Very efficient car

[Mark Holmes]

The problem I have with this car is that you cannot drive it like a normal ev in that if you want to get 3kwh or more you have to crawl up to your desired speed.... If you're getting over 4 kwh and you're driving it without thinking ie crawling up to say 30 mph then there's something wrong with a lot of these cars because not many people are getting above 3 kwh.... The zoe it replaced you could drive like a normal car and smash 4.5 kwh

Have you driven the car only in the winter?

 

[Kithmo]

Mark not just you mate I'm 3 years in to ev ownership and this car is so inefficient even when you're trying ....65 mph on the motorway with heating on low and in eco will struggle to get 2.6 whereas in the 40kw zoe before it would easily do 3.5.
I honestly think that for a car with 42.5kw battery it should be able to do at least 140 miles at 65mph.

The Zoe is more aerodynamic, the ZS has the aerodynamics of a brick.

 

[Mark Holmes]

I maybe doing another work road trip tomorrow, subject to the PM’s announcement tonight. If I do go out I will do some range testing on what I can achieve based on my normal motorway speeds of 65 to 70 mph.

 

[Gomev]

MG advertise a WLTP (lol) range of 163 miles, that would give a value of approx. 3.8 so even MG was not expecting to achieve a magnificent 4.

EV database suggest a more realistic real world range of 135 miles. This would give us approx. 3.1

I knew these advertised ranges before I purchased and to be honest these seem to tie up with what the car is telling me.

 

[Mark Holmes]

Let’s face it there’s lots of things that affect an ICE or EV, wind, cold, hills, tyre pressure, load of carry; more noticeable in an EV because we look more at range, but my Volvo was only meant to do 41 miles per gallon, but I would get 46 miles PG on average, yes I used to drive at about 60 - 65 mph rather than 70 mph +
The point I’m trying to make is that unless we are all driving the same road at the same time with the same weights in the same conditions with the same TP’s we cannot really compare like for like.
I remember driving to Kingswinford and the car did fine, but on the way back my range was massively affected as I had loaded the car up with equipment, my distance was reduced by about 30 miles purely on load.

 

[Cocijo]

I'd concur with Gary, having had 4 EVs, two with heat pumps (HP) and now the last two without I think I can give a fair judgement on what is and isn't an efficient drivetrain in the summer and winter. Here were my averages I've seen for all 4 cars, this was mainly driving a 78 mile roudtrip commute with 60 miles of that at motorway speeds (65-70) and the rest 30mph and under as I crawled in and out of Manchester, the elevation of the M62 from Brighouse into Greater Manchester and the M60 is the highest in England, so its pretty inefficient:

I've given the as new usable capacities (in truth the Leaf was 8-10% lower capacity due to battery deg, if I took the Leaf to work, I needed to make sure I got charged before coming home). Also to note my averages for the MG are on more slower roads, thanks to not having been to the office since March and only aving had the car since September (so those summer number could eek up, as they are more warm Autumn numbers) and less motorway driving, so i'd maybe take another 10-15% off for efficiency if I was to compare apples to apples on my previous EV commuting.

My take-away's are that tyre size and heat pumps make a big difference, the MG loses out due to having large wheels, no heat pump and poor aero, the smaller battery cars eat into its on paper larger battery advantage (size of the car should also be taken into account, but the unladen weight of the e-Golf and Kia are more than the MG, the Soul like the MG is a brick flying through the air).

I also refuse to sacrifice comfort for more range in Winter, you won't find me wearing a blanket and thermals to eek out 10 miles more range!

Car	Summer Range	Winter Range	Weight (unladen)
Kia Soul 30kWh (HP, 16" tyres)	4.5-5kWh = 135-150 miles	3.5-4kWh = 105-120 miles (heating set at auto 20C)	1580 kg
Nissan Leaf Tekna 21.3kWh (HP, 17" tyres)	3.5-4kWh = 75-85 miles	3-3.5kWh = 64-75 miles (same as above for heating)	1505 kg
e-Golf 32kWH (no heatpump, but heated seats, 16" tyres)	4.5-5kWh = 144-160 miles	3.2-3.7kWh = 102-118 miles (heating set auto 19C + heated seats)	1615 kg
MG 42.5kWH	3.2-3.7kWh = 136-157 miles	2.4-2.9kWh = 102-124 miles (heating set to three red blobs, fan on 3 + heated seats)	1566 kg

This is excellent real world information. If you look at internal combustion engined vehicles (sorry to swear) there is quite a bit of difference in mpg between saloon type vehicles and suv’s. i think the same is true in the EV world. The MG is as you say a brick and not a small streamlined car. It will suffer badly for higher consumption at higher speeds. I’ve personally found that applying 3miles/kwh and then multiplying this by the usable battery capacity usually gives a reasonable prediction of overall usable range over time. on really short cold journeys my consumption can go to 2miles/kwhr quite easily. On warm days city driving 4+ is achievable for me anyway. Thanks again for an informative post.