Poor emergency stop

jimben

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Dec 7, 2023
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74
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Ruthin
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MG4 SE LR
I failed to stop when entering a roundabout behind a driver who changed their mind suddenly. I'm confident that I would have stopped in my last BMW and my wife's Polo, but my MG4 didn’t seem to assist at all, if anything the brakes went a bit spongy. Isn’t it supposed to do emergency stops, even unaided, never mind when the driver is slamming on? What can we expect from the car? Any ideas?
 
I have the opposite problem - the car will give me a warning in that situation and slam the emergency brakes on if it just thinks I might collide (not so far). Sounds like a software issue?
 
I failed to stop when entering a roundabout behind a driver who changed their mind suddenly. I'm confident that I would have stopped in my last BMW and my wife's Polo, but my MG4 didn’t seem to assist at all, if anything the brakes went a bit spongy. Isn’t it supposed to do emergency stops, even unaided, never mind when the driver is slamming on? What can we expect from the car? Any ideas?
Either faulty brakes (unlikely), or your are above 95% SOC?
 
I was 20 miles away from home so I couldn’t have been so high a SoC. In any case would that affect the brakes?
 
I nearly went into someone at a local roundabout when driving after charging up fully. Had got so used to regen I didn't adjust my driving accordingly for it not being available.
 
I had the opposite experience on Thursday, and was going to post about it in the tyres thread. Just the same thing, only it was a T-junction rather than a roundabout. I thought the car in front of me was going ahead with his left turn and was looking to my right to see if I could follow him. Realised at the last second that he had stopped without making the turn - I think a car coming from his left made it inadvisable.

I slammed on the brakes, and the car stopped immediately. No AEB involved at all, it was all me. I wasn't going very fast of course, but even so I was impressed. The tyres just seemed to grab on to the tarmac and stop with pretty much no skidding at all. I was mostly impressed by the tyre performance, but the brakes were obviously up to it.
 
I failed to stop when entering a roundabout behind a driver who changed their mind suddenly. I'm confident that I would have stopped in my last BMW and my wife's Polo, but my MG4 didn’t seem to assist at all, if anything the brakes went a bit spongy. Isn’t it supposed to do emergency stops, even unaided, never mind when the driver is slamming on? What can we expect from the car? Any ideas?
That's one of the reasons that we didn't buy an MG4 - this happened on the test drive and it was scary.
 
Yes I hit it. The damage to them wasn't much really but all my front electronics were wiped out and it took 3 months to get the parts.
I’ve tested the brakes since of course and it stops ok but nothing feels really sharp.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
We can't tell whether your brakes are operating normally of course but you might find it useful to test another car (dealer demonstrator perhaps?)
 
Yes I hit it. The damage to them wasn't much really but all my front electronics were wiped out and it took 3 months to get the parts.
I’ve tested the brakes since of course and it stops ok but nothing feels really sharp.

That should not be. When I did my emergency stop on Thursday the car stopped dead. Also, the one time it did an AEB (justified), it stopped dead. Multiple people describing sudden unwanted AEB operation and the car stopping dead.
 
I failed to stop when entering a roundabout behind a driver who changed their mind suddenly. I'm confident that I would have stopped in my last BMW and my wife's Polo, but my MG4 didn’t seem to assist at all, if anything the brakes went a bit spongy. Isn’t it supposed to do emergency stops, even unaided, never mind when the driver is slamming on? What can we expect from the car? Any ideas?
Do you have 'assists' on ? In which case it should assist. If not, then no. It's all you, with abs i'd have thought.
 
The behaviour of the car sounds so abnormal in a number of ways. Why didn't AEB activate? Why did the brakes feel spongy? It's completely at variance with the experience of other owners, including the ones incensed by unwanted and inappropriate activation of the AEB.
 
I've done it a couple of times in cars with EBA (emergency brake assist) and ABS, braked hard and thought they wouldn't stop.
The EBA works on how fast you press the pedal not how hard.
So if you press the pedal really hard but gradually, the ABS keeps letting the wheels rotate to prevent skidding, whereas if you press the brake fast the EBA kicks in and brakes hard, it is a weird feeling.
When it happens, if you momentarily release the brake then press it again fast the car will stop better.
 
That should not be. When I did my emergency stop on Thursday the car stopped dead. Also, the one time it did an AEB (justified), it stopped dead. Multiple people describing sudden unwanted AEB operation and the car stopping dead.
Mine did an automated emergency stop a few weeks back when a child with head down looking at a phone just turned and walked out right in front of me about 5m away. Glad the systems worked.
 
There’s some really interesting suggestions here, I’ll follow them up. Anything else please chip in. I’ll let you know if anything turns up. Many thanks.
 
I have a very steep drive into my garage. And while rolling backward down hill I really need to press the pedal hard.
I think I need to find an empty Supermarket car park somewhere. Where I can test the brakes and fully understand whats going on.
 

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