The owner's 'Manual'

The Skoda Superb was always available with the 1.8-litre turbo charged petrol engine with a useful 160bhp, but pushed out to the wheels through its seven-speed DSG transmission. Now, this Czech manufacturer has launched a six-speed manual transmission variant bolted on the same 1.8-litre engine. This is the same powertrain that we have seen on the Skoda Laura 1.8-petrol, and need we say, it’s a complete joy to drive. By fitting a manual transmission to the Superb, Skoda has managed to reduce the cost of its flagship model, to Rs 18.71lakh from Rs 20.28lakh (both ex-showroom, Mumbai), making the car cheaper by approximately Rs 1.5lakh.

The Skoda Superb is a chauffeur-driven sedan with real limousine-like rear leg room and the cheaper price tag, thanks to the manual transmission, will no doubt bring a smile to the face of prospective owners. It is now not only cheaper to buy, but is also now slightly more fuel- efficient compared to the automatic variant. The Superb has quite a lot going for it. Great legroom, comfortable ride, luxurious interiors with all the bells and whistles and now with the cheaper price tag, the Superb is even more of a value proposition than ever before.

So how exactly does Skoda’s 1.8-litre TSI engine paired along with the six-speed manual transmission work out? In our acceleration test, the Superb galloped to the 100kph mark in 10.4seconds which is really quick for a car that weighs two tonnes! However you do feel a little bit of the turbo lag until the turbo spools up to produce all that exhilarating (and addictive) power. The gearing of the car seemed fairly well sorted out with sixth being quite tall – useful when you’re cruising on the highway. It’s even got a shift indicator in the digital display that tells you when to shift up so you get optimal economy. The gear knob is small and shifts are smooth, short and quite positive. In our in-gear test, the sedan took 4.5 seconds to clock 30-50kph in the third gear and 6.5 seconds for the same speed in the fourth. In the 50-70kph test (in the fifth gear) the Superb took 6.9 seconds.

The Superb, even after weighing a shade over two tonnes has fairly good brakes that haul it from 80-0kph in 32.1m. While the pedal feel is good and the brakes are progressive we felt that the tyres somewhat lost the plot. The fuel efficiency of the Superb isn’t really that bad considering its weight and the fact that the turbo does really make you want to drive in Schumacher mode all the time. The overall fuel efficiency of the saloon was 8.7kpl, whereas in our highway driving run, it gave a figure of 12.5kpl. The worst figure that we got was during our performance test where the mileage was about 7.5kpl. The only difference between the Superb MT and the auto-box variant is just the transmission, and although enthusiasts amongst us may love the manual transmission for that feeling of control and chauffeur driven owners would love the lower sticker price, we’d still plum for the same engine with the auto-box. But that’s really just a matter of opinion since in this case the grass is quite green on both sides of the fence!

For the rest of the road test, please read the Skoda Superb RT.

Test Data

Engine Specifications

1.8-litre turbocharged petrol engine View specifications

Max in Gear

Performance Test Data

Fuel Efficiency