MG4 doesn’t get warm.

[GameZone]

They installed a firmware for the heating today. Not sure if it did anything, have to do more testing. They told me to come back next week, because there's a separate update to the monitor, and a third update to something else. Not any all in one update for this car I guess.

 

[Kithmo]

I thought I'd try my heater for the first time today and there seems to be no warm air coming out even on "HI"
I tried different fan speeds, different temperature settings, recirc on, recirc off, AC on, AC off, Auto setting etc. no heat coming out just tepid air, it feels like the PTC is not working.
AC was great on the hot days we've had just no heat now.
Would the ambient air temperature affect it ?
It's 22C today, I thought that may be the case on auto but shouldn't affect it on manual settings.
As a matter of interest is the temperature display supposed to be blue, ranging from mid blue to light blue, or should it be red at the hot end ? Seems odd.

 

[GameZone]

I thought I'd try my heater for the first time today and there seems to be no warm air coming out even on "HI"
I tried different fan speeds, different temperature settings, recirc on, recirc off, AC on, AC off, Auto setting etc. no heat coming out just tepid air, it feels like the PTC is not working.
AC was great on the hot days we've had just no heat now.
Would the ambient air temperature affect it ?
It's 22C today, I thought that may be the case on auto but shouldn't affect it on manual settings.
As a matter of interest is the temperature display supposed to be blue, ranging from mid blue to light blue, or should it be red at the hot end ? Seems odd.

You mean the remote heater from the app? Do you have the heat pump?

I live in norway so I got the heat pump version. I found out that using the app to warm up my car remotely does jack shit. Like you said, just cold air. It's 15C outside today. I guess I have to see if this works better when my car gets frozen this winter.

I'm going to install the latest firmware updates at the dealer next week so I'll check if something changes.

But Yeah, the temperature inside the car will effect the air temperature. It's usually 18C inside my car when wake up. If I set my AC to 26C it will usually warm my car up to 22-23C before the air gets colder. You'll probably notice it when it gets colder outside.

 

[Kithmo]

You mean the remote heater from the app? Do you have the heat pump?

I live in norway so I got the heat pump version. I found out that using the app to warm up my car remotely does jack sh*t. Like you said, just cold air. It's 15C outside today. I guess I have to see if this works better when my car gets frozen this winter.

I'm going to install the latest firmware updates at the dealer next week so I'll check if something changes.

But Yeah, the temperature inside the car will effect the air temperature. It's usually 18C inside my car when wake up. If I set my AC to 26C it will usually warm my car up to 22-23C before the air gets colder. You'll probably notice it when it gets colder outside.

This was me inside the car not with the app.
I tried preheating it with the app yesterday and it was no warmer than outside when I got in the car.
I'm in the UK so we don't have a heat pump.

 

[Rolfe]

Set at HI with the A/C off should be getting you heat. If it isn't, I think something is wrong.

My heating/aircon works beautifully. It's one of the things about the car I'm really happy with. But I;ve heard a number of people say it's not working like that for them.

 

[GameZone]

Set at HI with the A/C off should be getting you heat. If it isn't, I think something is wrong.

My heating/aircon works beautifully. It's one of the things about the car I'm really happy with. But I;ve heard a number of people say it's not working like that for them.

With the heat pump it's 100% necessary to keep AC on to produce any heat. With AC off, it's producing no heat at all, not even on max. My guess is that the app activates pre heating without AC ON in my car, therefor no heat. It's possible that MG treats the remote app like the cars without heat pump (which produces heat with AC off). And there's no way for me to set AC on trough the app, because it doesn't provide me the option. Only cold air and seat warmer. And yeah, I tried setting it to max. Just like they didn't bother moving the steering wheel to the right side in the UK app.

 

[Rolfe]

But @Kithmo doesn't have a heat pump.

 

[GameZone]

But @Kithmo doesn't have a heat pump.

Don't know what's going on there, but it was pretty warm that day, so it could be the reason.

 

[Kithmo]

I thought I'd try my heater for the first time today and there seems to be no warm air coming out even on "HI"
I tried different fan speeds, different temperature settings, recirc on, recirc off, AC on, AC off, Auto setting etc. no heat coming out just tepid air, it feels like the PTC is not working.
AC was great on the hot days we've had just no heat now.
Would the ambient air temperature affect it ?
It's 22C today, I thought that may be the case on auto but shouldn't affect it on manual settings.
As a matter of interest is the temperature display supposed to be blue, ranging from mid blue to light blue, or should it be red at the hot end ? Seems odd.

Update:
I tried the heater again last night when the ambient temperature had dropped a few degrees to about 17 or 18C and it worked perfectly. Blasting very hot on HI and up to heat within a minute or two. Saved me a trip to the dealers. ?
I hope it's just the fact that when the ambient is 22C the car won't let me heat it any higher and not an intermittent fault.
Strange though, that I can get very hot air coming out set to HI, which I believe is a setting of about 34C (really 29C ?) when the ambient is 17C but not when the ambient is 22C.
Surely if it's set to 29C (real world), that is 7 degrees above ambient and should be pushing out warm or hot air but it wasn't.
At least I'm more confident it will work on those cold frosty mornings now.

 

[GameZone]

Update:
I tried the heater again last night when the ambient temperature had dropped a few degrees to about 17 or 18C and it worked perfectly. Blasting very hot on HI and up to heat within a minute or two. Saved me a trip to the dealers. ?
I hope it's just the fact that when the ambient is 22C the car won't let me heat it any higher and not an intermittent fault.
Strange though, that I can get very hot air coming out set to HI, which I believe is a setting of about 34C (really 29C ?) when the ambient is 17C but not when the ambient is 22C.
Surely if it's set to 29C (real world), that is 7 degrees above ambient and should be pushing out warm or hot air but it wasn't.
At least I'm more confident it will work on those cold frosty mornings now.

Good for you. My car blowing cold air at max trough the app.

 

[Kithmo]

Good for you. My car blowing cold air at max trough the app.

Going on my test last night at 17C, I think yours does have a fault. It should work at 15C, as it was when you tried it.

 

[Rolfe]

Good for you. My car blowing cold air at max trough the app.

And you did set the temperature through the app as well as telling it to pre-heat? We did that part?

 

[GameZone]

And you did set the temperature through the app as well as telling it to pre-heat? We did that part?

Yes I did.

I'll check back once they've updated the cars firmware next week. No pre-heat working trough the app must be a valid complaint right? It's 10 months with 20-10 minus in Norway.

 

[Rolfe]

It's clearly a fault. I tried it out when I first got my car, and the first time it didn't do anything because I didn't set the temperature. Second time I tried, and the evening wasn't particularly cold, it worked so well I had to apologise to the friends I was picking up for the fact that the car was too warm.

There is another wrinkle though. The pre-heat gives an error message if the car is plugged into a charger but not charging. This is a genuine fault, and a complete pain in the neck if you have been charging overnight but the charge has finished by the time you want the car in the morning. Some people say this has been fixed with a software update. However, even the cars experiencing this problem will pre-heat perfectly well when not plugged in.

Just checking that your car wasn't plugged into a charger when you tried all this.

 

[GameZone]

It's clearly a fault. I tried it out when I first got my car, and the first time it didn't do anything because I didn't set the temperature. Second time I tried, and the evening wasn't particularly cold, it worked so well I had to apologise to the friends I was picking up for the fact that the car was too warm.

There is another wrinkle though. The pre-heat gives an error message if the car is plugged into a charger but not charging. This is a genuine fault, and a complete pain in the neck if you have been charging overnight but the charge has finished by the time you want the car in the morning. Some people say this has been fixed with a software update. However, even the cars experiencing this problem will pre-heat perfectly well when not plugged in.

Just checking that your car wasn't plugged into a charger when you tried all this.

Did they change the ismart app at some point? I there were more options for AC on the older app.

 

[siteguru]

The fault @Rolfe mentions is a car software issue (I believe), not an app issue as such.

 

[Rolfe]

I believe so. However when I reported it to my dealer, along with some other issues, they said they couldn't look at it because the car is bound to my phone and they didn't have my phone. Duh.

 

[GameZone]

I believe so. However when I reported it to my dealer, along with some other issues, they said they couldn't look at it because the car is bound to my phone and they didn't have my phone. Duh.

With apps and new Technology, it seems like dealers are more limited with what they can resolve. I dont know if my pre heat issue is related to software, and if it is, there is probably nothing they can do, other than keep demanding updates as they arrive. They could not test the app on their other M4 at the dealer because they didnt want to bind it to another phone.

The fault @Rolfe mentions is a car software issue (I believe), not an app issue as such.

The pre heat (cold air) issue I have must also be software related, as the car is able to blow warm air if you hit the front window button inside the car. This isn't possible trough the app.

 

[Davn]

The thing is, everyone can add or subtract five. The light sensor works fine if you simply take the cover off and replace it with one with a transparent top. (Driving down the M40 last week my lights came on around the time the road lighting was coming on, and some little time after the lights had come on on some of the other cars on the road.)

If only some of the other glitches were as easy to live with.

Where do you get one with a transparent top?

 

[Rolfe]

Ah. Search the forum for a thread with the word "Hillbilly" in the title. Some way into that threat a member has posted a link to a set of 3-D printer files for a selection of replacement sensor covers. These have a variety of tops. I have found the one with the open top to be best. The idea is you stick a section of clear plastic across the open part with superglue or something like that, just to keep dust out of the sensor area. Someone else said they got the closed-top one printed in clear plastic and that worked too but I didn't try that.

Best to get the thing printed by a professional company as it can get very hot on the dashboard under the windscreen so you need a suitable compound to print it in. I think there is also a link to such a company further on in the thread. It's cheap to do, and the most expensive part is actually the postage.