Radar

[FlyingCircus]

Hi, I have had my MG4 SE SR for my forth week and in that time I have had several phantom auto breaking. The first couple of times, it was when I had pulled in behind another car, while I waited for opposite direction traffic to pass. I pulled away and the car slammed the brakes on and a message appeared on the screen “cannot start right now”. I nearly had someone smash into the back of me! Someone asked me, did you indicate? I made a point of indicating but it happened again!
I then kept indicating every time I passed anything. I was then driving along side parked cars and it did it again.
Then again, I waited for oncoming traffic and it did it again! This jolts is so hard, our necks are feeling sore.
This morning I made a point of turning all of the safety features. On our five minute journey to work, it happens twice, in close succession! When I checked the safety features, they were all back on again.

I called my dealer and send that I am not driving it anymore until it’s been fixed. The AA came and said the it was due to bugs on the radar and stated that it was a known MG fault. I have seen nothing on the Facebook groups about bugs on the radar and MG had not heard about this. I don’t believe that it’s bugs on the radar, as this has happened when the car was spotless.

I am waiting for what MG come up with.
The car may have to go back if they don’t find anything.

Any advice would be grateful received. I am frightened to drive the car now.

 

[Rolfe]

This is not normal, and don't let anyone tell you it is.

I have had my MG4 SE SR for over two months, and although I have had a couple of occasions when the brakes slammed on, these were not out of the blue. One happened when someone walked out into the road between two parked cars and opened the door of one of these cars almost in front of me. There was enough room to pass, but not by much, and it was clear why it happened. The other was as I drew up behind a stationary car at road works, and the automatic braking dead-heated with me braking the car myself. It was only because the force of the braking was more than I had applied that I even realised it had activated.

And I can assure you that I am not one of these drivers who slavishly cleans the car every week. It's been through a hand car wash once, and I de-bugged it with some de-bug spray last week some time. It was basically a flies' cemetery before I did that.

Meanwhile, I suggest you deactivate the automatic braking system. It's on the MG Pilot section of the car menu on the infotainment screen. You'll have to do it every time you start the car (in fact every time you put your bum on the seat) because it defaults to on, but if you do that you should be able to drive without fear because it won't happen.

 

[Ian Key]

I've learned to hang back from the parked car I'm overtaking by a couple of feet more than in my previous car and let the oncoming vehicle clear the front of my car before going round it.
But having said that I don't have any real trouble with LKA either so I wonder if it's down to how well adjusted the radar and camera are calibrated.

 

[Rolfe]

I've not changed my driving behaviour at all to avoid the automatic braking, and as I said, it has practically never happened. I've had a visual warning when coming up behind a stationary car a few times, but only once did the car brake, and as I said it did it simultaneously with me braking. I said it was on probation after the incident with the guy coming out from between the parked cars, but that was about six weeks ago and nothing since.

Maybe it's an adjustment thing, but if they can get it right on my car then they can get it right on FlyingCircus's car.

 

[OriginalBigAl]

I think that the radar is a bosch system , If you look up " bosch mobility.com " then automatic braking , it will give you a better overview of its operation. I do not think its deactivated by the indicator and if the wheels are turned , ie you are pulling out passing a parked car then it might detect oncoming traffic as crossing your path and activate. I do not want to defend this system and make excuses for its operation but it is something which is applied to all new cars ( which want a 5 star rating) and every different car forum has complaints about it , not just MG. We are all going to have to learn how this and other "safety" systems actually work to be able to understand their strengths and weaknesses. There is another post about railway crossings where it possibly detects the rails as somethings which crosses the path of the car and again activates, in our minds falsely ,in the algorithms calculations correctly. We have to get inside the minds of the people who design and implement these systems and hope they have accounted for every situation we are going to experience, which of course they can't. Having said that it could also be faulty! with so many variables ,who knows!

 

[Diggsy]

Maybe the first thing that would make MG sit up and pay attention is if you were to visit your GP as a result of your neck pain, then visit a solicitor and lodge an injury claim. I bet they’d not be long finding a solution then!

 

[Rolfe]

I'm really surprised FlyingCircus's dealer and/or the AA hasn't suggested turning off the automatic braking option. It's a terrible thing to be afraid to drive your new car! But surely the fix to get rid of that fear is to turn the damn thing off! It's not satisfactory, of course it isn't, and it shouldn't be regarded as a permanent solution. There is something wrong with that system in that car and it needs fixing.

But at least there is no need for FlyingCircus to drive in fear, and if nobody has shown him how to turn that option off, then they're derelict in their duty.

 

[Vingnut]

I do not turn off the LKA and ELK completly anymore as I find it easyer to set it to warning (and low sensitivity wich it actually remember who ho). The resonining is that I always forget to turn of LKA/ELK before starting to drive and one can always turn off LKA and ELK both stationary and driving when turning the system to warning only in my LHD Luxury/Trophy (R30 Infotainment version).

My car phantom brakes to, but (if LKA/ELK is off) only when ACC is activated. Usualy sharpish right turns with oncoming traffic (it will be left turn for you lot that drives on the wrong side ) or parked cars in the road on the drivers side . When this happens I get warning on screen to hold the steering wheel to (why I do not know).

 

[Rolfe]

I got something that sounds like that the other day, momentarily. I was using ACC to hold to the 20 mph speed limit only about 200 yards from home, and the car decelerated quite quickly (not an emergency stop) and I got a quick flash of a steering wheel with hands on it. It vanished almost immediately though, as I accelerated to stop the car doing whatever it was that it was doing. I certainly had my hands on the steering wheel at the time!

I'm just playing around with the ACC to get used to using it and familiar with how it behaves. I don't think I'm likely to use it regularly though. My overall conclusion is that I'm a better driver than my bloody car is.

 

[FlyingCircus]

This is not normal, and don't let anyone tell you it is.

I have had my MG4 SE SR for over two months, and although I have had a couple of occasions when the brakes slammed on, these were not out of the blue. One happened when someone walked out into the road between two parked cars and opened the door of one of these cars almost in front of me. There was enough room to pass, but not by much, and it was clear why it happened. The other was as I drew up behind a stationary car at road works, and the automatic braking dead-heated with me braking the car myself. It was only because the force of the braking was more than I had applied that I even realised it had activated.

And I can assure you that I am not one of these drivers who slavishly cleans the car every week. It's been through a hand car wash once, and I de-bugged it with some de-bug spray last week some time. It was basically a flies' cemetery before I did that.

Meanwhile, I suggest you deactivate the automatic braking system. It's on the MG Pilot section of the car menu on the infotainment screen. You'll have to do it every time you start the car (in fact every time you put your bum on the seat) because it defaults to on, but if you do that you should be able to drive without fear because it won't happen.

Thank you. I am waiting to see what MG say before I can make a decision to keep the car.

 

[Vingnut]

That's what I tried to describe @Rolfe , it brakes but not emergency braking when on ACC.

 

[FlyingCircus]

I’ve had that too!!

 

[Rolfe]

That's what I tried to describe @Rolfe , it brakes but not emergency braking when on ACC.

Yes. I don't really like that. I don't see me using the ACC a lot, although there are possibly situations where it could come in useful. But mostly, the ride is a lot smoother if I'm controlling the car myself. I can anticipate in ways a mechanical system simply can't. Not with today's technology.

Thank you. I am waiting to see what MG say before I can make a decision to keep the car.

If you like the car otherwise, what about simply switching the forward crash protection off - or on to audible alert only so you get the beep but not the brake - so that you're not scared to drive it? You could continue to press for them to address the issue while not being affected by it.

 

[FlyingCircus]

If you like the car otherwise, what about simply switching the forward crash protection off - or on to audible alert only so you get the beep but not the brake - so that you're not scared to drive it? You could continue to press for them to address the issue while not being affected by it.

I love the car, that’s why i am so truly gutted that this has happened. I have been in two reasonably quality cars today. Passenger in a convertible Merc and driving a courtesy top spec Kuga and they felt horrendous.
my wife is petrified of the car, I will need some solid evidence from MG before I can get her to go in the car again

 

[Rolfe]

I can understand how your wife feels. But if you turn off the forward collision alert, then it can't happen.

I can't stand the Lane Assist. I won't have a car that twitches the steering wheel in my hand, no way on earth. I make a point of turning it off every time I sit down in the car (unless I'm just moving it out of the garage or something). I also turn off the speed limit recognition at the same time, because it lies to me too often.

I could easily turn off the front collision alert while I'm at it, and I gather a lot of people do. I don't. I said it was on probation after the incident when the guy stepped out on to the road, but part of me thinks that could have prevented an accident, and it hasn't ever braked on me for no reason, so I leave it on.

But lots of people turn it off. If you did that, you and your wife could regain confidence in the car.

Your car is identical to mine, it seems! I love mine to bits.

 

[FlyingCircus]

I can understand how your wife feels. But if you turn off the forward collision alert, then it can't happen.

I can't stand the Lane Assist. I won't have a car that twitches the steering wheel in my hand, no way on earth. I make a point of turning it off every time I sit down in the car (unless I'm just moving it out of the garage or something). I also turn off the speed limit recognition at the same time, because it lies to me too often.

I could easily turn off the front collision alert while I'm at it, and I gather a lot of people do. I don't. I said it was on probation after the incident when the guy stepped out on to the road, but part of me thinks that could have prevented an accident, and it hasn't ever braked on me for no reason, so I leave it on.

But lots of people turn it off. If you did that, you and your wife could regain confidence in the car.

Your car is identical to mine, it seems! I love mine to bits.

Thank you.

 

[OriginalBigAl]

If you kook on VW ,Kia , Hyundai forums and possibly many others, many owners have the same complaints as we do, for all the new systems which have been " forced " onto the vehicles. Most of these systems generally work in the same way, hardware and software allowing so dumping one manufacturer for another might not solve the problem. I thought I saw a site which predicted that in the near future for newer models these would be permanently enabled without any disabling features, whether or not software updates to our cars will make them compatible with newer standards I can't say. Maybe we should question the legislators to say why they think these systems are needed , we all have our theories and conspiracies , but thats another post!

 

[Rip Van]

I could see, in about ten years time, people looking back saying, "do you remember when you could switch LKA off at the start of every journey? Yeah, those were the days!"

 

[Grriff]

I could see, in about ten years time, people looking back saying, "do you remember when you could switch LKA off at the start of every journey? Yeah, those were the days!"

In about ten years time people will be saying, 'Do you remember the time when we could actually drive a car?'

 

[siteguru]

Re. phantom braking ... for me it's most-prevalent when using ACC (like for others), but I can generally plan ahead and know when it is likely to happen (e.g. when passing a line of cars and you're edged into the oncoming lane, and there's a car coming towards you).