MG4 - standard provided three point plug only giving 1.8kw

[GManMG4]

Hi

I have just purchased a newly new MG4 SE 23 plate. I havent got a 7kw charger installed at home yet so I have plugged the mg provided three point plug. MG iSmart is telling me that the charging power is 1.8kw.

Now I thought I would be getting around 3kw using the 3 point plug cable that came with the vehicle and obviously speed up the charging. Is this correct is it my home electric supply i.e. the mains socket or is the standard 3 point plug cable that came with the car?

If its the cable what cable should I purchase and how much am I looking to pay for it?

Thanks for your help.

 

[Rolfe]

No, you're getting exactly what that plug will deliver. I use it all the time, and when the app showed an extra significant figure the highest I ever saw was about 1.88 kw. Now they're rouding it I do see 1.9 kw quite often, but that's it. That's all you'll get from a 13A plug.

You'll just have to put up with it till your charger is installed. You can always call in at a DC charger if you want a faster charge. I have a 50 kw DC charger five minutes walk away and used it quite often in the summer to speed things up. However they have recently doubled the price, so I won't be doing that again except in an emergency! But it's an option if you can't wait for the time it takes on the 13A.

 

[Jomarkh]

The MG 'granny' EVSE use 13A plug top but only pull 10A which is just over 2kW but due to losses the car gets under 2kW.
Did you get a type2 to type2 32A cable with the car for destination charging or if your home EVSE is untethered?

 

[emmadragon]

Our Trophy draws 1.9kW. It did start out at 1.6kW the first time we plugged in, but now it seems to regularly draw 1.9kW. We will be waiting a while for a wall charger to be fitted, but this is enough for our usual requirements. If we have a big day out planned, we'll be using a rapid charger to get to 80%, and then topping off to 100% at home. It took us about 8 hours to go from 80 to 100% charge on Saturday, but it does slow down as the battery gets more full.

 

[dragon2611]

It's to try and avoid overheating the socket, although some old worn sockets may still be an issue so make sure to check it's not getting too hot if you are going to charge off a 3pin plug.

 

[GManMG4]

Hi thanks for the clarification on this. Like I said wait until I get a 7kw charger fitted or go to a station with a rapid charger.

 

[Rolfe]

If you think in terms of 3 hours for 10% charge to be added, you won't go far wrong (it's a wee bit faster than that in reality). So I tend to think about leaving the car on the plug all night once I'm down to 60-70% charge, if I'm just pootling about. That will bring it up to 100%.

Don't worry about the battery, it can take anything you want to throw at it, and it actually benefits from being charged to 100% then left sitting on the charger for 30-35 min to balance the cells. It's recommended to do this every week anyway.

If you do a long trip and come home low then you're looking at a long recharge time, but unless you have another long trip planned for the next day you should be fine. If you do think you're looking at starting a day a bit tight on charge for what you want to do, plan a session on a public charger to pick up the extra - either sit on a DC charger for a bit, or if you're going somewhere with destination chargers, put the car on one of these.

 

[Tight Git]

Mine was about 27 hours from very nearly empty to full on the granny with my SE SR.

 

[DixieTGS]

We have a non MG granny charger with a display on it so that I can tell how much electricity we've stolen when visiting friends and family. It can also be set to 13A as well as 10A, but we don't normally use 13A due to the various warnings on the forum that a continuous 13A exceeds the design specifications of the socket.

Having said that, it has been tried at 13A in a couple of metal clad sockets whose wiring had been checked. In both cases the socket temperature according to an IR thermometer was barely 2 degrees above ambient, the same as the MG charger.

 

[Rolfe]

Mine was about 27 hours from very nearly empty to full on the granny with my SE SR.

That concurs with my experience.

 

[Rolfe]

We have a non MG granny charger with a display on it so that I can tell how much electricity we've stolen when visiting friends and family. It can also be set to 13A as well as 10A, but we don't normally use 13A due to the various warnings on the forum that a continuous 13A exceeds the design specifications of the socket.

Having said that, it has been tried at 13A in a couple of metal clad sockets whose wiring had been checked. In both cases the socket temperature according to an IR thermometer was barely 2 degrees above ambient, the same as the MG charger.

The sockets in my garage are metal-clad, and the electrician who was here fixing my fuse box (issue with an interior light circuit) basically said "have at it". I've never felt the plug even warm, even after the above-mentioned 27-hour charge.

 

[mg4mc]

from - "not electrical standards expert"...

From what I understand, a properly rated socket should be tested at 14 amps for 8 hours and the temperature rise had to be within a limit.

The problem is that manufacturers churn out cheaply made sockets that they only rate at 10 amps continuous. It's scandalous really, the average consumer (me!) would expect a 13 amp socket to deliver a nominal 13 amps for as long as they wanted.

I think partly is due to most of the popular sockets in Europe being rated at 10 amps (I know they 16 A as well), so most appliances are designed to max out at 10 A now (remember when heaters etc used to 3 kW = 12.5 A) to be a common design across the market. The socket manufacturers then said, hey all the devices have dropped to 10 A max, we can cheapen our designs to cope with less current and get away with it.

If they do that, then I really think they should be clearly marked with their maximum continuous rating. The UK standards around sockets and plugs are a mess afaics - world beating as Boris would say.

That said, I think you can now buy 13 amp EV charger sockets that are rated for the full 13 amps? They have a marking (on the back!) that they are rated for EVs.
But like Rolfe, the standard sockets I have used for granny charging have not ever had any perceptible warmth.

 

[dragon2611]

I've seen an outside socket get warm at even 6A but then again I'm not convinced the electrics in that place were up to a particularly decent standard.

 

[Grriff]

I believe the weak link in the chain is the plug. The fuse must be firmly in the contacts and the cables firmly clamped to the pins, although this cannot be checked if it's a moulded plug.

 

[Martinonline]

In the past I was looking at an Electricians' forum discussing the update to the IET Regulations (basis for BS 7671) and querying the move to metal-clad consumer units (replacing plastic ones). The Posters said the problem was not the plastic casing but rather the reduction in the amount of copper in the conductors and the failure to ensure all contacts were fully tightened.

I came across this today on the IET Website about consumer units:

The Institution of Engineering and Technology is registered as a Charity in England and Wales (No. 211014) and Scotland (No. SCO38698). Michael Faraday House, Six Hills Way, Stevenage, Hertfordshire, SG1 2AY, United Kingdom.

The cause of the fires investigated was almost invariably found to be resistance heating as a
result of poor electrical connections due to poor workmanship or lack of maintenance.

Examples of such poor workmanship are thought to include:
* failure to tighten neutral conductor connections to the same torque as line conductor
connections due to a misconception that neutral conductors carry less current,
* inadvertently taking cable insulation inside the terminal at a connection, resulting in
the securing screw or clamp of the terminal not making proper contact with the
conductor,
* failure to check factory installed connections for tightness where required to do so by
the manufacturer, and
* tightening connections to an incorrect torque and/or with inappropriate tools.

The crucial importance of checking that all electrical connections are properly made, and of
taking remedial action where necessary, should never be forgotten.

Whilst the main cause of fire within plastic consumer unit enclosures is without doubt poor
workmanship, other potential causes of fire within plastic consumer unit enclosures are
thought to include:

* the type of internal components, such as where terminations have only one securing
screw or are of the 'cage clamp' type), and
* where increased heat transfer to the enclosure is caused by the close proximity an
internal item, such as a neutral bar or a conductor terminated at the neutral bar and
protruding above it.

I do not know if the Certification of Domestic Electrical Installations includes a test at maximum socket current over long period with temperature testing but if not, perhaps, that should be included or a more extensive resistance-level testing.