MG4 in Australia

[Archev]

Was there any issue getting a replacement?

I haven't checked under mine for the rear tray bulge for quite a while, I probably should. If I find a bulge I'll book it in for the fix and I'd be tempted to get them to do firmware updates (even if it costs a bit) as I suspect that might help with a few of the annoyances.

I'll hit 12 months a bit later in the month and by then will have circa 14,000 km on the dial. It's been generally very good car. Performance is good, handling is good, comfort ride wise is good. Seats are not that great and I've had an annoying creak in mine pretty much from new. Wife enjoys driving it.

Having the home charging all set up has been excellent. Just plug it in and my system manages it all automagically and is so cheap it's criminal. Like you most of my charging at home is either free energy or using our excess solar. Been a good month for solar! Lots of sun.

The wireless adapter for CarPlay (CarlinKit 5.0) has also been rock solid after a bumpy start. Once the settings got dialled in it just works. I tend to just have it on Waze nav app, but on the highway we will often play music. If by myself then a podcast.

The sound system is just adequate but it would be nice if it were a little better. And one addition I would like is front/rear dashcam. Still tossing up on getting a space saver spare tyre kit.

LKA is still pretty twitchy for me, there are a few spots where it will trigger perhaps 2/3rds of the time for no reason. One is as you go over a crest on shoulder-less bit of Waterfall Way. Not had a false trigger on the emergency braking for a while.

My rear right side tyre loses pressure just a little faster than the others, not bad by any stretch, it's more the others maintain pressure while rear right is more of a normal pressure loss rate. I use one of those portable Ryobi battery powered inflators. Works well.

I have a few long drives coming up this next couple of weeks so I signed up for a month of Tesla membership as I know the amount of fast charging I'll need to do makes it worthwhile.

I charged the car to 100% today for a drive tomorrow (down Taree/Forster way) but had to do a run this afternoon which dropped it back a little. I do want to take a look at the new superchargers in Taree but time may get the better of me and a Thrumster top up might be more likely.

I am going to try something tonight I've not done before as an experiment - put the granny charger on to do a scheduled charge overnight which will use my home battery. It needs about 6 kWh. I set it up from the car and my Home Assistant tells me it is programmed ready to start charging a bit later this evening. Not a normal charge process, just an experiment. I can't use the normal EV charger for that as it does not draw from the home battery side of our supply (which is how I want it - it should only need to use excess solar or scheduled charging for super off-peak).

Grand story. Personally I go nowhere without the space saver spare after two badly ripped tyres in the past. I agree with the Ryobi unit and I also carry the Ryobi torch to share the battery.

 

[Corindikev]

Was there any issue getting a replacement?

Insurance Company told me to use O'briens. I called them & they rang back within the hour to say they had a MG4 windscreen & I booked in to get it replaced. Looks the same as the original but is not made by SAIC. The job took a bit over 2 hours including re-calibration of all the gizmos housed in the attachment.

 

[wattmatters]

Good to know about the windscreen availability, thanks. It's something I had wondered about as driving on our roads there's always a fair chance of a stone being flipped up. Had it on all previous cars driven here. Also wondered about the system recalibration.

Personally I go nowhere without the space saver spare after two badly ripped tyres in the past.

I'm less concerned about local driving, it's more for travel well away from home. If I got one it would likely sit in the garage most of the time. But on a trip it would be reassuring to know I can at least get on my way relatively quickly as you can be a long way from anywhere pretty quickly here.

My last car I got some nasty sidewall damage one day (never noticed how/when - the car's system told me I had an issue). It had runflats and they were good enough for the drive to a tyre shop but I do wish it had a spare.

I still have the old Golf space saver (which got used on a few occasions), bolt pattern likely fits fine but the outer tyre diameter is about an inch or so less than my MG4's wheel and I'm not sure if that's a good idea, especially if it's a drive wheel. I thought they'd need to be closer in diameter than that.

My last car was very particular about not running tyres of even sightly different wear (Merc AWD), differential issues presumably, not as sure on the electric drive what the issues are. Front being non-drive is less of an issue I'd imagine, for the rear I guess one could do a double swap front to back but ugh.

I am going to try something tonight I've not done before as an experiment - put the granny charger on to do a scheduled charge overnight which will use my home battery.

That all went as it was supposed to. Charging started at 9PM on cue and ran until the car was full, and all but emptied the excess capacity in the home battery.

Can see it running from 9PM on my general power circuit monitoring:

Doing a run down to Rainbow Flat and back today, about 470km give or take with diversions.

 

[Lanster27]

MG4 is listed as $31,000 under MG’s September offer. That’s quite crazy.

I have my excite on NL at the moment, expiring early 2025. If this deal is still on by then, it’s gonna be cheaper for me to get a new MG4 than buyout my current one.

EV’s are really depreciating hard. Not that I’m complaining.

 

[clayton4115]

MG4 is listed as $31,000 under MG’s September offer. That’s quite crazy.

I have my excite on NL at the moment, expiring early 2025. If this deal is still on by then, it’s gonna be cheaper for me to get a new MG4 than buyout my current one.

EV’s are really depreciating hard. Not that I’m complaining.

New versions of MG cars with the solid state batteries due out next year.

 

[ilukey77]

MG4 is listed as $31,000 under MG’s September offer. That’s quite crazy.

I have my excite on NL at the moment, expiring early 2025. If this deal is still on by then, it’s gonna be cheaper for me to get a new MG4 than buyout my current one.

EV’s are really depreciating hard. Not that I’m complaining.

Ive seen a few at under the 30k mark NEW which to be honest anyone not snaping one up at that price is quite crazy !!

in my opinion 30k for a EV is a no brainer with 10 year warranty

Are the MG4's the perfect car NO but to be honest if your paying the same amount for a I30 or corolla ( if not more ) with no fuel cost why go either petrol or hybrid !!

Range can be a issue but even myself im seeing more changing stations popping up ( in fact there is another one on its way much much closer to the one i normally go to ) next to a hungry jacks ( two birds one stone )

With the low KM's i normally do and charge my X power on the stock crappy charger most of the time and its fine ..

I dont work every day and work 5 minutes away and then with my second job i do a bit of travel at night but nothing huge but its my main means of transport and usually take that car with the kids and/ or go out places in general so it does get used more often for personal things than my GF's hybrid prius !!

Ive found every second night i put it on charge no issues even my GF sister who has an EV to and uses a wall box charger we have been lucky to see $100-150aud increase a quarter in the power bill !!

New versions of MG cars with the solid state batteries due out next year.

problem is though while the range is going to be better with the solid state it WILL come at a higher cost ..

Take the MG3 last gen was around the 18 to 23k aud fully optioned the latest gen MG3 ( and being hybrid) is pushing the 28k mark fully options but starting at around the 20k mark so the new tech costs more ..

I believe till we get to the peak of EV tech even the cheaper Chinese EV's will increase in price every gen until like i said we get to a peak and the only difference between last gen and next gen is the shape , screen size and interior!!

 

[ozzz]

Grand story. Personally I go nowhere without the space saver spare after two badly ripped tyres in the past. I agree with the Ryobi unit and I also carry the Ryobi torch to share the battery.

I have the rattle gun no struggle with wheel nuts and fast.

 

[Archev]

I have the rattle gun no struggle with wheel nuts and fast.

I have the mower and strimmer but luckily I don’t mind a slightly rough campsite otherwise this all just gets out of hand ??

The chainsaw I could have employed to get a clearer view of the Cuillin hills on Skye. But this Ryobi obsession gets really out of hand ? good tools ?

 

[crc32]

Has anyone here put a lightbar on their MG4? I do a lot of night time highway driving and find the stock high beam a bit lacking.

 

[decrep]

Nice to be able to see the roos on the side of the road

 

[wattmatters]

If this deal is still on by then

It's a limited offer. Either end-September or end-October depending on which part of the website you believe

I have the rattle gun no struggle with wheel nuts and fast.

Oooh, I hadn't thought of including that in a pack, nice one. I use mine mostly for changing the blades on the mower. Wish that thing was electric but those units cost more than an MG4!

Trip down south and back today.

I did manage to do a quick charge at the new Taree supercharger to check it out:

459 km, 83.9 kWh (18.7 kWh/100 km).

Left home with 100%, arrived home 5%. Will be sucking down those photons tomorrow!
DC charge 23.1 kWh / $18.00
Home charge 60.8 kWh / $0.69

 

[crc32]

That's the first one I've seen in silver. It like it!

It's amazing how cheap they are to run. According to Solar Analytics I've spent $8.38 on off peak power so far this month which is mainly used for car charging.

 

[wattmatters]

That's the first one I've seen in silver. It like it!

That's the Camden Grey, not silver.

 

[wattmatters]

Battery status this morning.

No plans to head anywhere today. Just waiting for the sun to get a bit higher in the sky so it can start charging up.

 

[siteguru]

It must be the bright sunshine - it looks brighter than my own Camden Grey.

 

[wattmatters]

It must be the bright sunshine - it looks brighter than my own Camden Grey.

It's sure been sunny up this way of late. This is our driest period of the year, great for solar. Our last seven days of PV output:

 

[Coulomb]

It must be the bright sunshine

I live a few hundred km north of Wattmatters, in the state of Queensland, considered the skin cancer capital of the world. The sun really is bright here. I forget why that is.

Launch of New Skin Cancer Prevention Targets for Queensland – ASSC

www.assc.org.au

Edit: Ah. It's to do with the orbit of the earth, along with ozone depleted winds and low pollution:

Aerosols Over Australia

Ironically, EVs are cleaning up the atmosphere, and making the sun even slightly harsher ??

And now, back on topic.

 

[Dodgy]

Use a 15 amp charger at home which has met all our needs for the past year. Working on power reading on cable & percentage charging change on car’s infotainment screen, losses are in the range of 10-15%. I understand this has something to do with the conversion from AC source to DC battery.

(You can tell by now I’m no tech head!)

We’ve recently commenced traveling further afield using DC fast chargers.

My question is: are there comparable losses when charging the battery using DC?

 

[PeterM]

Has anyone here put a lightbar on their MG4? I do a lot of night time highway driving and find the stock high beam a bit lacking.

Have you tried adjusting the headlamp leveling dial? I've found the "0" setting to be hopeless on freeways. On "2" it's quite good.
No experience with a light bar, but there was a post on the MG4 Owners AU FB page where someone had fitted one.

 

[wattmatters]

Battery status this morning.

No plans to head anywhere today. Just waiting for the sun to get a bit higher in the sky so it can start charging up.

And battery status once charging had stopped for the day:

So that's 40.4 kWh into the drive battery. Almost all solar PV, with the exception of a bit of free grid energy 12-2 PM:

Iotawatt reports 42.2 kWh of AC energy supplied to the EVSE. That's 95.7% charge efficiency.