@@brunojl2 Yes, despite all the anti-EV types saying that we will have to buy a new battery every 5 years (despite a 7 or 8 year warranty being common) or you can't do long distances. Been to France 3 times over the past 9 months, not a problem in my mates MG4. My ZS EV (apart from the steering knock) has been faultless, long journeys are so relaxed and at 4.2 m/kW (or whatever it is!) is really cheap to run. Hoping to get mine serviced by Cleeveley, already I feel more confident about them doing the car than the dealer!
Owned an MG5 SR for 4 years and just changed it to a new MG5 FL LR Trophy because of the crazy deals around (£20,500 for new metallic!). I've owned all sorts Audis, BMWs, Mercedes, VW but this has to be the best put together and most reliable I've had. And with James continually confirming that with his expert factual knowledge I know it's the right decision. This may well be the last car I buy.....
@@Jamesandkate Should also say the new one was £1000 less than what I paid in Jan 2021 but in addition has a bigger battery, Adaptive Cruise Control, Interior rear seat lighting, Lane Keep assist, Traffic Jam assist, Driving speed assist, Headlight Beam assist, 360 Cameras, bigger internal screens, faster software, full LED external lights, better front charging port with lights to show progress, split level boot shelf, 500kg towing capacity, remote access with app, redesigned interior and seats, and Vehicle to Load capacity. So an amazing deal.
Just bought our first BEV - a revised MG5, mostly because of watching you with yours. Thanks! The local MG dealer, which is 20 odd miles away, is useless so may well be contacting you for service in future. :)
This is an impressive and detailed vlog of an underestimated car. Thanks so much James. I can't believe it's needed so little. No wheel bearings failed or anything. The car may well be "free" by the end of it, because the running costs compared to a diesel!
My MG5 LR has just turned 25K miles. It's still got plenty tread on the front tyres and the interior is still tight as a drum. I've had cars in the past where the interior fit and finish starts to lose it's shine after a while (rattles, squeeks etc) but the MG5 still feels like like the day I drove it off the forecourt. I'll stick my neck out and say that it's possibly the best car I've owned in my 30+ years of driving. It's literally cost me nothing to drive other than the electricity used to charge it.
James does a great job with these updates on his fleet. I like how he shows the brake and suspension components, and matter of fact description of service needed vs. typical ICE equivalent. MG is delivering on EV reliability and durability, something startup companies often struggle with. The real world fuel and maintenance savings that James documents so well are a real draw to EVs, especially for high mileage fleet vehicles.
Great see the vehicle is still performing well. It’s people such as yourself that are providing that Ev batteries do go the distance. Let’s have another update at 200,000 moles if you still have the car
"Providing EV batteries do go the distance?" You are joking? A diesel... Especially the Ford Eco boost ("Eco boom") would be coming up to it's third cambelt change, 12th(?) Oil change, from what James said 4th set of front Discs/ Pads, plus filters, probably Injectors, etc, etc, etc. Then add the fuel savings. I think that battery would be paid for easily IF it needs changing. Correct?
Had your car on our drive the other day. Thanks for the Zoe service, really impressed how thorough you were. Thanks for not taking our Sprocker home, despite her taking a liking to you ( and your car).
I'm running the pre-facelift mg5 as a family car and its working well for us. The main attraction of the facelift model for me are the app (preheating and charge management) and ability to fit a towbar for my bike rack. Solid car.
For the bike rack, I have bought the Thule 993 Outway Platform 2. It's an easy fit for the MG5 and means you don't have to worry about obscured number plate and lights. You can also leave it on the car and open the boot without the bike on (if you are careful, you can do it with the bike on). The MG is a fantastic car and has proved very reliable. Mine is on 83k miles now and runs like new. The last 8500 miles has returned 4.3 miles/kWh and easily gets 250+ miles on a full battery.
@@WoolyChewbakker looks really nice. Wouldn't work for me unfortunately as I need room for 4 bikes (partner and kids), and my e-mtb is too heavy. I use a Thule velospace xt4 instead, and just take my partners car (has a towbar) whenever we head out for a day on the bikes. My next EV (possibly a facelift MG5) will have a towbar!
I got the same LR model, and it's done nearly 100,000 miles. There are no issues. It's Used as a van. I recently upgraded the 12V battery to LFP, and the rear shocks were changed. It's the best car I've ever owned.
Interestng update thanks. I have an MG4 - will be 2 years old december. Ive done around 16000 miles and am very hsppy with reliability - its only needed a new door handle fitted and a software update - both under warranty. I've saved a lot in running costs, but depreciation is high as i bought soon after launch at rrp. Overall a very good result - I'm sceptical of the recent BS in the motoring press slagging off MG reliabilty....
Thank you for your videos about MG5's. We wanted a roomy car with a decent range, but at a sane price point. Your excellent and honest information guided us to the MG5. We live in the Channel Islands and - finally - our government recently offered incentives to buy electric (had to be purchased through a local agent, so couldn't use Jonathan Porterfield this time). We got an ex-demo SE long range. Superb car for long trips in France, as well as being great for daily use on our tiny Island's narrow lanes. Best of all, our Golden Retriever has ample room to enjoy rides in the boot. Cheers!
Fantastic update James, so,happy with our MG5 drives like a dream & zero problems, good advice on the wheel arches thanks. oh apart from my drivers windscreen wiper that still makes a juddering sound now & again, I tried to change the angle to make sure it’s parallel with the windscreen as it does look slightly angled but it wouldn’t move & unsure to force it, I’ll try some different wipers, you did recommended some I still haven’t ordered them. Must do that now winter is here.
Nice update, thank you James! Unfortunately Motorway returns the following: "Online valuation unavailable. We haven’t been able to generate a valuation for your car. This can happen if your car is rare, unique or has unusual mileage for its age." In my opinion the car industry still need to cotton on about the incredible longevity of EVs, and decouple this notion of "high mileage" from the car's value. It doesn't really matter how far an EV has travelled, the battery SoH is the key. All other things are low-value bits and bolts replacements. Anyway, all good! I got myself a 71 plate MG5 SR with just over 40k on the clock (battery at 98.3%), so this gives me huge amounts of confirmation bias! 😀
Thanks for the video upload. You are showing us a 3 year old vehicle. It's bound to be in good nick, even at the high mileage that you've done, there is absolutely no reason for the calipers to give in in such a short time (even with high mileage). My main concern is the longevity of the high voltage battery over a span of e.g. 10 years. Apparently, lithium batteries do age with time (in addition to usual usage factors etc.). That's the concern. If your MG5 was 14 years old with 144k miles and the battery was showing SOH of 91% I would imagine it would be very impressive. It's still impressive to see 91% SOH with such high mileage, however, the battery is only around 3 years old...
An ICE car would probably do about 250k before dying so would be finished in another two years as simply worn out. This MG is likely to still have more than 80% battery in two years so I'd say that's a win.....
@@chrispenn715 perhaps so, but in ICE you buy another low mileage engine and you keep going another 250k. Whereas in theory you could buy used battery for similar money for your MG, if you can find a decent one. I'm just not convinced by the volatility of the cells within the battery, one cell goes and it throws off performance of the battery for good.
@@Lukeaaaa But no one does that for a car like the MG5. The only time it's worth replacing the engine is if the car has some intrinsic value - ie it's rare, it's expensive etc. At 250,000 miles (that would be pretty unusual - I think the average is way less than that) most cars have so little value they aren't worth the cost of replacing an engine. Or a transmission. And BTW calipers are a mechanical item - they suffer wear and tear with use. And at 143K miles, cars without regen would most likely have worn them out or be close to wearing them out.
Average mileage of a dead ICE is 130k miles. Less than 1% get to 200k (iSeeCars) and then only with US$10k in repairs and maintenance (Consumer Reports). large data bases like the Tesla Dutch/Belgium show 300k is no problem with plenty at 500k. Dahn for Tesla has test cells that are at 6.5Mkm and still serviceable. Recurrent survey shows less than 2% of batteries replaced and then usually under warranty.Tesla battery replacements were too small to show on the graph which is why they went with reliability rather than repair-ability. Dahn recommends keeping LiIon cool for long life, and not leaving at high voltage for negligible degradation. He foresees stationary storage packs lasting 80 years, and all vehicle batteries having this role as a secondary life before crushing and recycling 97% of constituents into more batteries. th-cam.com/video/rOAYjcO6kao/w-d-xo.html
Thank you for this review. We have been driving an MG5 LR since July this year and so far we are very happy with this car. There is nothing to complain about except the missing dead angle assistant. Your video made me even more confident in this vehicle than before. Oh, Chinese women seem like a good choice, I didn't know that until now. 😂
Hello James, one thing you didn’t touch on, how is the drivers seat bearing up? I know you always use covers but I mean the actual structure - thanks for the update, my experience with Cleevelys was brilliant, thanks!
That’s amazing! For perspective I’ve got a 3 year old corsa E and that had a sticking rear caliper at 43000 miles literally just after the first MOT… full dealer service history is great… 😅
@@Jamesandkate nope, dealer said it wouldn’t be covered as it was out of warranty (by 2 weeks) and was considered wear and tear. Wanted an hours labour just to take a look so I stripped and cleaned them myself and put a little bit of Wurth Brake paste on the carrier to stop the pads sticking.
Been subscribed for quite a while and I love your honest and no nonsense approach. I've got a facelift MG ZS EV and it's a great car. I've suffered what seems to be the common problems of a knocking steering column (finally resolved under warranty) and seat 'leather' cracking - still arguing about that with the dealer. From this great video, it seems that the MG service schedule is a bit OTT. The last service cost me more that my petrol 4x4 Suzuki Vitara! I can't believe that the brake fluid needed changing after just 18,000 miles! Could you do a video about servicing MG EV's in the real world? For example annual checks, what are sensible service intervals. I'm due to get mine serviced next month but would like to get it done by Cleevely if that's really needed. It will be it's 3rd year service and an idea of service intervals for low mileage cars by an independent dealer would be really helpful.
just found your channel. Am on my 2nd Hyundai Kona electric via motablity. Would have looked at MG but dealer was rubbish. Kona is wonderful to ride in and wouldn't want to go back to ice car. enjoyed this video.
Just swapped a 2020 ZS EV for a new SR ZS EV, old 19,000 miles so not worked hard but the easier charging point was needed because I am disabled. I was happy to part with £11500 cash which might seem frightening depreciation but fuel ~ £450 (?) and servicing at the main dealer just over £450 including MOTs doesn't compare to a petrol or diesel. The new car much improved headlights and SatNav etc and more range which is obtained with higher 10-15% miles per kWh. Buying back in 2019/20 the motoring press were ridiculing punters who bought them. Who is laughing now!
It was the after sales that made us swap our MG5 for a Citroen e-C4. The dealer even got us a speeding ticket whilst falling to get MG UK to repair our broken radio. Have you needed to talk to MG UK about anything? How was it?
I seem to have got the only MG5 that ever properly broke down. A coolant leak inside the motor, apparently. Motor was replaced and never had another issue in the 2.5 years since 👍😉😀
@Jamesandkate Should add, I'm fully intending to never get rid. It's the perfect daily that's always impressed me. Gonna to get it fully detailed (she manky inside) and, if possible, Waxoyled underneath.
I have an MG5 face lift long range trophy model, it has just had it's second service at 33,000 miles. I have to say i'm really impressed with it, the brake pads are still at 80%. There one or two niggles i have such as the temperature controls are difficult to change whilst driving. I have bought a spare wheel recently after a puncture that the supplied gunge wouldn't fix, so I went online got one with a fitting kit, jack and delivered for £149.99, I took out the polystyrene thing out the boot and the spare dropped right in. I don't know why they don't offer one when you buy the car? Overall I'm really pleased with the car and would recommend one looking for an estate EV.
We buy any car thinks its worth £6,500, its a lot of car for the money. Glad your a true mechanic, you give out thee advice but don't do it yourself on your own car! Like they say never buy a mechanics car or a builders house!😉
Thank you James for a great video again. I bought a face lift MG5, based on your comments, and I am pleased with it. I notice you have a bumper protector on yours, do you happen to know if it would fit the face lift version (ie have you put one on the face lift versions you have) and obviously where did you get it from. I bought some protectors from China but the boot one does not fit. Please keep the videos coming, I miss your get away servicing videos around the country.
@@Jamesandkate Please, could you tell me if you got a guy working for you in Scotland? I remember in one of your videos, you said that is too much for you guys to come to Scotland, and it is better to hire someone locally.
Hopefully with the kia/hyundai group starting production of their commercial bev segments 25 onwards if cleverly requires "real" vans it would be great to see them in action. Cheers
I have a facelift LR MG5 registered 1 Mar 2023. Now at 18 months just short of 20,000 miles. Fantastic car, love it. But it has broken down 3 times and needed repair under warranty. The MG assistance recovered the car to the dealer, but it took them 24 hours to provide a replacement hire car. The dealer workshop has a month lead time so it takes several days for them to look at which means the hire car time expires and I have to change to a dealer provided car. The first breakdown was a remote key failure and took 3 months to get replacement parts from China. The second and third were battery issues, failing to charge and going into turtle mode at 30% charge. So great car, but poor support from MG/dealer when things go wrong.
@@Jamesandkatethat’s interesting. About 10-12 years ago I gave up on estate cars as I found the rear suspension wasn’t up to carrying the tools I needed as a property surveyor. 👍
@Jamesandkate I'll get you to do a service soon, my first service i got done at the local mg dealership but I like the way you operate by going the extra mile in lubricating and cleaning parts that the dealer wouldn't do on a normal service, so I'll get you to do one of those checks one day
Thanks for the update. I was wondering how the paint looks underneath. Have you seen any rot as a result of our salty winter roads? Does it need any wax oil? Also as you plan to run it into the ground. What do you think will kill it? I need to put a few more miles on my 22 plate as 30k looks like I have not been going anywhere in comparison. Your videos has reminded me to book my February service.
2 weeks ago i brought a 'high mileage' 2021 (70 plate) MG5 PFL with 76k on the clock. so far, any concern i have had has proven to be completely bunk. it's 1/3rd of the cost of my diesel van, services are half of the price, free road tax and, if i was so inclined, i could save even more money by searching around for a cheaper energy provider! (yes! i'm still using EDFS 23.5p/kw tarif and it's still cheaper!). at the price i got it at, it's just proving to be the best purchase of the century.
@@dorsetengineering it's a little confusing, the pre-facelift (so up to q3-2022) had NMC batteries across the range in the 51.5 and 61kwh afaik. The facelift then had an upgrade to LFP on the standard range (50.3kwh). I don't think the standard FL is sold here in the UK so it's fair to say they'll all be NMC for now. it's easy enough to check what type of battery they have though, there's a sticker on the battery which you can see behind the drivers side wheel. I'm sure people have gone out to buy the LFP explicitly because it's more tolerant to abuse though so I imagine you'd still come across it occationally.
Thanks for the reply. I’ve been trying to find a standard range facelift model (to get the lfp pack) but I simply cannot find any for sale anywhere In the Uk second hand market. I don’t think they were actively offered, was yours a special order?
@@dorsetengineering Sorry, Mine is still NMC, PFL in my first reply is for Pre-FaceLift. I don't think we have a standard range model in the facelift version yet compared to what's available in the EU. i suspect MG is prioritising the LFP packs for the base model MG4 before rolling them out in the UK for the SR MG5 (which may be in a few months imho, they've dropped the prices). LFP is still a relatively new tech and, if memory serves me correctly, the ZS EV had quite a problem with their LFP hybrid packs initially so i wouldn't be surprised if they're being careful. from what i hear, you can change the batteries over quite easily, there's no coding or anything. so you could get a cheaper NMC car for now and when the LFP packs become available swap it over. I'll probably do the same when my NMC battery has some time on it (it's still very happy though, maybe in a few years time).
My head is turned towards MG… great to know how well the EV5 is doing… worrying about the rust issues tho. Guess there is anti-perforation in the warranty.. 🤔
James in the video , the front left arm behind the left front wheel had a line that looked like a crack , right where it attaches to the car, could have been the light but perhaps have a look or watch the video back ??
I saw it too, at 8:29 in the video. Watched it a few times more and at first it looks like a tear in the metal, but later you can see that is where muck has been scraped off, presumably with the pry bar indeed. Phew.
My 2022 MG ZS EV SR is at just 24000 miles. SOH is at 91% (I have the original SAIC VDS tool and SIPS subscription). I wonder how you get 91% with 143k miles. We never DC charge but we charge every day from around 50 to 100% as you cant limit the charge and drive a lot of fast german Autobahn (110mph) . How do you charge? Oh and p.s. my rear brake disc are rusted inside as they are not used. So you should mention that sometimes users should use the brakes heavily to prevent this from happen.
I bought a used MG5 a few months ago, partly because I saw it was working well for you but mostly because it was the only estate/hatch EV available that could do over 200 miles for my budget. So far I'm very happy with it. Did you get the Tesla Charger firmware update?
@@Jamesandkate If you can drive the miles you do without using Tesla chargers then I suspect most people would be able to manage. I have a service coming up in a few months so will ask the dealer to check for firmware updates then. Thanks for another interesting video.
The MG5 can only be described as really impressive. I am hoping that you are going to run this one to destruction just to demonstrate how good an EV it really is.
Only 17500 miles in on mine. Had my first problems. ABS fault, Traction Control fault, Emergency braking not available, no hill start, and about 3 other errors I cant remember. Still drives, I'm booked in but earliest is a 2 week wait. I thought i was done with maintenance issues with cars when i bought this.
@@madm4tty I did think this, but the battery voltage seems fine. Also tried disconnecting the battery for 20 minutes to see if that cleared it, no joy. Had the annual service the week before, would they have checked 12v condition?
James, you mention battery replacement in your great video; is it feasible to replace a 2020 Tesla Model 3 Long Range battery with a 2022 Tesla Model 3 Long Range battery ?
Hey James, something that I’m curious about on the MG5 is the history of the platform. It looks like it uses a “cost-reduced” variant of the Astra-K platform. Have you seen much evidence of the GM-derived design underneath? Does it have many shared parts?
Yep, it's 100% an Astra estate chassis, but thats where it stops. All the running gear is either SAIC or VW. I often tell customers and they sound surprised.
Always interesting. I saw that you had the rear brake callipers off to check the brakes. Having the electric handbrake must make that a little trickier. I saw a vid where the person got someone to sit in the driver seat and sel3 t neutral to disengage the handbrake, then he unplugged the wiring to stop it coming back on. Is that how it's done? I'd like to keep things clean between dealer services but reluctant to do the back ones it in case it all goes wrong. Thanks.
That's a long winded way. With the car in 'Ready Mode' Push the 'P' button on the gear selector, release the park brake, then switch the car off. The park brake will stay off unless you spin the wheels quickly. If in doubt, disconnect the 12v after you switch off the car.
@malcym3394 using a different login by mistake. Hi again. Sorry to hassle you. I tried that and the park brake goes back on. I have a facelift - would that make a difference? Ready -> P = park brake won't go off Ready -> P+brake pedal = shifts to N, PB goes off, PB can toggle between off and on -> Switch off, no brake pedal = PB goes on Ready -> P+brake pedal = shifts to N, PB goes off, PB can toggle between off and on -> Switch off + brake pedal = PB goes on I don't want you to waste time helping me, but maybe I'm only missing a step somewhere?
Be really interested to know which cars are easy to do battery swaps on? And how easy it is to code new batteries to cars that need it. I keep being tempted by an ipace but seem to be lots of issues. If i knew it was easy to swap/repair a battery I might go for it
Cheers James thanks for the heads up on the revised version. I am looking to change my car next autumn and the MG5 is certainly on the list. You haven't mentioned rust problems ( cars not old enough yet I guess), any thoughts on protection like Lanoguard. Cheers
Thanks for sharing! Still looking very tidy for a "van"! Only downside with the facelift is the driver assistance system. What's your long term plan now the MG5 is being discontinued in favour of the less reliable MG4 estate?
@@esm7708 MG5 recently ranked 4th more reliable electric car on the road and the MG4 ranked dead last in the same reliability test. It was what car if you want to read it for yourself.
I'm hoping the MG4 will have the issues ironed out before the estate lands. I'm pretty sure most of the issues with the MG4 are software related, so I'm confident it should be ok.
Have an mg5 at work ....74 plate so new shape . Good stuffs a struggle to find to be honest . Its clearly built to a budget . Stuff that annoys is as follows . Getting in and out is a pisss take . The appiture is simply too small . To a 6`3`` guy its like being born again and the more rotund also really struggle . The screens not obvious . An easy example is try to find how to turn the fan speed up and down ..... its not in one of the easy to go to sub menus and yet the nav is . The boot lock is also oddly on the pisss . No idea why but its not in the centre of the boot and the rubber covering the switch doesnt feel like its the switch . Giving it a bit the arse end dips and the fronts all flighty and lost to the point its guess where you are going ! . Also find the centre console a bit intrusive . The hole under it is pointless . The radio stays on after you turn it off ..... so you think its still live which is beyond annoying . It also can and will lose the plot when you turn it on . Ready shows happily on the dash but it wont go into `gear` until pressed a second time .... even though its showing its live and ready to go ! . I also have to look at the gear change as rev and drive seem to be the wrong way round . Main thing is getting in and out crowning yourself on the bastard door daily . It comes to something the lads tend to reach for the keys to the remains of our pug partner thats 19 years old rather than the mg . I wish they had bought a leaf .......
totally disagree, I traded in a Leaf for MG5 a couple of weeks ago. The MG is a far superior car. Definitely twice as good. With the Leaf you will have issues with Rapidgate on long trips. But you are entitled to your opinion of course - I am 6ft1 so maybe the extra 2 inches height make a negative difference
@@TomMillarMusic I turned up at work today ... theres 2 vehicles , the MG or the diesel van ... guess what i was left with ? That says the findings of all of us . One of the lads has a less than 200 mile old BMW iX1 and he still jumps in the van rather than the MG ! . If you happy then thats good .
Hi James. I am looking for an ev to sleep in when i go on bike tours. I couldn't quite see if it was long enough when you opened the boot and did you need to remove the whole back seat to get a flat floor or just pop out the bit you sit on and fold the seat-back down? Thanks John
Hi John. The rear seats are out and we had a professional conversion carried out to install the base and bulkhead. I'm not sure this would be long enough unless the front seats are pushed forward and back rest in the forward most position.
@@Jamesandkate oh, thank you for getting back to me mate. No worries, there's a bloke up the road with one, i'll ask him if i can have a little lie down in the back.
Have you ever experienced any stickiness or notchyness in the steering at motorways speeds? We have a little on our 5 and wondered if in all your miles you ever had anything similar?
@@JamesFord-g1x yes I did. It started at around 60k but then disappeared again and haven’t felt it since. For me it was only when the steering was straight and I was making slight adjustments. I figured the strut top bearings were dry.
I wonder what's the LOWEST mileage around on a 3 year old MG5? My own 21 plate MG5 SR has just passed 10,000 last month (I bought it with only 7,700 after it had been barely used). I saw another three year old one for sale at a dealership near me with only 5,500 miles on it.
Hi James, you said in this video at min: 6:25, that the MG5 owners, can change the SR traction battery with LR traction battery by swaping them. Please could you tell me if you guys can do this? Thank you.
Love my mg5 but the software is driving me crazy, I use Apple CarPlay a lot as I’m rubbish with directions, I now have a wireless usb dongle for it and it’s a little better, if I got something from Halfords (full unit) would that sort the issue or would it no make a difference?
I have one of these mg 5's which is brilliant, 90000 trouble free miles, but the main complaint is the headlights are dreadful, does anyone have a fix for this. The high beam doesn't seem to work either
Pre-facelift? I think James has upgraded his to LED bulbs. I haven't. They aren't great on low beam but I have no complaints on high beam (auto high beam is not great though(
Surprised to see that MG’s are lasting this long. But I would rather stick with Tesla. I bought the highest mileage M3 2021 heat pump SR+ now it has 166k. 10% degraded and at some point averaged 260miles/day. I just had 500 mile road trip and averaged 200wh/m on a colder day. Nothing beats this on the EV market. After 3.5 years still 200miles on a full charge on a cold day! On low speeds and warm days it literally 130-150 watt hour per mile makes it go further then the range when was new.
@@Jamesandkate I don't know if you cover Scarborough, but I can always encourage them to get you - might help them make their mind up about their upcoming balloon payment decision
I have just watched the latest What Car worst car reliability survey that has the MG4 and ZS EV in its top ten most unreliable cars, with the MG dealership listed as the worst at number one. Now I have an MG4 coming up to two years old and my experience is not in alignment with their findings at all. Working in the trade, could you make some sense of these What Car findings. Thanks for the videos, I always make a point of watching them as they are always very informative.
The dealer network has been sketchy, that's true, but these figures also cover software issues, which is by far the biggest issue for electric cars, and MG.
I bought a 125 mile range EV 3 yrs ago £38k now worth £13k, fastest depreciating car I’ve ever owned. I used to by a new car every 3 years , not going to afford that for a while
Hi James i love your video’s, I’m looking to buy an electric vehicle so I had a test drive from Leicestershire down to my son in St Albans in an MG 5 face lift on the way we stopped at Toddington services on the M1 to have our first go at public charging , the first 150kw charger would not connect to the MG 5 face lift the second charger did , 20 minutes later we returned to the car removed the plug got into the car but it would not move, could not get reverse or forward on the selector , turned off and then on several times but the car would not move, eventually another EV driver at the charging point suggested we lock up the car and take a 10 minute walk around the services , on return the car went into reverse first time, the rest of the journey was absolutely fine. This episode has put me off buying an MG 5 , did I do something wrong or is this something that happens to this model. Would appreciate your take on this occurrence . Regards Michael O’Grady an inexperienced EV driver.
Hi. The only issues we ever have is with Gridserve units. Occasionally we have to disconnect the 12v to rectify the issue. 9/10 times they're fine, but on the odd accession it springs a fault in to the BMS. It's an on going software issue between MG and GS.
I pulled in by mistake at a Tesla supercharger at Moto Services, Exeter that wasn't open to non-Tesla vehicles. My MG5FL with the Tesla update wouldn't handshake, and like yours, wouldn't move when I unplugged. The dash indicated a "HV batttery fault" - Tesla had crashed my car's computer! So I forced the car to reboot by momentarily disconnecting the 12v battery negative and all was fine on reconnecting. I breathed a sight of relief and then drove to Tesla supercharger, Darts Farm, Topsham, Exeter where I charged as normal.
@@Jamesandkate I think he means do you have a rough estimate when the facelift was released? I.E March 2023 onwards facelifts were coming off the production line....
How are you finding it when it comes to rapid/public charging, I've had mine fail to handshake a fair few times. I've also found if it's connected to an A/C post that for whatever reason doesn't dispense power it tends to throw it in a fault condition where you either have to leave it alone for 10 mins or so or disconnect the 12v and reboot everything or it will throw a HV battery fault and refuse to engage the contactors.
Hello James. Really enjoyed this update/report as usual. Currently am considering buying one of the 'deals' on offer. Both brand new. SE £19,200 or Trophy £20,300. Which would you choose?
@@Jamesandkate Thanks James. The Trophy it is then. I agree with your costs analysis. After 6 years and 60,000 miles I estimate the car will have a private sale value of approx £8k at today's value given it will still have 1 years manufacturer's warranty remaining. The annual £2k depreciation is more than offset by the savings and reliability factor.
We’re so lucky to have this guy! Clearly an expert in the field providing us with an honest and educated review. Hats off to you, good sir!
PS: we’ve had our MG5 for 5 yrs now and couldn’t be happier with it. Trips to France and Ireland galore and not a single issue with it
Thanks for your nice comments 🙂
@@brunojl2 Yes, despite all the anti-EV types saying that we will have to buy a new battery every 5 years (despite a 7 or 8 year warranty being common) or you can't do long distances. Been to France 3 times over the past 9 months, not a problem in my mates MG4. My ZS EV (apart from the steering knock) has been faultless, long journeys are so relaxed and at 4.2 m/kW (or whatever it is!) is really cheap to run.
Hoping to get mine serviced by Cleeveley, already I feel more confident about them doing the car than the dealer!
Just done first 100 miles in my new MG5. Your reviews have me the confidence to buy. Thanks so much.
Great to hear!
Owned an MG5 SR for 4 years and just changed it to a new MG5 FL LR Trophy because of the crazy deals around (£20,500 for new metallic!). I've owned all sorts Audis, BMWs, Mercedes, VW but this has to be the best put together and most reliable I've had. And with James continually confirming that with his expert factual knowledge I know it's the right decision. This may well be the last car I buy.....
Awesome 👌🏻
@@Jamesandkate Should also say the new one was £1000 less than what I paid in Jan 2021 but in addition has a bigger battery, Adaptive Cruise Control, Interior rear seat lighting, Lane Keep assist, Traffic Jam assist, Driving speed assist, Headlight Beam assist, 360 Cameras, bigger internal screens, faster software, full LED external lights, better front charging port with lights to show progress, split level boot shelf, 500kg towing capacity, remote access with app, redesigned interior and seats, and Vehicle to Load capacity. So an amazing deal.
No good pedestrian detective system
Just bought our first BEV - a revised MG5, mostly because of watching you with yours. Thanks! The local MG dealer, which is 20 odd miles away, is useless so may well be contacting you for service in future. :)
This is an impressive and detailed vlog of an underestimated car. Thanks so much James. I can't believe it's needed so little. No wheel bearings failed or anything. The car may well be "free" by the end of it, because the running costs compared to a diesel!
Indeed, it's been awesome.
Absolutely amazing! - cracking video - from a MG4 owner / 2 years /30k miles = faultless
Thank you, glad the MG4 is looking after you.
My MG5 LR has just turned 25K miles. It's still got plenty tread on the front tyres and the interior is still tight as a drum. I've had cars in the past where the interior fit and finish starts to lose it's shine after a while (rattles, squeeks etc) but the MG5 still feels like like the day I drove it off the forecourt.
I'll stick my neck out and say that it's possibly the best car I've owned in my 30+ years of driving. It's literally cost me nothing to drive other than the electricity used to charge it.
Amazing, thanks for the feedback.
James does a great job with these updates on his fleet. I like how he shows the brake and suspension components, and matter of fact description of service needed vs. typical ICE equivalent. MG is delivering on EV reliability and durability, something startup companies often struggle with. The real world fuel and maintenance savings that James documents so well are a real draw to EVs, especially for high mileage fleet vehicles.
Thanks 🙏🏼
Great see the vehicle is still performing well. It’s people such as yourself that are providing that Ev batteries do go the distance. Let’s have another update at 200,000 moles if you still have the car
Probably do a few before that, every 20k seems to work well.
"Providing EV batteries do go the distance?"
You are joking?
A diesel... Especially the Ford Eco boost ("Eco boom") would be coming up to it's third cambelt change, 12th(?) Oil change, from what James said 4th set of front Discs/ Pads, plus filters, probably Injectors, etc, etc, etc. Then add the fuel savings.
I think that battery would be paid for easily IF it needs changing.
Correct?
@@rogerstarkey5390I think he meant proving, but it auto corrected to providing
On your experience I have got a mg5 sr with 111000 miles and have been very impressed with it thanks for sharing your experience with us
Great to hear!
Excellent video as always. Have a pre-facelift MG5 that i use as a Taxi. So pleased with it.
Amazing 👌🏻
My mg4 has clocked up 55000 kms. Early doors yet but very confident in it. I fear the seat ass switch will pack in first. Let’s see 👀
Great insights into the condition of a high mileage EV. Thank you.
You're welcome
Had your car on our drive the other day. Thanks for the Zoe service, really impressed how thorough you were. Thanks for not taking our Sprocker home, despite her taking a liking to you ( and your car).
I'm running the pre-facelift mg5 as a family car and its working well for us. The main attraction of the facelift model for me are the app (preheating and charge management) and ability to fit a towbar for my bike rack. Solid car.
Yeah, it's definitely a more family orientated car. They've also added LED headlamps, reworked the suspension and it looks more inviting too.
@@Jamesandkate interesting. How different is the facelift to drive? Does it still have the excellent ride comfort?
For the bike rack, I have bought the Thule 993 Outway Platform 2. It's an easy fit for the MG5 and means you don't have to worry about obscured number plate and lights. You can also leave it on the car and open the boot without the bike on (if you are careful, you can do it with the bike on). The MG is a fantastic car and has proved very reliable. Mine is on 83k miles now and runs like new. The last 8500 miles has returned 4.3 miles/kWh and easily gets 250+ miles on a full battery.
@@WoolyChewbakker looks really nice. Wouldn't work for me unfortunately as I need room for 4 bikes (partner and kids), and my e-mtb is too heavy. I use a Thule velospace xt4 instead, and just take my partners car (has a towbar) whenever we head out for a day on the bikes. My next EV (possibly a facelift MG5) will have a towbar!
Another great from yourself and the team and it’s good to see the car is going strong.
Thank you
I got the same LR model, and it's done nearly 100,000 miles. There are no issues. It's Used as a van. I recently upgraded the 12V battery to LFP, and the rear shocks were changed. It's the best car I've ever owned.
Interestng update thanks. I have an MG4 - will be 2 years old december. Ive done around 16000 miles and am very hsppy with reliability - its only needed a new door handle fitted and a software update - both under warranty. I've saved a lot in running costs, but depreciation is high as i bought soon after launch at rrp. Overall a very good result - I'm sceptical of the recent BS in the motoring press slagging off MG reliabilty....
Sadly there will be more of this. Journos seem to look after those that advertise in their magazines 🙄
Thanks for the update James.
No problems 👍🏼
Thank you for your videos about MG5's. We wanted a roomy car with a decent range, but at a sane price point. Your excellent and honest information guided us to the MG5. We live in the Channel Islands and - finally - our government recently offered incentives to buy electric (had to be purchased through a local agent, so couldn't use Jonathan Porterfield this time). We got an ex-demo SE long range. Superb car for long trips in France, as well as being great for daily use on our tiny Island's narrow lanes. Best of all, our Golden Retriever has ample room to enjoy rides in the boot. Cheers!
Nice one James, like you not bothered with warranty ... must get my second service sometime, 2020 ZS 😀
Fantastic update James, so,happy with our MG5 drives like a dream & zero problems, good advice on the wheel arches thanks. oh apart from my drivers windscreen wiper that still makes a juddering sound now & again, I tried to change the angle to make sure it’s parallel with the windscreen as it does look slightly angled but it wouldn’t move & unsure to force it, I’ll try some different wipers, you did recommended some I still haven’t ordered them. Must do that now winter is here.
We just fitted some Trico blades and they're very good. Worth a shot
@@Jamesandkate Thanks James you’re a super star!
Nice update, thank you James! Unfortunately Motorway returns the following: "Online valuation unavailable. We haven’t been able to generate a valuation for your car. This can happen if your car is rare, unique or has unusual mileage for its age." In my opinion the car industry still need to cotton on about the incredible longevity of EVs, and decouple this notion of "high mileage" from the car's value. It doesn't really matter how far an EV has travelled, the battery SoH is the key. All other things are low-value bits and bolts replacements. Anyway, all good! I got myself a 71 plate MG5 SR with just over 40k on the clock (battery at 98.3%), so this gives me huge amounts of confirmation bias! 😀
Thanks for the feedback, Jan. Glad your MG is looking after you.
Thanks for the video upload. You are showing us a 3 year old vehicle. It's bound to be in good nick, even at the high mileage that you've done, there is absolutely no reason for the calipers to give in in such a short time (even with high mileage). My main concern is the longevity of the high voltage battery over a span of e.g. 10 years. Apparently, lithium batteries do age with time (in addition to usual usage factors etc.). That's the concern. If your MG5 was 14 years old with 144k miles and the battery was showing SOH of 91% I would imagine it would be very impressive.
It's still impressive to see 91% SOH with such high mileage, however, the battery is only around 3 years old...
An ICE car would probably do about 250k before dying so would be finished in another two years as simply worn out. This MG is likely to still have more than 80% battery in two years so I'd say that's a win.....
@@chrispenn715 perhaps so, but in ICE you buy another low mileage engine and you keep going another 250k. Whereas in theory you could buy used battery for similar money for your MG, if you can find a decent one. I'm just not convinced by the volatility of the cells within the battery, one cell goes and it throws off performance of the battery for good.
@@Lukeaaaa But no one does that for a car like the MG5. The only time it's worth replacing the engine is if the car has some intrinsic value - ie it's rare, it's expensive etc. At 250,000 miles (that would be pretty unusual - I think the average is way less than that) most cars have so little value they aren't worth the cost of replacing an engine. Or a transmission. And BTW calipers are a mechanical item - they suffer wear and tear with use. And at 143K miles, cars without regen would most likely have worn them out or be close to wearing them out.
Average mileage of a dead ICE is 130k miles. Less than 1% get to 200k (iSeeCars) and then only with US$10k in repairs and maintenance (Consumer Reports).
large data bases like the Tesla Dutch/Belgium show 300k is no problem with plenty at 500k. Dahn for Tesla has test cells that are at 6.5Mkm and still serviceable.
Recurrent survey shows less than 2% of batteries replaced and then usually under warranty.Tesla battery replacements were too small to show on the graph which is why they went with reliability rather than repair-ability.
Dahn recommends keeping LiIon cool for long life, and not leaving at high voltage for negligible degradation. He foresees stationary storage packs lasting 80 years, and all vehicle batteries having this role as a secondary life before crushing and recycling 97% of constituents into more batteries.
th-cam.com/video/rOAYjcO6kao/w-d-xo.html
@@waynerussell6401 thanks. Good to see facts being used in the ice-ev debate 👍
Thank you for this review. We have been driving an MG5 LR since July this year and so far we are very happy with this car. There is nothing to complain about except the missing dead angle assistant. Your video made me even more confident in this vehicle than before. Oh, Chinese women seem like a good choice, I didn't know that until now. 😂
Hello James, one thing you didn’t touch on, how is the drivers seat bearing up? I know you always use covers but I mean the actual structure - thanks for the update, my experience with Cleevelys was brilliant, thanks!
Hi. The seat hasn't got any worse. It's still comfy so I've pretty much forgotten about it.
That’s amazing! For perspective I’ve got a 3 year old corsa E and that had a sticking rear caliper at 43000 miles literally just after the first MOT… full dealer service history is great… 😅
I've seen a few as it happens on some other Stellantis cars. Did you get it under warranty??
@@Jamesandkate nope, dealer said it wouldn’t be covered as it was out of warranty (by 2 weeks) and was considered wear and tear. Wanted an hours labour just to take a look so I stripped and cleaned them myself and put a little bit of Wurth Brake paste on the carrier to stop the pads sticking.
Been subscribed for quite a while and I love your honest and no nonsense approach.
I've got a facelift MG ZS EV and it's a great car. I've suffered what seems to be the common problems of a knocking steering column (finally resolved under warranty) and seat 'leather' cracking - still arguing about that with the dealer.
From this great video, it seems that the MG service schedule is a bit OTT. The last service cost me more that my petrol 4x4 Suzuki Vitara! I can't believe that the brake fluid needed changing after just 18,000 miles!
Could you do a video about servicing MG EV's in the real world? For example annual checks, what are sensible service intervals. I'm due to get mine serviced next month but would like to get it done by Cleevely if that's really needed. It will be it's 3rd year service and an idea of service intervals for low mileage cars by an independent dealer would be really helpful.
Pop us an email to mobile@cleevelyev.co.uk and we can sort that all out for you 👍🏼
My MG5 goes for its first MOT in a couple weeks, at 28k miles. Pretty confident it will pass... Literally no issues to report
Of the tyres are good it should sail through 🙏🏼
just found your channel. Am on my 2nd Hyundai Kona electric via motablity. Would have looked at MG but dealer was rubbish. Kona is wonderful to ride in and wouldn't want to go back to ice car. enjoyed this video.
Just swapped a 2020 ZS EV for a new SR ZS EV, old 19,000 miles so not worked hard but the easier charging point was needed because I am disabled. I was happy to part with £11500 cash which might seem frightening depreciation but fuel ~ £450 (?) and servicing at the main dealer just over £450 including MOTs doesn't compare to a petrol or diesel. The new car much improved headlights and SatNav etc and more range which is obtained with higher 10-15% miles per kWh. Buying back in 2019/20 the motoring press were ridiculing punters who bought them. Who is laughing now!
That is impressive stats what that MG5 is showing .
She is doing very well,very impressive,cheers fella 👍
It was the after sales that made us swap our MG5 for a Citroen e-C4. The dealer even got us a speeding ticket whilst falling to get MG UK to repair our broken radio.
Have you needed to talk to MG UK about anything? How was it?
Not as yet, but we would use one dealer who we know are very good. Sorry for your shitty experience 🙁
Great video and update James 👍. You've got some way to catch me up with my ZS EV on 204k ;)
I reckon I'll catch you by the end of 2025 😂😂😂
How's it doing? Do you know the battery health?
I seem to have got the only MG5 that ever properly broke down.
A coolant leak inside the motor, apparently. Motor was replaced and never had another issue in the 2.5 years since 👍😉😀
Wow, that's a rare one but I suppose there will be premature failures. Glad it's sorted for you 👍🏼
@Jamesandkate Should add, I'm fully intending to never get rid. It's the perfect daily that's always impressed me.
Gonna to get it fully detailed (she manky inside) and, if possible, Waxoyled underneath.
Thanks for the detailed update ! At 8:32 isn't there a crack in the bottom control arm ?
Someone else said this. It's where I scratched the arm with my pry bar 👍🏼
I have an MG5 face lift long range trophy model, it has just had it's second service at 33,000 miles. I have to say i'm really impressed with it, the brake pads are still at 80%. There one or two niggles i have such as the temperature controls are difficult to change whilst driving. I have bought a spare wheel recently after a puncture that the supplied gunge wouldn't fix, so I went online got one with a fitting kit, jack and delivered for £149.99, I took out the polystyrene thing out the boot and the spare dropped right in. I don't know why they don't offer one when you buy the car?
Overall I'm really pleased with the car and would recommend one looking for an estate EV.
We buy any car thinks its worth £6,500, its a lot of car for the money. Glad your a true mechanic, you give out thee advice but don't do it yourself on your own car! Like they say never buy a mechanics car or a builders house!😉
Thanks for that. It's so true. Customers cars get well looked after, mine, less so.
This has done mainly Motorway work, so straight line, constant speed.
There's little wear.
Why wouldn't you buy this one?
Brilliant update - other than a bit of a dirty underside it looks pretty good.
Thank you 🙏🏼
Thank you James for a great video again. I bought a face lift MG5, based on your comments, and I am pleased with it. I notice you have a bumper protector on yours, do you happen to know if it would fit the face lift version (ie have you put one on the face lift versions you have) and obviously where did you get it from. I bought some protectors from China but the boot one does not fit. Please keep the videos coming, I miss your get away servicing videos around the country.
Considering the mileage covered, the damage and few stone chips are very minor and easy to fix.
Yeah. If we sell it on we'll spruce it up before it goes.
Great video as always. I was wondering when you'll make another video. Please, could you do at least one video a month?
Thank you. I try to keep the vids 20,000 apart or I feel there's nothing new to tell. Every month would be 4k apart, maybe a bit too regular?
@@Jamesandkate Please, could you tell me if you got a guy working for you in Scotland? I remember in one of your videos, you said that is too much for you guys to come to Scotland, and it is better to hire someone locally.
@@calutuuWe have a tech in Scotland now. He's been on the road for a year and is a great guy 👍🏼
The battery state of health is 91%, but what impact have you seen in terms of reduction in range, if any?
Hopefully with the kia/hyundai group starting production of their commercial bev segments 25 onwards if cleverly requires "real" vans it would be great to see them in action. Cheers
I have a facelift LR MG5 registered 1 Mar 2023. Now at 18 months just short of 20,000 miles. Fantastic car, love it. But it has broken down 3 times and needed repair under warranty. The MG assistance recovered the car to the dealer, but it took them 24 hours to provide a replacement hire car. The dealer workshop has a month lead time so it takes several days for them to look at which means the hire car time expires and I have to change to a dealer provided car. The first breakdown was a remote key failure and took 3 months to get replacement parts from China. The second and third were battery issues, failing to charge and going into turtle mode at 30% charge. So great car, but poor support from MG/dealer when things go wrong.
You say it is fantastic, how, it has broken down 3 times in 18 months. My ICE Honda from new 11 years, hannover broken down.
My’14 ampera, 175k, original front discs and pads, no lip…. Rears rotted out so had to be replaced at 160k ish…
That's good going. Regen for the win.
What are shock absorbers like James, especially the rears, given the load of kit you carry around?
No issues, just a little misting. Drives beautifully 👌🏻
@@Jamesandkatethat’s interesting. About 10-12 years ago I gave up on estate cars as I found the rear suspension wasn’t up to carrying the tools I needed as a property surveyor. 👍
Look forward to you doing some servicing on my taxi in plymouth over next couple years
I was there last week 👍🏼
@Jamesandkate I'll get you to do a service soon, my first service i got done at the local mg dealership but I like the way you operate by going the extra mile in lubricating and cleaning parts that the dealer wouldn't do on a normal service, so I'll get you to do one of those checks one day
Thanks for the update. I was wondering how the paint looks underneath. Have you seen any rot as a result of our salty winter roads? Does it need any wax oil? Also as you plan to run it into the ground. What do you think will kill it? I need to put a few more miles on my 22 plate as 30k looks like I have not been going anywhere in comparison. Your videos has reminded me to book my February service.
I think we'll run to 200k, by then there will be an MG4 estate with a, hopefully, solid state battery. No rot or anything to report 👌🏻
Good to know that it looks good underneath.
2 weeks ago i brought a 'high mileage' 2021 (70 plate) MG5 PFL with 76k on the clock. so far, any concern i have had has proven to be completely bunk. it's 1/3rd of the cost of my diesel van, services are half of the price, free road tax and, if i was so inclined, i could save even more money by searching around for a cheaper energy provider! (yes! i'm still using EDFS 23.5p/kw tarif and it's still cheaper!). at the price i got it at, it's just proving to be the best purchase of the century.
I didn’t think we had lfp packed mg5 here in the UK? I thought that both the 51 and 61 kWh were NMC?
@@dorsetengineering it's a little confusing, the pre-facelift (so up to q3-2022) had NMC batteries across the range in the 51.5 and 61kwh afaik. The facelift then had an upgrade to LFP on the standard range (50.3kwh). I don't think the standard FL is sold here in the UK so it's fair to say they'll all be NMC for now. it's easy enough to check what type of battery they have though, there's a sticker on the battery which you can see behind the drivers side wheel. I'm sure people have gone out to buy the LFP explicitly because it's more tolerant to abuse though so I imagine you'd still come across it occationally.
Thanks for the reply. I’ve been trying to find a standard range facelift model (to get the lfp pack) but I simply cannot find any for sale anywhere In the Uk second hand market. I don’t think they were actively offered, was yours a special order?
@@dorsetengineering Sorry, Mine is still NMC, PFL in my first reply is for Pre-FaceLift. I don't think we have a standard range model in the facelift version yet compared to what's available in the EU. i suspect MG is prioritising the LFP packs for the base model MG4 before rolling them out in the UK for the SR MG5 (which may be in a few months imho, they've dropped the prices). LFP is still a relatively new tech and, if memory serves me correctly, the ZS EV had quite a problem with their LFP hybrid packs initially so i wouldn't be surprised if they're being careful. from what i hear, you can change the batteries over quite easily, there's no coding or anything. so you could get a cheaper NMC car for now and when the LFP packs become available swap it over. I'll probably do the same when my NMC battery has some time on it (it's still very happy though, maybe in a few years time).
My head is turned towards MG… great to know how well the EV5 is doing… worrying about the rust issues tho. Guess there is anti-perforation in the warranty.. 🤔
There is a warranty on this, I think European law states 10 years.
James in the video , the front left arm behind the left front wheel had a line that looked like a crack , right where it attaches to the car, could have been the light but perhaps have a look or watch the video back ??
I've just watched it back. It's where I'd shoved my pry bar in to check for play in the rear bushes 👍🏼
Had me worried for a second 😳
I saw it too, at 8:29 in the video. Watched it a few times more and at first it looks like a tear in the metal, but later you can see that is where muck has been scraped off, presumably with the pry bar indeed. Phew.
@@Jamesandkate ah good 👍 I was going to call you this morning , but glad it’s fine
Remarkable, especially given the mileage. Great info.
Great video, thanks for the interesting information.
Thanks and glad you enjoyed it.
Nice Dagger James.
My 2022 MG ZS EV SR is at just 24000 miles. SOH is at 91% (I have the original SAIC VDS tool and SIPS subscription). I wonder how you get 91% with 143k miles.
We never DC charge but we charge every day from around 50 to 100% as you cant limit the charge and drive a lot of fast german Autobahn (110mph) . How do you charge?
Oh and p.s. my rear brake disc are rusted inside as they are not used. So you should mention that sometimes users should use the brakes heavily to prevent this from happen.
Good video James,just off to Autotrader. If you say they are brilliant cars,then that’s good enough for me.
Thank you. You can pick them up brand new for 20k now, they're clearing old stock.
@@JamesandkateMust be desperate to clear them , massive financial loss to MG. I wonder what Barrie Crompton would say 🤔😂.
@@davidtaylorbfd new model coming shortly, clearing the decks for that.
When you talk about the wheel arches, is it possible to clean/spray with the the wheel on?
It is, but jacking it up will give you more access if you can't remove the wheels.
I bought a used MG5 a few months ago, partly because I saw it was working well for you but mostly because it was the only estate/hatch EV available that could do over 200 miles for my budget. So far I'm very happy with it.
Did you get the Tesla Charger firmware update?
That's great. I haven't bothered with the Tesla update, but if it was my own car I probably would.
@@Jamesandkate If you can drive the miles you do without using Tesla chargers then I suspect most people would be able to manage. I have a service coming up in a few months so will ask the dealer to check for firmware updates then.
Thanks for another interesting video.
The MG5 can only be described as really impressive. I am hoping that you are going to run this one to destruction just to demonstrate how good an EV it really is.
That's the plan, unless something better comes along 🤔
Only 17500 miles in on mine. Had my first problems. ABS fault, Traction Control fault, Emergency braking not available, no hill start, and about 3 other errors I cant remember. Still drives, I'm booked in but earliest is a 2 week wait. I thought i was done with maintenance issues with cars when i bought this.
Check the 12v battery, in my experience any sort of ‘gremlins’ with strange errors seems to be down to a dying 12v most of the time with modern EVs
@@madm4tty I did think this, but the battery voltage seems fine. Also tried disconnecting the battery for 20 minutes to see if that cleared it, no joy. Had the annual service the week before, would they have checked 12v condition?
@@dannyjones296it’s not necessarily the voltage but capacity. Best to get a battery specialist to run a check on it.
Hi James .Thanks for the update. Im going to buy one for taxi use. Does your company cover the Bournemouth and Poole area please?
Great video. I drive the facelift version and love it. Where did you get the tailgate bumper protector from?
Thanks. I got it from eBay or Amazon, can't remember which. It's a generic fit but sits nicely.
James, you mention battery replacement in your great video; is it feasible to replace a 2020 Tesla Model 3 Long Range battery with a 2022 Tesla Model 3 Long Range battery ?
Great video
Thank you.
Hey James, something that I’m curious about on the MG5 is the history of the platform. It looks like it uses a “cost-reduced” variant of the Astra-K platform. Have you seen much evidence of the GM-derived design underneath? Does it have many shared parts?
Yep, it's 100% an Astra estate chassis, but thats where it stops. All the running gear is either SAIC or VW. I often tell customers and they sound surprised.
@@Jamesandkate I’m surprised a little by VW, but it makes some sense given SAIC builds VWs in China with their partnership.
Always interesting. I saw that you had the rear brake callipers off to check the brakes. Having the electric handbrake must make that a little trickier. I saw a vid where the person got someone to sit in the driver seat and sel3 t neutral to disengage the handbrake, then he unplugged the wiring to stop it coming back on. Is that how it's done? I'd like to keep things clean between dealer services but reluctant to do the back ones it in case it all goes wrong. Thanks.
That's a long winded way. With the car in 'Ready Mode' Push the 'P' button on the gear selector, release the park brake, then switch the car off. The park brake will stay off unless you spin the wheels quickly. If in doubt, disconnect the 12v after you switch off the car.
@@Jamesandkate Thanks James. I'll give that a try. Very much appreciate you replying!
@@malcym3394the car also has a park pawl so it won't roll away 👍🏼
@malcym3394 using a different login by mistake.
Hi again. Sorry to hassle you. I tried that and the park brake goes back on. I have a facelift - would that make a difference?
Ready -> P = park brake won't go off
Ready -> P+brake pedal = shifts to N, PB goes off, PB can toggle between off and on -> Switch off, no brake pedal = PB goes on
Ready -> P+brake pedal = shifts to N, PB goes off, PB can toggle between off and on -> Switch off + brake pedal = PB goes on
I don't want you to waste time helping me, but maybe I'm only missing a step somewhere?
Be really interested to know which cars are easy to do battery swaps on?
And how easy it is to code new batteries to cars that need it.
I keep being tempted by an ipace but seem to be lots of issues. If i knew it was easy to swap/repair a battery I might go for it
Cheers James thanks for the heads up on the revised version. I am looking to change my car next autumn and the MG5 is certainly on the list. You haven't mentioned rust problems ( cars not old enough yet I guess), any thoughts on protection like Lanoguard. Cheers
Yeah, avoid the white, it's a bit of thin, but the other colours are multicoat and a lot better 👍🏼
@@Jamesandkate can you elaborate? I bought a white one... is there anything I can do to extend the life? Planning to drive it for at least ten years
Thanks for sharing!
Still looking very tidy for a "van"!
Only downside with the facelift is the driver assistance system.
What's your long term plan now the MG5 is being discontinued in favour of the less reliable MG4 estate?
@@UpsideDownFork less reliable?
@@esm7708 MG5 recently ranked 4th more reliable electric car on the road and the MG4 ranked dead last in the same reliability test. It was what car if you want to read it for yourself.
@@UpsideDownFork blimey. I'm a little surprised. Lucky my wife's is a lease.
I will concede the lane assist is terrifying.
@@esm7708I was very surprised as well!
I'm hoping the MG4 will have the issues ironed out before the estate lands. I'm pretty sure most of the issues with the MG4 are software related, so I'm confident it should be ok.
Have an mg5 at work ....74 plate so new shape .
Good stuffs a struggle to find to be honest . Its clearly built to a budget .
Stuff that annoys is as follows . Getting in and out is a pisss take . The appiture is simply too small . To a 6`3`` guy its like being born again and the more rotund also really struggle . The screens not obvious . An easy example is try to find how to turn the fan speed up and down ..... its not in one of the easy to go to sub menus and yet the nav is .
The boot lock is also oddly on the pisss . No idea why but its not in the centre of the boot and the rubber covering the switch doesnt feel like its the switch .
Giving it a bit the arse end dips and the fronts all flighty and lost to the point its guess where you are going ! .
Also find the centre console a bit intrusive . The hole under it is pointless .
The radio stays on after you turn it off ..... so you think its still live which is beyond annoying . It also can and will lose the plot when you turn it on . Ready shows happily on the dash but it wont go into `gear` until pressed a second time .... even though its showing its live and ready to go ! . I also have to look at the gear change as rev and drive seem to be the wrong way round .
Main thing is getting in and out crowning yourself on the bastard door daily . It comes to something the lads tend to reach for the keys to the remains of our pug partner thats 19 years old rather than the mg . I wish they had bought a leaf .......
totally disagree, I traded in a Leaf for MG5 a couple of weeks ago. The MG is a far superior car. Definitely twice as good. With the Leaf you will have issues with Rapidgate on long trips. But you are entitled to your opinion of course - I am 6ft1 so maybe the extra 2 inches height make a negative difference
@@TomMillarMusic I turned up at work today ... theres 2 vehicles , the MG or the diesel van ... guess what i was left with ?
That says the findings of all of us . One of the lads has a less than 200 mile old BMW iX1 and he still jumps in the van rather than the MG ! .
If you happy then thats good .
Every ICE car I've ever owned has been scrapped before it reached 140K miles.
Pretty standard, although I've had a few 150k+ VW's, but they were sheds at that point
I've run some old vag 1.9 pd engines well over 300k . Much better than the 1.6 cr they replaced it with.
Hi James.
I am looking for an ev to sleep in when i go on bike tours.
I couldn't quite see if it was long enough when you opened the boot and did you need to remove the whole back seat to get a flat floor or just pop out the bit you sit on and fold the seat-back down?
Thanks John
Hi John. The rear seats are out and we had a professional conversion carried out to install the base and bulkhead. I'm not sure this would be long enough unless the front seats are pushed forward and back rest in the forward most position.
@@Jamesandkate oh, thank you for getting back to me mate.
No worries, there's a bloke up the road with one, i'll ask him if i can have a little lie down in the back.
Have you ever experienced any stickiness or notchyness in the steering at motorways speeds?
We have a little on our 5 and wondered if in all your miles you ever had anything similar?
@@JamesFord-g1x yes I did. It started at around 60k but then disappeared again and haven’t felt it since. For me it was only when the steering was straight and I was making slight adjustments. I figured the strut top bearings were dry.
@ ah interesting thanks for the response.
I will have a look at the bearings
It’s just slightly irritating :)
I wonder what's the LOWEST mileage around on a 3 year old MG5? My own 21 plate MG5 SR has just passed 10,000 last month (I bought it with only 7,700 after it had been barely used). I saw another three year old one for sale at a dealership near me with only 5,500 miles on it.
James, there is a crack in the arm at 08:30.
That's a safety issue.
That thing could break at any moment now.
Maybe its not a crack, please double check it as they pattern look a lot like a crack.
Hi James, you said in this video at min: 6:25, that the MG5 owners, can change the SR traction battery with LR traction battery by swaping them. Please could you tell me if you guys can do this? Thank you.
MG5 EV in Thailand call name is MG EP there is a lot of problems case with AC system. The most case is HV battery shut off.
I might of missed it, but although the battery SOH is holding strong. Is the range behaving the same or have you range behaviour differently?
Do you guys have any petite ladies driving the Mg5s? I'm looking at purchasing one but I'm teeny tiny at 4'9 and struggle to drive some cars safely!
Love my mg5 but the software is driving me crazy, I use Apple CarPlay a lot as I’m rubbish with directions, I now have a wireless usb dongle for it and it’s a little better, if I got something from Halfords (full unit) would that sort the issue or would it no make a difference?
It would sort it. Have you used a genuine cable, mine works well with one.
@@Jamesandkate I have yes and that worked 90% of the time it’s just a pain every now and again it’s rubbish
I have one of these mg 5's which is brilliant, 90000 trouble free miles, but the main complaint is the headlights are dreadful, does anyone have a fix for this. The high beam doesn't seem to work either
Pre-facelift? I think James has upgraded his to LED bulbs. I haven't. They aren't great on low beam but I have no complaints on high beam (auto high beam is not great though(
Similar problem on Mk1 MG ZS. I swapped the bulbs for Osram Nightbreaker, far better than standard although not up to LED levels
I did fit LEDs, but went back to Osram Nightbreakers when the LEDs failed. Overall, they're quite poor.
Battery SOH 91% at 143k miles. Never serviced. Savings over equivalent fuel car of £17,000 over the same period in fuel savings
Exactly that 👌🏻
Do you know what the increased weight of the car is when you are fully loaded with tools and spares?
Yeah, with me and the tools it's about 1800kgs
@@Jamesandkate wow.. even more impressive
Delighted for SAIC and the Chinese 🇨🇳
Top Chinese tyres 🛞 too.
Why have you got two commando daggers on the back of this car???
Surprised to see that MG’s are lasting this long.
But I would rather stick with Tesla.
I bought the highest mileage M3 2021 heat pump SR+ now it has 166k.
10% degraded and at some point averaged 260miles/day.
I just had 500 mile road trip and averaged 200wh/m on a colder day. Nothing beats this on the EV market. After 3.5 years still 200miles on a full charge on a cold day!
On low speeds and warm days it literally 130-150 watt hour per mile makes it go further then the range when was new.
How's the rear subframe?
Is that one of those cars with the 'for decorative purposes only' roof rails?
It is not. They are rated to 75kg from memory (I have one). I think they were not rated when initially released though, that rating came late
75kgs rating.
When i use my OBD2 dongle - car scanner pro doesnt pick up my mums MG5 well at all and i cant see the SOH. do you use a different app for it?
We use diagnostic equipment which can give a 3 month average for accuracy. Do we service it? If we do we supply this as part of the service.
@@Jamesandkate I don't know if you cover Scarborough, but I can always encourage them to get you - might help them make their mind up about their upcoming balloon payment decision
@@Lewis_StandingJames came to me in Filey. Very happy with the service.
@@Lewis_Standing we do cover Scarborough, we have plenty of customers there.
I have just watched the latest What Car worst car reliability survey that has the MG4 and ZS EV in its top ten most unreliable cars, with the MG dealership listed as the worst at number one. Now I have an MG4 coming up to two years old and my experience is not in alignment with their findings at all. Working in the trade, could you make some sense of these What Car findings. Thanks for the videos, I always make a point of watching them as they are always very informative.
The dealer network has been sketchy, that's true, but these figures also cover software issues, which is by far the biggest issue for electric cars, and MG.
For some reason, TH-cam has unsubed me! I only spotted this video becuse I follow you on Twitter
I bought a 125 mile range EV 3 yrs ago £38k now worth £13k, fastest depreciating car I’ve ever owned. I used to by a new car every 3 years , not going to afford that for a while
Which car is it
Honda e
Hi James i love your video’s, I’m looking to buy an electric vehicle so I had a test drive from Leicestershire down to my son in St Albans in an MG 5 face lift on the way we stopped at Toddington services on the M1 to have our first go at public charging , the first 150kw charger would not connect to the MG 5 face lift the second charger did , 20 minutes later we returned to the car removed the plug got into the car but it would not move, could not get reverse or forward on the selector , turned off and then on several times but the car would not move, eventually another EV driver at the charging point suggested we lock up the car and take a 10 minute walk around the services , on return the car went into reverse first time, the rest of the journey was absolutely fine. This episode has put me off buying an MG 5 , did I do something wrong or is this something that happens to this model. Would appreciate your take on this occurrence . Regards Michael O’Grady an inexperienced EV driver.
Hi. The only issues we ever have is with Gridserve units. Occasionally we have to disconnect the 12v to rectify the issue. 9/10 times they're fine, but on the odd accession it springs a fault in to the BMS. It's an on going software issue between MG and GS.
I pulled in by mistake at a Tesla supercharger at Moto Services, Exeter that wasn't open to non-Tesla vehicles. My MG5FL with the Tesla update wouldn't handshake, and like yours, wouldn't move when I unplugged. The dash indicated a "HV batttery fault" - Tesla had crashed my car's computer! So I forced the car to reboot by momentarily disconnecting the 12v battery negative and all was fine on reconnecting. I breathed a sight of relief and then drove to Tesla supercharger, Darts Farm, Topsham, Exeter where I charged as normal.
When as the facelift
Sorry, you've lost me?
…..for the car!
@@Jamesandkate I think he means do you have a rough estimate when the facelift was released? I.E March 2023 onwards facelifts were coming off the production line....
@@markthomasson5077late 2022
How are you finding it when it comes to rapid/public charging, I've had mine fail to handshake a fair few times.
I've also found if it's connected to an A/C post that for whatever reason doesn't dispense power it tends to throw it in a fault condition where you either have to leave it alone for 10 mins or so or disconnect the 12v and reboot everything or it will throw a HV battery fault and refuse to engage the contactors.
I've had a few issues, they are always on Gridserve ABB units. Never had any AC issues though. I keep a 10mm spanner handy for exactly this 😂
@@Jamesandkate Hah I do have a 10mm insulated spanner in the glovebox ;-)
Great to see its still pushing on 💯. My Tesla M3 LR went over 111k, no worries 🤷♂️
Nice work!
Out of interest, how much is a set of new tyres?
What brand? They vary in price by a fair bit. £400 to £600
We paid £280+vat for these 4
Hello James.
Really enjoyed this update/report as usual.
Currently am considering buying one of the 'deals' on offer.
Both brand new. SE £19,200 or Trophy £20,300.
Which would you choose?
Save some money buy a low mileage second hand Trophy!
My dad brought one brand new! Even though he likes it, the depreciation stings for him
I'd take the Trophy, it had a few extras that I like. We only have the higher spec cars for the lads.
@@Jamesandkate Thanks James.
The Trophy it is then.
I agree with your costs analysis.
After 6 years and 60,000 miles I estimate the car will have a private sale value of approx £8k at today's value given it will still have 1 years manufacturer's warranty remaining.
The annual £2k depreciation is more than offset by the savings and reliability factor.
We went non-trophy on our pre-facelift SR because after having driven both my wife hated the slightly aggressive LKA. It's not for everyone!
Has it lost any horsepower?
No, it still pulls very well.
Electric Motors don't lose horsepower.