Between 1.9 and 2.0 engines there is a big difference - the 2.0's are all common-rail and include modern gizmos like dual-mass flywheels - which have made them smoother and even slightly more powerful but alas also less reliable. The 1.9 in both PD and normal guise is much more reliable - especially the venerated TDI 110 and PD 105 - just check out the Fabia TDI PD 105 and Octavia TDI 110 - everyone raves about them as if they never fail - and you can find Octavias with a quarter-million miles on the clock with still quite a lease of life left in them! Something you cannot quite say of the 2.0's which are also much thirstier!

Firstly all Mk2 Octavia diesels have dual mass flywheels, even the 1.9, so if you want a diesel Octavia there's no avoiding them.

Although the later 1.9 engines have Siemens injectors it is specifically the Siemens piezo injectors in the 2.0 170 bhp PD VRS version that give trouble. The ones in the 1.9 don't seem to have any problems despite coming from the same manufacturer.

The majority of 2.0 TDI Octavias are not common rail but PD, the common rail versions came along later. The variants of the 2.0 PD which were fitted to the Octavia did not have balancer shafts (unlike the Passat etc) so do not have the oil pump drive issue that afflicts the larger VAG 2.0 diesels. There are plenty of 2.0 PD140 engines in Octavias with 200k plus on them - it's not the same engine as the Passat -different oil pump, different injectors.

Personally the only diesel engine I would avoid in the mk2 Octavia is the 2.0 PD 170 VRS - it suffered from both injector problems and DPF issues. The rest aren't bad.

Edited by nick74 on 02/08/2011 at 00:02