Potential Fix for MG4 Not Being Available in the App + Build Your Own Automations [Home Assistant]

[jamakr4]

I think it’s a common issue for most MG4 owners that the car enters some kind of deep sleep mode where you can’t pull information from it anymore and therefore can’t, for example, preheat the car.

My solution (when this happened to me at home) so far has been to go to my kitchen window with the key fob, unlock the car, and then lock it again so it became available within iSmart again. Quite annoying, but still better than nothing.

My idea is to do this lock–unlock procedure automatically every day so the car won’t enter this deep sleep state.

I would do this with either one of these two Home Assistant add-ons (they give you full access to the car and even let you see some things that you can’t see in the MG app). More interestingly, they also give you the option to build your own automations. The possibilities are only limited by the actions that MG provides—so instead of doing this unlock–lock trick, you could also preheat the car, seats, etc. via one these integrations:

GitHub - ad-ha/mg-saic-ha: MG SAIC Custom Integration for Home Assistant - NOT MAINTAINED
SAIC-iSmart-API

Important: When using these integrations, you need a second account for your iSmart app; otherwise, you will receive weird errors like “token expired”, etc. When setting up the second account, make sure you share the key with this account so it has full privileges.

I personally am not going to try this because my car is parked directly near a public road, and I’m too afraid that some random person walking by could see the car getting unlocked and do something stupid. But if your car is parked in a garage or on a locked property, I think it could be worth trying.

 

[webhiker]

Doing so means that you are not allowed to complain about 12V battery issues in here

 

[Geekice]

I also use Home Assistant, but there’s one problem with this idea. As even the developers pointed out, the lock command sent from HA often doesn’t work because the car responds by saying to check that there are no keys inside and doesn’t lock. So we’d risk leaving the car unlocked.

 

[siteguru]

How does the iSmart app work around that issue? (I'm assuming it's using the same API as its base).

 

[jamakr4]

How does the iSmart app work around that issue? (I'm assuming it's using the same API as its base).

The idea would be that the car will never enter this deep sleep mode again so therefore it will be always available.

I also use Home Assistant, but there’s one problem with this idea. As even the developers pointed out, the lock command sent from HA often doesn’t work because the car responds by saying to check that there are no keys inside and doesn’t lock. So we’d risk leaving the car unlocked.

Haven't thought about that..

Doing so means that you are not allowed to complain about 12V battery issues in here

I would say it's actually not that big of an issue. Of course, it will depend on the size of your 12 V battery, but if we assume the battery has 55 Ah, that would be 0.66 kWh (12 V×55)/1000. The measurements from the integration show a consistent baseline power draw of around 20 watts. So, if you don't park your car and leave it unused for weeks, you should be fine.

The massive peak in the screenshot was me driving on the Autobahn

 

[siteguru]

My previous post was in response to @Geekice's comment re. the lock command. Not re. HA in general.

 

[Geekice]

How does the iSmart app work around that issue? (I'm assuming it's using the same API as its base).

When we are around the car, the lock and unlock commands are sent via Bluetooth to the car. In fact, I can lock and unlock also without an internet connection. I tried several times with the app without Bluetooth, and several times the app shows the same error.