Pre heat

[Kithmo]

Tried the pre heat this morning for the first time. Plugged in, finished charging, worked perfectly! A/C, drivers seat and cabin temp change. Couldn't see anything in the app to heat the steering wheel though.
Trophy.

There's no steering wheel option in the app, the heat is almost instant anyway when you turn it on in the car, The driver's seat heater and passenger seat heater are the wrong way round in the app. To heat the driver's seat you have to select the passenger seat.

 

[Rolfe]

If plugged in but not charging presumably rather than go out in the cold you could just turn on charge for 10 mins (assuming not charged to 100%) as an extra 10 mins at non night rate wouldn’t be much cost?

The SR always charges to 100%, so you'd have to do something tricksy to stop that from happening, and this would also stop the battery pack from balancing, so it's not really a great idea.

@Rolfe does this work for you?
I’m using the supplied granny charger (2.2kW supply -> car gets 1.9kW)
I stopped the charge using the iSMART app.
I left the granny charger plugged in the port and switched on at the wall socket, but car not charging.
I then activated the HVAC to pre heat the car.
The command was sent successfully, it started the HVAC and started charging at the same time.
Supply at 2.2kW still, but HV battery pack receiving between 0.2kW and 1.5kW due to HVAC doing its job.

Is that correct?

I will try later to see if it works with the charger plugged in but switched off at the wall. Although I don’t see a point in doing that as it will use the HV battery I just charged!

EDIT:
It doesn’t seem to work when connected to the charger switched off at the wall.
Also the heating when connected to the granny charger is limited. I think it might be due to the wall supply not being sufficient and cutting out.

Well, the obvious issue with this is that I don't want to wake up at some indeterminate time in the middle of the night to stop the charge. The SR will go on charging to 100% and then balance unless you physically intervene to stop it. I suppose you could set a time in the app that would stop it prematurely, but then the pack wouldn't balance, and the car doesn't like that.

Any time I have tried it has been after the balance charge has finished and the car is sitting at 100%, still plugged in. All I get is a string of error messages.

 

[mg4mc]

If anyone got ohme home charger there is option for preconditioning which will automatically give power for a preset time before your scheduled departure time.

Won't work with an MG though - MG will not open up the cars API to third party use.

Or are you saying that it will send power to the car, and you can then use iSmart to turn on the heating? You could use the override in that case, but if the car is at 100% will it not just shut the charger down again?

 

[MGFour]

Won't work with an MG though - MG will not open up the cars API to third party use.

Or are you saying that it will send power to the car, and you can then use iSmart to turn on the heating? You could use the override in that case, but if the car is at 100% will it not just shut the charger down again?

Yeah it doesn't link to the MG API but will auto send power to the car to pre-heat/cool, not sure on how car would handle if at 100% though so would need to test.

Currently I ask my ohme for 60miles per night ready for 7am, which it then works out the cheapest and greenest way to do it, then if set precon it will provide power for a set time before 7am. So if I then ask car to preheat at say 06.40 it should in most cases do so and draw power from the ohme to do it.

 

[Rolfe]

Some posts about pre-heating of the battery have been moved to a new thread. I think this is a good topic in its own right, but separate from pre-heating of the cabin.

Indications for using battery heating (now the weather is getting colder)

Does the bug affect cabin pre-heat, battery pre-heat or both? I decided to do a battery pre-heat this morning. Started it 90 minutes before departure; app said it was on. Looked again 30 minutes before departure and app said it was off.

www.mgevs.com

 

[MartinSEsr]

One of the reasons I switched to EV was the thought of pre heating the car on cold summer / autumn / winter / spring mornings. How easy and amazing that would be. I have an SE on R16 software.

Except it's cr@p and doesn't work. Ok, it seems to work when the car is unplugged. But my car charges overnght every night, and I'd quite like to pre-heat it (the car interior not the battery) when i wake ready for when i go out.

But for several mornings I have

1) Scanned the car systems to get the app fully linked
2) slid the pre-heat the car slider and put in my PIN (why the high security for heater??) Acknowledged back as 10 mins pre heating and OK.
3b) If I look out of the window I see the car's rear lights on, showing it is pre-heating the cabin.
3) Press the the HVAC tab and set to 'max heat' and 'send' that command to the car. Acknowledged back as temp sent for 10 mins heating and OK.

So I do the usual morning things, get dressed, go to the car, unlock it, unplug the charger, get inside and it is freezing. Totally freezing. So any pre-heating is pre cooling. Or there is none.

This is pathetic. it's a basic function and doesn't work. Is it just me, and if not, why aren't people going mad about this? LKA is a pain and can be turned off, etc. But no fiddle gets this working there's nothing you can do.

If I unplug the car and THEN do the pre-heat, it works. So I now have to go out in my dressing gown, unplug the car, then faff with the app, and eventually the car will pre-heat. So it pre-heats before I leave work as it isn't plugged in. But you are only allowed 1 pre heat an hour, for "safety reasons" so if the first one doesn't work, you've had it. "safety reasons" ??? It must be really really dangerous as I drive for an hour, then, with the heater on all the time.

 

[PristDean]

Indeed, but I believe this is a standard flaw with all EVs'. The HV battery runs the AC, but is disconnected from the car's main systems when the charger is connected for safety reasons. Hence, the AC cannot be engaged when the charger is connected.
It's a real catch 22 on a cold winter morning. In effect, you have to freeze your t@ts off just to warm up.
Not unless, you can attach a long stick to the charger socket that you can reach from a window, unlock the car from inside the house then reach out and pull the stick ! How far we have come in the modern world eh !

 

[MartinSEsr]

my quick (and very irritated fix) is to go to the car, open it, lean onto the driver's seat to put weight on it.

The car boots up into ready mode.

I then make sure the temp is set to 30 (or do that on my after flight shutdown checklist when parking up the night before lol) and leave it humming away in ready mode, as a plus, warming up for more than the 'permitted' "safe" ten minutes. The car can't be stolen as it won't go into drive without the key inside.

 

[WithGravitas]

Indeed, but I believe this is a standard flaw with all EVs'. The HV battery runs the AC, but is disconnected from the car's main systems when the charger is connected for safety reasons. Hence, the AC cannot be engaged when the charger is connected.
It's a real catch 22 on a cold winter morning. In effect, you have to freeze your t@ts off just to warm up.
Not unless, you can attach a long stick to the charger socket that you can reach from a window, unlock the car from inside the house then reach out and pull the stick ! How far we have come in the modern world eh !

Three ev in my family and all can run preheating when a charger is connected.

 

[PristDean]

Indeed, just seen on another forum
" looked at my GTE's e-manager settings and one is: 'Allow air-conditioning on battery' or words to that effect. Mine is unchecked. I haven't tried it, but my guess is that if you checked this option and set up a departure time, it would pre-condition the car even if plugged in"

So MG has another miss then ! A simple option to allow the HVAC to run for a short while via 12v

 

[Rolfe]

Some people have reported having a software update that fixes this, but it seems a bit hit and miss. I think this is the time of year for everyone to complain loudly to anyone they think it's worth complaining to, to get MG's attention. If there really is a fix, everyone should have it.

 

[rabacon001]

So I messed with this the other day because my car (MG4EV Long Range Trophy) is about to go for its first service and I have a have a big long list of software bugs that I am hoping will get fixed (stop laughing). Anyway, a few things I figured out:

1. Can' do anything till you have your car linked to your WiFi. I am not sure how this will work if I am away from home.
2. If you schedule a charge then the pre heat will not work once the charging has finished. You have to have the car actively charging.
3. If you do get it to pre heat whilst charging the charging is interrupted and halted.
4. It will work if the charge cable is removed after a scheduled charge, but it kinda defeats the objective of remotely pre heating it.

Hope this helps!

 

[JonnyG]

Yeah not easy to coordinate but I will be setting the charge to 80% or 90% on ISMART and then charging to this overnight. Then in the morning doing all the preheats etc before I leave and charge up further as required. This works for me so far. It will preheat unless the charge has already ended at 100% with mine.

 

[Rolfe]

However, we can't do that with the SR - it charges to 100% regardless. The only way to stop it would be to set a time too short for it to get to 100%, but then it wouldn't balance, which the battery doesn't like. And we'd be shaving range of the shorter-range car.

Since there are two current threads on this same issue, I'm going to merge them before it gets any more confusing.

This thread also deals with pre-heating problems, but from the point of view of getting the app to initiate the process after the car has been inactive for a day or two.

How quickly does your car fall asleep?

I am noticing that my car becomes unresponsive to the app within a relatively short time after parking it up and leaving it. Less than 48 hours for sure, although I'm not sure if it's less than 36 hours. The app simply doesn't connect to the car at all, but if I go out to the car and unlock it...

www.mgevs.com

 

[GarRo247]

However, we can't do that with the SR - it charges to 100% regardless. The only way to stop it would be to set a time too short for it to get to 100%, but then it wouldn't balance, which the battery doesn't like. And we'd be shaving range of the shorter-range car.

Since there are two current threads on this same issue, I'm going to merge them before it gets any more confusing.

This thread also deals with pre-heating problems, but from the point of view of getting the app to initiate the process after the car has been inactive for a day or two.

How quickly does your car fall asleep?

I am noticing that my car becomes unresponsive to the app within a relatively short time after parking it up and leaving it. Less than 48 hours for sure, although I'm not sure if it's less than 36 hours. The app simply doesn't connect to the car at all, but if I go out to the car and unlock it...

www.mgevs.com

Are you sure about balancing. I thought I read in the manual that it should be done something like once every 6 weeks

But that's how I'm doing it. I almost never need the 300+km range, so I have my charger set to add 10kwh each night. When I want to preheat I open the charging app, tap charge now, open the MG app and slide the preheat thingy

 

[Rolfe]

Which model do you have? If you have the SE SR with the LFP battery you should be charging to 100% and balancing every week - or every time you charge if it's longer than a week, I think. The SR will not stop charging until it gets to 100% unless you choke off the charger, so if you do that it will never balance.

 

[Jonknee]

Yeah it doesn't link to the MG API but will auto send power to the car to pre-heat/cool, not sure on how car would handle if at 100% though so would need to test.

Currently I ask my ohme for 60miles per night ready for 7am, which it then works out the cheapest and greenest way to do it, then if set precon it will provide power for a set time before 7am. So if I then ask car to preheat at say 06.40 it should in most cases do so and draw power from the ohme to do it.

I’m interested in this. Have another thread running in which I’m considering getting a MG4 but am (unduly) fixated on the pre-heating of the cabin. As I see it, one quite big advantage over my ICE car.

I’ve been told I may get an OHME charger with the lease deal and I’m currently with OVO for my electricity so will probably use their smart EV tariff rather than swap suppliers.

Are you saying you can smart charge the MG4 using the OHME but also tell the charger you need it to supply power to the car when the car demands it purely for pre-heating of the cabin thus getting around the bug of not preheating whilst plugged in and not receiving charge? Or is it just a clever scheduling thing for the same departure time each day? I work shifts……

Thanks.

 

[GarRo247]

Which model do you have? If you have the SE SR with the LFP battery you should be charging to 100% and balancing every week - or every time you charge if it's longer than a week, I think. The SR will not stop charging until it gets to 100% unless you choke off the charger, so if you do that it will never balance.

I have the SR. The charger has an option for how much to add, and I also have it set to not charge outside my my night rate. I'll try to find it again at some point, but I'm pretty sure somewhere it said you only have to balance occasionally

 

[GarRo247]

I’m interested in this. Have another thread running in which I’m considering getting a MG4 but am (unduly) fixated on the pre-heating of the cabin. As I see it, one quite big advantage over my ICE car.

I’ve been told I may get an OHME charger with the lease deal and I’m currently with OVO for my electricity so will probably use their smart EV tariff rather than swap suppliers.

Are you saying you can smart charge the MG4 using the OHME but also tell the charger you need it to supply power to the car when the car demands it purely for pre-heating of the cabin thus getting around the bug of not preheating whilst plugged in and not receiving charge? Or is it just a clever scheduling thing for the same departure time each day? I work shifts……

Thanks.

The Ohme is complicated in some ways. You don't set when you want to charge, you set when you need the car to be ready and it will decide when to charge based on electricity prices. There is a preconditioning option that will provide electricity for preconditioning during the 30 minutes before you have said you want your car to be ready. There is also just a "max charge" button in the app and on the charger that you can use at any time that charges at full power now ignoring electricity prices.

 

[Rolfe]

I have the SR. The charger has an option for how much to add, and I also have it set to not charge outside my my night rate. I'll try to find it again at some point, but I'm pretty sure somewhere it said you only have to balance occasionally

Seriously, it says once a week. One of the problems is that if you don't do this the GOM is likely to become unreliable and you could find yourself on a motorway 20 miles from the next exit going suddenly from 25 miles range to 5 miles range. Another problem is that an unbalanced battery will lose range - temporarily, I believe, until it is properly balanced again.

I don't know how you operate this when you don't want to charge outside your night rate, but I'm sure you can find a way. (At the moment I don't have a variable rate so I just let the car do it's thing on the granny charger any time I charge. I'm thinking about a solar system with a wall box and a variable rate, but I'll add a home battery too, to store excess solar and as much cheap rate electricity as it will take. This should allow me to go on charging to 100% and balancing without actually using peak rate electricity.)