Battery range concerns on S5

[ATull]

I've had my Trophy S5 for around 4 months, and have been consistently underwhelmed with the range I can get from it.
I'm keen to know if this performance does seem lower than it should be, or not.
I typically get 3.3-3.6miles/kw, which would be made up mostly of 30mph driving with max regen braking (albeit this has been in colder months - but I use heated seat, not cabin).
I did a mostly motorway drive at the weekend with these stats:
Started with 100% SOC, outside temp over 10degrees, fairly blustery side-winds, 3 passengers, avg. speed 39mph.
I was down to 15% battery after 122miles, with an estimated remaining range of 26miles - totalling a range of 148miles from 100% SOC.
Giving me 3.0miles/kw.
It just seems a long way from where it should be.
I got the car as an ex-display with 800miles on the clock. The salesman's charging habits for these 800miles was drive to work, plug it in all day, everyday, meaning the battery would have remained between around 90-100% SOC almost constantly. I'm just wondering whether this might have caused damage to the battery, impacting it's performance.
Grateful for your thoughts and personal range experiences.

 

[Porsche944]

I would discharge to <10% and then do a slow UNINTERUPTED recharge to 100%. This is what everyone seems to recommend. I did this a few weeks ago and whilst I am getting more range I suspect the slightly warmer weather is influencing it as well.

 

[Rei]

It's a bit marginal. In the winter, cold and wet, at 70 on the motorway I was seeing 200 miles of actual range, somewhere in the 3.2 mi/kWh range.

The actual usable battery capacity is something like 62kWh I think (some is reserved in all EVs) so 148 miles is something like 2.4mi/kWh if I'm not mistaken. That's very low.

 

[Porsche944]

It's a bit marginal. In the winter, cold and wet, at 70 on the motorway I was seeing 200 miles of actual range, somewhere in the 3.2 mi/kWh range.

The actual usable battery capacity is something like 62kWh I think (some is reserved in all EVs) so 148 miles is something like 2.4mi/kWh if I'm not mistaken. That's very low.

Reset the trip, mine is best in free flowing traffic at around 40-55MPH It is worse in stop start or motorway speeds. But I get 2.x worst case & so far 3.7 Best case. Obviously outside air temp affects this.

 

[Ruislip Resident]

Sounds low. In the depths of winter with heating on I was getting around 200 miles range (or equiv miles per kWh). Now its 280 to 290'sh.

 

[Rei]

Yes, I should mention I usually have the heating on in the winter.

Anyone know how to check the battery SoH? Is there an app like the old Leafspy that lets you see things like cell voltages?

 

[Ian Key]

@ATull unless you've been pre-heating the cabin or the battery that does seem on the low side. It might benefit the car to do a balance charge by charging to 100% on a AC charger and leaving it connected for up to an hour while it balances the cells. The charging rate will fluctuate between 0 and 1.8kW while it does this.

 

[Lovemyev]

Yes, I should mention I usually have the heating on in the winter.

Anyone know how to check the battery SoH? Is there an app like the old Leafspy that lets you see things like cell voltages?

If you don’t have a device to interrogate the SOH of the HV battery, you could perform this simple DIY basic check.
Before your next charge, reset ALL 3 of your mileage trips, using the R/H button on the steering wheel.
Charge the car to 100% SOC and allow it to complete a balance cycle.
When it has completed, now boot up the car into ready mode.
What is the car now predicting as the range ?.
It should now display the WLTP range of 288 miles.
If it does, then your pack is fine !.
It does this because the car has no historical data stored by the car and therefore it should display a fairly accurate predicted range based on the energy the battery was able to store at 100%.
Any less than 288 miles of predicted range at this point, could indicate that battery degradation is present.
Of course it will not tell the status of each cell of the battery of course, but this type of test is accurate enough to offer some reassurance of battery health.
I have carried out this simple test on both of previous ZS EV’s that we owned and the same on our 6 month old S5 now,
You can perform a similar check at 80% SOC and you should see about 222 miles of predicted range on your S5.
But conduct a 100% charge is ideal.

 

[Alb]

In my experience, the MGS5 is particularly good with energy consumption.
I've not managed to get it below 4 miles/kWh throughout the Winter.

Update - I've just posted my latest figures:

Post in thread 'The Ultimate MGS5 "Real World" Energy Consumption Thread'

Yesterday at 10:54 AM

Another very good (albeit low mileage) month that continues the trend. The weather is definitely a factor in these readings as March has been uncharacteristically mild.

• Alb

• 

 

[Lovemyev]

In my experience, the MGS5 is particularly good with energy consumption.
I've not managed to get it below 4 miles/kWh throughout the Winter.

I agree, I don’t find our S5 to be over thirsty tbh.
Although using the cabin heater in cold weather does absolutely murder the range.
But this standard fair really.
I refuse to be uncomfortable while driving, so turning off the heater is not an option !.
It’s one of the few disadvantage of owning an EV over an ICE in the winter time.
Your cabin heat provided in an ICE vehicle, could be seen as “free heat” in some respects, as it has little to no effect on any lost range by its use really.
Energy consumption is high when the heater is on constantly in use in an EV.
Although the drain is less after the cabin has reached the required temperature, maintaining that temperature it when it cold and windy outside is costly on range.
Never buy an EV purely based on your summer usage / requirements, or you are likely to be disappointed in the winter months for sure.
I think some people DO get caught out in with this.

 

[Rei]

I find that the heating doesn't make much difference, but maybe I have it on a lower setting. It ends up being 10 miles over the maximum range or something, negligible really.

I thought about it when deciding which EV to buy, and it's not worth paying extra for a heat pump that boils down to seconds of extra charging on a long trip.

 

[Lovemyev]

We made a trip on Monday up and over to Harlech.
The weather was not great and the wind was strong and cold.
Normally, we would only have the heater on for a short time, but that day it was on for the whole journey, both there and back !.
It’s about 55-60 miles and we had consumed roughly about 70-80 miles of range according to the GOM of course.
I have done the same trip in both of our previous ZS EV’s.
Both in not so good conditions with the cabin heater in use and also in perfect weather conditions with no heater use and the difference in very noticeable.
It’s the continued use of the heater on longer trips in bad weather, that really affects the range badly.
Short trips, not so much.
I agree with the heat pump thing, they are an expensive option, even providing IF you can select one, which you can’t with MG regardless.
I remember it being a customer option on the VW eGolf.
I seem to recall it was an £1,200.00 extra !.
You need to cover a lot of miles in order to recoup that outlay.

 

[Alb]

I'm perfectly happy with a cabin temperature of 18 Deg C so I probably don't expend much energy on heating. I can also add the fact that I rarely do early morning starts, so even on colder days, the sun has already defrosted the car and warmed it internally before I step inside.

 

[Rei]

If you get an OBD2 dongle (I got a cheap one for a few quid that seems to work just fine, only I ended up cutting through the plastic clip part because otherwise it's a nightmare to get it out) and a suitable app for your phone, you should be able to check the minimum and maximum cell voltages.

If there is a big difference like 100mV then try running it down to 10% and then doing a full overnight charge with time to balance at the end, and see if it corrects itself.

 

[Lovemyev]

Anyone know how to check the battery SoH? Is there an app like the old Leafspy that lets you see things like cell voltages?

Surely if you have a dongle you can see your battery SOH on there .

 

[Rei]

Surely if you have a dongle you can see your battery SOH on there .

You can, but how accurate it is, especially if the battery has a cell imbalance or one weak cell, is anyone's guess.

 

[ATull]

Thanks everyone for your input, really helpful. I'll definitely try a full charge from <10% and see what the GOM shows. Probably won't get a chance to do this for a week or so.
Alb, they're incredible figures you're getting!
Does anyone have a thought on what level of performance / range would be far enough off the 298 mile WLTP that it would be worth reaching out to MG about it?