MG 4

Miscreant

Looks like there is a recall brewing in the UK. Something to do with getting locked into the car and not being able to power it on or get out?

https://www.mgevs.com/threads/mg4-recall.8918/

DaveyDave

When people are saying it's €10k less than the competition, what are they comparing it with? Obviously the Excite Long Range would compete with the ID.3/Born, Leaf, Mégane e-tech but none of them are €10k more?

I don't know many cars competing in the 50kWh range, the e-208 50kWh is €32k I think but terrible spec for the money and a smaller car. The 40kWh Leaf battery is too small to compare.

Old diesel

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120004297#Comment_120004297

Megane eTech is over 37 k in 40 kwh vs 28 k MG4 with 51 kwh battery.

Ditto a new ID3 is over 40 k.

Mokka e is in the region of 36 to 37 k on done deal*

Kia Niro EV is 43 to 47 k depending on if its a K3 or K4.

Yes you can buy a Kona for 33 k but that's a 39 kwh which is smaller in battery size and interior space.

And so on.

*new cars

DaveyDave

I didn't realise smaller EVs were such crap value for money. I think you'd want your head examined for looking at a 40kWh Mégane or the 50kWh Mokka e for that money.

Buddy Bubs

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120004297#Comment_120004297

How much is an excite long range? Website says 31k but I suppose there's delivery etc on top of that.

The Born is every bit 10k on top of that, some of the others might be a bit less. Look at them on donedeal now for 2023. But I suppose once Audi have their a3 sized EV it will be 10k on top again.

MojoMaker

Add approx 2500 onto the RRP indicated by MG Ireland. We are at the stage now that if you are not prepared to pay the dealer premium then step out of the queue as there are plenty who are.

DaveyDave

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120004813#Comment_120004813

The Born would be similar to the Exclusive Long Range which is €35,500 or so after delivery with the Born being €40,800 (or €40,000 if you were to compare it without the service plan)

Still a significant price difference but I would consider the Born to be fairly priced for the spec, battery and performance on offer especially as a comparable ICE would be similar money. The likes of the 40-45kWh Mégane or Mokka for €37-38k or €42k ID.3 aren't reasonable prices though.

Even if there's a price increase coming the MG is still untouchable. It will be interesting to see what sort of sales figures we'll be seeing over the next few months.

Buddy Bubs

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120004963#Comment_120004963

I see a UK import Born and a demo model for under 42k but everything else is up around 45k for 2023. I have one myself but didn't pay that much....quite the gap to the mg4 so I'm agreeing it's untouchable at the price. Reminds me a little of kia and hyundai courting market share in years gone by but pricing up there with the Europeans now.

I think we're going back to the days where a rear window wiper was a luxury.....

This is how bad things are getting, VW only have 1 id3 model now with the 58 Kwh and it costs more than my 77 Kwh id3 Tour 5 and it has a lot less kit than my tour 5, it really is bad. Even if I got a good price for mine 2nd hand I'd still be getting a far interior car with much less range. I can't wait to see how expensive the new id3 is next year.

I don't know if ICE prices are gone this bad ? either way, it doesn't look like I'll be buying a new EV in 2024/25 if this continues, I'd rather go back to 2nd hand Diesel, I might just keep the id3 T5 if the battery proves not to be degrading much, I'm very lucky I bought when I did.

I know a lot of the German price increases are probably down to the gas prices, the Americas are selling Gas to Europe at massively inflated prices, isn't that nice of them ? the buyer then has to make up the extra cost, but, not me, I'm out if this situation doesn't improve.

Imagine paying almost 60 K for a Kia EV6 or Ioniq 5 ? this is insane.

MojoMaker

Exclusive Long Range long gone past 35,500 unfortunately. You're looking at the MG website possibly? Frank Keane might give you one for €37500 before Dec 31st.

pandabat

I actually ended up cancelling my MG4 Excite/SE order during the week.

While it was a nice car to test drive, I was coming from a high spec ICE but do relatively low mileage which was making the sums for changing marginal to begin with - there was no way I could justify stretching to an Exclusive/Trophy.

Looking at the UK forum, the number of weird issues on the cars (to be expected on new platform perhaps?) and the frustration that they were causing some new owners did start to make me think - I've been through a warranty claim process before on an intermittent issue on a car and it was a very stressful experience to get it over the line and sorted. Not something that I'd want to risk repeating if I could avoid it.

Coupling that with the amount that I'd be paying to get a lower spec car with no rear camera, no heated steering wheel, no official option for roof box in this market, no rear cabin light, no rear speakers, wobbly rear seat belt mounts (making child seat belting up more difficult), an iffy infotainment system, longer journey times on occasional longer trips, etc. and other issues such as winter range reduction, questionable efficiency on ground up new EV platform and I was sitting higher and higher on the fence.

The final straw was the offered trade-in value against my own car (when I pushed for it, I'd actually heard nothing since initial deposit in late Sept/early Oct) which was well below what I would have expected based on my own research (especially given that we've nothing heard in media but how high second-hand car values have been over last 2 years). I could see where the dealer was coming from in that my exact car model/spec was probably a bit "niche" and difficult to price on the Irish market and they have no margin to play with on the MGs but, with the mounting doubts that I already had and the extra money that it would have forced me to pony up, it actually made the decision easy enough for me in the end and I withdrew my interest in the car.

Going by all the reviews, the MG4 is a great EV for the price but remember reviewers will only have the car for a few hours or a few days at most. They don't have to live with any issues or worry about them getting fixed. There are issues, at least with the initial cars, and MG do appear to be reacting to at least some of them (although there are still question marks about some of the fixes). Some other more minor issues *could* be solved by software updates but they may or may not come - there's no guarantee.

I've no doubt that the MG4 will work well for many people and switching to an EV will probably make most sense of you do a fair bit of mileage and can home charge. For me and my lower mileage though, even at the value end of things where the MG4 is the only car that makes sense, the payback time is just too long. It would be different if I needed to change my current car but, at the end of the day, there's actually nothing wrong with it so why incur the expense.

Like many others would say, I would encourage anyone thinking of moving to an EV to do all your homework, do the realistic sums on these high vehicle costs, read the current owners forums, make yourself aware of potential issues that you may face in how you will use the car (sometimes on a daily basis), be aware how certain winter usage patterns may drastically affect your range, and so on. There are those who are well-informed, well-financed and/or who don't mind being on the bleeding edge but it would be easy to rely purely on online reviews and sleepwalk into an unsuitable, unsatisfactory and financially unsound ownership experience.

That said, I do hope the MG4 is the success that it sets out to be. The EV market badly needs more reasonably-priced models to make it more accessible to people on normal salaries, paying childcare, mortgages, etc. It's a great looking car that drives well and has great potential!

pandabat

@[Deleted User] based on prices I had from when I was looking at changing in ~2017 and where I could match with comparable current models from mid-2022, I found that ICE prices had increased by an average of ~25% in that period. Some models much less than that, some much more but that was the average. Inevitably you're going to be getting yet more safety equipment in newer models and that contributes somewhat to the cost but inflation also affects it. With latest Euro emissions regulations and the development costs that imposes on manufacturers, we'll probably see yet further increases in ICE car prices and the convergence of EV/ICE prices may be as much to do with ICE prices increasing as EV prices decreasing.

While I had an interest in going EV, I just can't justify it at current prices and my own current mileage. We'd have to drop down to one car as a family and combine our mileage to really come closer to being able to make it work and that's just with an econobox like the MG4. If we only had one car then it would need to do more, carry more, etc. than the MG4 and then you're looking at the crazy big prices for Niro, Ioniq5, EV6, ID.4 etc. I'm just gonna step back, stick with what I have for now that's costing me nothing only running costs (which aren't too bad given low mileage) and see where things go. Having recently done a big family trip up the country in the current Baltic conditions, I was very glad to have a warm, comfy, full-spec car that could do 7-8 hours of driving with no lengthy refuelling stops necessary (getting 40mpg in a fully-laden petrol car with a roof-box in absolutely freezing conditions) - it planted more seeds in my field of doubt about the wisdom of spending a lot of money on what would be, in some ways/by some measures (not all), an inferior car.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120006625#Comment_120006625

People who have never lived with an EV really underestimate the hassles of cold battery charging, it can add 30 mins to a charge and that's no joke. The VW id range, the Kia, Hyundai have battery heaters but do not use them to heat the battery, I think the ID cars might only start heating the battery when it detects a DC charge which is not good enough.

I've been driving EV since 2015 and by far the greatest let down is cold batter charging at fast chargers and now that VW's latest software update ensures the battery does not heat at all unless below 0 deg C this ensures also that fast charging will be much slower because the battery was always heated to 12 Deg C and this allowed 60 Kw on Ionity and 50 Kw on ESB 150 Kw chargers, but now this would be a lot less because the car no longer heats the battery, this greatly improves local driving efficiency because the battery isn't constantly heating and I've seen efficiency go from 35 Kwh/100 Kms on local trips to around 20-22 because the battery heater is no longer active. 50-60 Kw charing is not fast in nearly 2023.

Anyway, a wise decision is to keep your current car, inflation means wages are less, energy bills are high also and if not doing much mileage it makes sense not to spend more to save little.

I've saving around 3,200 a year on diesel at current prices with some free work charging, hopefully soon to be 100% free work charging so basically the energy costs me very little but I can justify it over x years with driving 46,000 Kms a year or more.

We took the Diesel Outlander on a recent trip to Galway and through Connemara because I just could not face the disgraceful charging network around the west and the long charging times, there are many here who'll tell you that the network isn't that bad but really, it is, they are die hard EV fans and have no issues waiting half their lives at chargers, and to be honest I'm tired of the poor network and long charge times especially in the cold. It was really refreshing to be able to do all that driving on one tank of Diesel from Carlow and still have a quarter of a tank, maybe bit less and that's in a thirsty Outlander diesel.

My previous car was the BMW i3 33 Kwh Rex, it is the only car in the world with such a unique system where the generator isn't connected to the wheels in any way and acts strictly as a generator, so I had around 140-170 Kms on EV then I could either wait at a fast charger or fire up the generator manually, I used to do that on the motorway so I'd have some battery for town driving.

If I had a Rex in the ID3 T5 I'd have 300-400 Kms range and if I could fire up a generator I'd never need a public charger or the hassle of waiting again, the Rex also allowed me to avoid cold battery charging, it really was some amazing piece of engineering.

Even if it's not "cool" to have an ICE in an EV, if they could put in a hydrogen generator it would be great but the problem is there's no hydrogen network at all or very little, but would mean no charging queues and much reduced refill times similar to ICE.

I don't need to fast charge much these days with the T5 but believe me, it can be a huge hassle when you do especially if you got a Wife/Husband that's not into the EV thing at all like my missus and it can cause conflicts especially if chargers are broken or there's 2-3 cars waiting before you. So I think for the foreseeable I'll just take the Diesel for really long trips.

If I were doing little mileage I wouldn't have spent so much on a new EV, I would have got a 2nd hand diesel, or if I was doing a lot less miles probably a Petrol, perhaps even a hybrid again but I prefer the punch of a diesel with decent power.

We still got a long way to go in my opinion before electrics can replace ICE and this is coming from someone that has had EV since 2015. If you're a 2 car household, then bring the ICE on the longer trips and save the hassle.

Old diesel

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120005017#Comment_120005017

Paying 60 k for an Ioniq 5 or EV6 is insane *to YOU*.

However it is not insane to the person who has 60 k to spend and a choice of every car that can be got for 60 k including 2nd hand diesels.

And decides that Ioniq 5 is the car they want.

Someone else will decide that this Tesla is what they want

https://www.donedeal.ie/cars-for-sale/model-s-2019-100d-long-range-low-mileage/32828714

And the beauty of it all is that no one is actually wrong.

Because the individual buyer is buying the vehicle that best meets their priorities, needs and wants.

Old diesel

Back on topic

This all sounds really positive

https://youtu.be/k92QeauFUz0

but someone in the comments has noted some MG4 issues - so that's worth a look.

Looks to be a fault with the car not recognising the key and thus locking you inside.

Hopefully they get on top of issues quickly.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120007070#Comment_120007070

It's mad, :-)

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120007089#Comment_120007089

If she comes with the car I'm buying it ! 😂

Seriously though, 27,500 K is amazing for any EV, hope they can make tonnes of them, this is what's needed.

350 Km range is misleading though, maybe Summer off the motorway but if average of 19 Kwh/100 km that would be 268 Kms before you need to be plugged in, say 240 by the time you're at the charger. Still for that money, hope it can charge at decent speeds.

There might be a flood of cheap Chinese cars in the not so distant future, tough times for Euro car manufacturers who pay their staff probably a lot better than the Chinese, the Germans can dish out nice bonuses even to the cleaners. Chinese car companies ?

Do MG advertise actual usable battery capacity ?

Found out the 51 Kwh has 50.8 usable, the 64 has 61.7 available, they're tiny buffers compared to the almost 10 Kwh in my id3 tour 5 and have 68 usable after a year.

Pity they don't have a larger usable battery version, I don't think I would buy another ev again with anything less than actual 80 Kwh usable.

The MG is RWD which is fantastic, RWD makes a massive difference.

1 year service intervals or 24,000 kms, that means 2 services a year for me on an electric car ? Absolutely not a hope.

Miscreant

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120007460#Comment_120007460

Don't buy a Kia or Hyundai then. 15k or 1 year service intervals. 🙂

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120007696#Comment_120007696

Seriously ? that has to be a scam. Is that official from Kia or Kia Ireland ? not possible on an EV that's just deception.

Miscreant

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120008332#Comment_120008332

That's their interval in Ireland and I think the UK too. Madness altogether.

Ah Is that really official from MG and Kia, 15,000 "service" intervals on an EV is a money making scam, you'd have to compare that to MG and Kia.

There's no way in hell I'd bring an EV in for an "inspection" 3 times a year @ my mileage. That's extortion.

Miscreant

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120008853#Comment_120008853

MG interval is 24k or 1 year but the Hyundai/Kia one is well known. There seems to be no differentiation between ICE and EV in those intervals either. Its crazy for sure.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120009282#Comment_120009282

I wonder is that ridiculous service a result of Kia Ireland or Kia Motor Co ? same with MG ? Smells like typical Irish rip off but could be wrong.

It just seems wrong to have an EV in 3 times a year to go in and maybe have the windscreen washer fluid topped up, I can do that myself......

Found service plan for E-Niro.

This is the ID family service schedule, full service schedule I can't find but gives an idea as to how other manufacturers are just trying to make money.

I also see nothing in the Kia schedule to actually require any form of service every 15,000 Kms, inspections me arse.

Some interesting reading on the MG 4 EV and possible future versions, I'd love a dual motor version, a poor Man's Tesla ? They could possibly go to 800v tech and also 150 Kwh battery size though what's not clear is if they could offer 150 Kwh in a car that size, the weight would probably be a killer ( and the cost ) but just imagine 150 Kwh @ 20 Kwh/100 kms = 750 Kms range!

https://topelectricsuv.com/news/mg/mg4-ev-cybere-details/