition (SE) with a modified standard upper grill and front bumper with detachable front bumper for on track action to aid fmic airflow

12/15/2018 - 21:29 |
12 | 0
1.8 turbo makes me happy

Here in Portugal the 1.9TDI engine is one of most famous perforce engine, it can do easily +300HP with a turbo upgrade and some mods

12/16/2018 - 17:06 |
2 | 4
Anonymous

Probably better of get a mondeo st tdci, if you get the right one they will have the st performance package with leather or half alcantara seats and will have the same suspension set up as the st220

12/17/2018 - 06:52 |
2 | 0
Anonymous

I have a 2005 VRS 1.9 TDI its such a fun car and it’s really fast and fun around 140hkw all tho it’s not much but it feels faster

12/17/2018 - 08:24 |
0 | 0
Anonymous

I’d like to see an old Fabia pull away from just a regular Swift or Polo, ain’t possible

12/17/2018 - 20:34 |
2 | 0

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