Just placed an order

[boyfrom64]

My wife and I went to our local dealer Polesworth Garage and this afternoon agreed a deal on a 2026 model year Long Range in Ealing Green.

We are moving to MG from being long time owners of VW's and it will be our first EV. If goes well, we may look to buy another electric car to replace the nearly 3 year old T-Roc, which will be the stablemate of the MG4.

I am currently looking at charging units, so any suggestions will be greatly received.

 

[MG Clive]

Excellent @boyfrom64, the Ealing Green is a lovely colour, welcome to MGEVs.

 

[salty]

Congrats on your new MG4. Lovely motor.

And,

To the forum.

 

[siteguru]

It you're looking to switch to an Octopus tariff then you may be better considering an Ohme or Zappi charge unit. (EVSE as we call them .. Electric Vehicle Supply Equipment). Otherwise just about any manufacturer will do .. mine is a Wallbox Pulsar Plus.

 

[boyfrom64]

It you're looking to switch to an Octopus tariff then you may be better considering an Ohme or Zappi charge unit. (EVSE as we call them .. Electric Vehicle Supply Equipment). Otherwise just about any manufacturer will do .. mine is a Wallbox Pulsar Plus.

Thanks for the feedback.
As we are already with Octopus, it just seems to make sense that we switch to one of their smart ev tariffs.
Please excuse my ignorance, but is it not possible to use any EV charger with any energy supplier?

Excellent @boyfrom64, the Ealing Green is a lovely colour, welcome to MGEVs.

Thank you. I'm very green when it comes to things like charging, and how to get the best out of the car etc.. so I am looking forward to learning from the members of this forum

Congrats on your new MG4. Lovely motor.

And,

View attachment 44180

To the forum.

Thank you for the welcome. We both really liked the look of the car and the way it drove, when we took one out for a test drive.

 

[MG Clive]

Thanks for the feedback.
As we are already with Octopus, it just seems to make sense that we switch to one of their smart ev tariffs.
Please excuse my ignorance, but is it not possible to use any EV charger with any energy supplier?

Yes, it doesn't matter who your energy supplier is, you can still have the EV charger of your own choice installed.

Thank you. I'm very green when it comes to things like charging, and how to get the best out of the car etc.. so I am looking forward to learning from the members of this forum

I don't stick to any specific charging routine myself, I just charge it up when it needs it, and in my case, it's usually on a Sunday when I have free electricity from my energy supplier.

 

[Martinonline]

You should be able to use and EVSE with any Energy Supplier but it will be in 'dumb' mode; that is the EVSE is not controllable via an App/Software interface.

Simply, Octopus offer a low cost 'Intelligent' tariff that communicates with your EVSE to control starting/pausing/stopping charging. The tariff allows you to plug in your car, specify an amount of energy (kWh) to add by a certain time and Octopus decides when it can provide that energy; when the grid is less loaded. Note I believe other suppliers may have similar tariffs and capability. Some cars but not MG, eg Cupra EVs, allow the EVSE to read the battery level and thus you specify a final target level and the system will try to meet that request. Octopus have a list of EVSEs they can communicate with. This is particularly important given Octopus's recent change to the amount of time you can charge your car for - limited to 6 hours as measured by the EVSE, I believe.

I am on Octopus Go which gives me a fixed period, 5 hours overnight, of low-cost electricity and use the car to schedule charging within that time as I am a low-mileage user and only need to charge about once a week.

Deciding the best tariff for you is a challenge given the available options and particularly so given current events in the Middle-East. An EV tariff usually means you are charged more for your electricity outside of the times the tariff gives you low-cost electricity.

EDIT: My Car is a MY22 MG4 Trophy.

 

[brucie]

I have an Indra Charging Unit which burnt out after 4y4m but they replaced under 5yr warranty, however the warranty period has been lowered for new units to 3yrs I believe.

Whilst I was waiting to see if Indra would honour warranty claim I did some research and came to the conclusion that the Andersen A2 was going to be my charger of choice. Whichever one you go for I would suggest you get a tethered version. I think you'll find most here would agree with that part.

 

[siteguru]

Tethered = yes, but make sure the cable is sufficiently long, a minimum of 5m - 7-10m is better.

 

[WonkoTheSaneUK]

Tethered = yes, but make sure the cable is sufficiently long, a minimum of 5m - 7-10m is better.

I got a "BP Chargemaster) 5m tethered charger with my first EV (Renault Zoe).
Due to the arrangement of my driveway/house and the change in charging port location, 5m was not long enough for the MG4 & I had to change it.
(BP had dropped support for home charging anyway)

 

[boyfrom64]

Tethered = yes, but make sure the cable is sufficiently long, a minimum of 5m - 7-10m is better.

I had already decided on having a tethered charger. I will take everyone's advice on having a longer cable length which will give more flexibility on where the car can be parked.

You should be able to use and EVSE with any Energy Supplier but it will be in 'dumb' mode; that is the EVSE is not controllable via an App/Software interface.

Simply, Octopus offer a low cost 'Intelligent' tariff that communicates with your EVSE to control starting/pausing/stopping charging. The tariff allows you to plug in your car, specify an amount of energy (kWh) to add by a certain time and Octopus decides when it can provide that energy; when the grid is less loaded. Note I believe other suppliers may have similar tariffs and capability. Some cars but not MG, eg Cupra EVs, allow the EVSE to read the battery level and thus you specify a final target level and the system will try to meet that request. Octopus have a list of EVSEs they can communicate with. This is particularly important given Octopus's recent change to the amount of time you can charge your car for - limited to 6 hours as measured by the EVSE, I believe.

I am on Octopus Go which gives me a fixed period, 5 hours overnight, of low-cost electricity and use the car to schedule charging within that time as I am a low-mileage user and only need to charge about once a week.

Deciding the best tariff for you is a challenge given the available options and particularly so given current events in the Middle-East. An EV tariff usually means you are charged more for your electricity outside of the times the tariff gives you low-cost electricity.

EDIT: My Car is a MY22 MG4 Trophy.

Excuse my ignorance but what does EVSE stand for?

As I said in an earlier post, I am very green when it comes to EV's and all that goes with them, including energy tariffs, so all help I can get will be greatly appreciated, so thank you for your post.

 

[Bam Bam]

Excuse my ignorance but what does EVSE stand for?

It is the technical name for the home charging wall box thing.

Technically they aren't chargers because it is the car that does the AC-DC conversion.

As I said in an earlier post, I am very green when it comes to EV's and all that goes with them, including energy tariffs, so all help I can get will be greatly appreciated, so thank you for your post.

These are changing all the time and some might not be available to new customers so I wouldn't be confident knowing what is out there.

If you've got a smart EVSE (Zapp, Hypervolt, Ohme) then you can qualify for the Octopus Intelligent Go tariff which has been one of the most appealing tariffs for some time now.

My wife and I went to our local dealer Polesworth Garage and this afternoon agreed a deal on a 2026 model year Long Range in Ealing Green.

We are moving to MG from being long time owners of VW's and it will be our first EV.

Congrats.

SAIC worked with VW in China so there are certain similarities.

Keep your old spare wheels as they will probably fit.

If goes well, we may look to buy another electric car to replace the nearly 3 year old T-Roc, which will be the stablemate of the MG4.

I am currently looking at charging units, so any suggestions will be greatly received.

I'd say Hypervolt if you've got good WiFi signal to the charging unit position (or Zappi if you prefer the look of that).

Ohme if you don't have good WiFi reach to where it will be...

 

[Kenp1]

I got the Hypervolt charger with a 10 metre cable, it isn't just your current car you have to think about, your next car will probably have the charge port in a different place.

 

[MG Clive]

Excuse my ignorance but what does EVSE stand for?

Electric Vehicle Supply Equipment.

 

[boyfrom64]

Electric Vehicle Supply Equipment.

Thanks

It is the technical name for the home charging wall box thing.

Technically they aren't chargers because it is the car that does the AC-DC conversion.


These are changing all the time and some might not be available to new customers so I wouldn't be confident knowing what is out there.

If you've got a smart EVSE (Zapp, Hypervolt, Ohme) then you can qualify for the Octopus Intelligent Go tariff which has been one of the most appealing tariffs for some time now.

Thanks for the explanation

Congrats.

SAIC worked with VW in China so there are certain similarities.

Keep your old spare wheels as they will probably fit.


I'd say Hypervolt if you've got good WiFi signal to the charging unit position (or Zappi if you prefer the look of that).

Ohme if you don't have good WiFi reach to where it will be...

To be fair we do have good WiFi and the charger unit will be very close to where the router sits in the house. We are with Sky broadband and get over 500 mbs download, so I think the Zappi and Hypervolt should work.

 

[Kenp1]

Electric Vehicle Supply Equipment.

Just stick with calling it a charger, it's the standard name.

 

[MG Clive]

Just stick with calling it a charger, it's the standard name.

Yes, and everybody understands it.

 

[siteguru]

Excuse my ignorance but what does EVSE stand for?

Answer already supplied before you even asked - see post #4.

 

[siteguru]

I got the Hypervolt charger with a 10 metre cable, it isn't just your current car you have to think about, your next car will probably have the charge port in a different place.

Exactly why I recommended 7-10m cable.

 

[boyfrom64]

Exactly why I recommended 7-10m cable.

What I have not mentioned in any post is that we currently have our house up for sale.
You may ask why then are you installing a charger. Two reasons, firstly it has taken our youngest daughter over 12 months to sell her house, which is one first time buyers will buy, our is not. So we could be in the house for quite some time yet, and if we are to take advantage of cheaper charging rates we need to get a charger installed.the second reason, well the way my wife and I see it, is that it is a good selling feature, which could help us achieve the price we have put the house up for sale for.
To these reasons, depending on the price, I may just go with a cable that is 5 - 7m in length.