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So I am seriously thinking of taking the plunge with the MG ZS EV. It’s currently the only EV on the scheme that meets my needs.
Any tips, thoughts?. I will mainly charge at home and a basing my choice on a real world range of 140 miles and probably just under £7 for a full charge.
What phone apps do people use to find CCS charging points?
I use a small electric wheelchair and will get a boot hoist via Motability.
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I would say the best app for ccs chargers would be zap map.
I think he is reffering to the 5 or so charging apps that is required to operate some of the charging points. Boris has told the power companies they should all be contactless payment on every charger and a phone app is not allowed.
Honestly – the EV MG Zs(?) is quite appealing just based on price and specs. It will be a change to your usual routine, but it may just be worth it. Running costs should be very attractive.
Just reading the original post – yup Zap Map is best for finding the charging points.
I watched a review on youtube about a guy using the Kia Niro for a week – 2000 miles. The night mare of these different power supply companies with their different apps to let you use the chargers, some need RF ID tokens sent out before they would work etc… His biggest gripe is the cars are not like a Tesla. you put you destination into satnav and the car works out how far you should get and will direct you to a charger if your range is not enough.
i think ev cars should be wireless charging too
im looking at mg ev and one of my issues is bending down too plug in the charger ,
MG ZS EV gets a good write up, considered it myself but not enough of an increase in range over my Leaf to justify the money for me. I’d definitely recommend getting a BEV ?
I prefer PlugShare as it gets updated more than zapmap, but I do check both before long trips. I can also use WattsUp, Waze, A Better Route Planner, Pod-Point, Charge your Car and some others I can’t remember…. but remember I’m doing 400+ miles in a day, most folk if staying local won’t need them all.
The multitude of different charging networks is a major downside but if you’re only, or mostly, charging at home it won’t matter. Once you’re used to it you’ll soon get the hang of different chargers and how to pay for them. Join an owners club (there’s one on Facebook) for hints and tips.
No chance of wireless charging, our Gov can’t even fill potholes so how would they put in the infrastructure for that… you don’t have to bend down, once you know what your doing it can be done just by feel.
The MG ZS EV is a remarkable car for the price, try watching Bjorn Nyland’s trip to the North Cape (Norway, Nordkapp) in one a couple of weeks ago, he also has one of his own in Thailand.
There are lots for apps for EVs, route planning ones, they have web pages too so you can try them out on a decent sized screen:
ZapMap – https://www.zap-map.com/live/
Plug Share – https://www.plugshare.com/
A Better Route Planner – https://abetterrouteplanner.com/
Then there are the charger apps, but which ones you need will depend on where you live & how much travelling you do. Put these together with the RFID cards that you can order from many companies & it soon becomes confusing, then you find GeniePoint & Engie are the same company but you can’t use the RFID charge on an Engie charger, and they’re going to rebrand to yet another name soon. Cards that you will likely need:
ChargePlace Scotland if you live in Scotland or, if you’re just visiting then a ChargeYourCar (CYC) card is the same company & a CYC card will work (£20 a year though).
PolarPlus, 3 months free (6 months free with some cars), try it out, see if you like it, then if you’re not doing much mileage stop the card as it’s £7.65 a month I think. Of course this is the same company behind CYC, so the card may work in the english chargers but not in the ChargePlace Scotland ones, that would be sensible & sensible hasn’t happened yet for EV charge providers. The Polar network can be accessed with an app but they don’t work in underground car parks.
GeniePoint, yes, £9 for a card or just use the app or contactless (debit or credit card). These chargers hang out at Morrisons.
Shell, again, RFID card available but you can use the app.
Charging with a debit or credit card, that’ll be Instavolt, these you’ll find are the more reliable type but no AC charging so don’t bring along a Zoe unless it has CCS (the optional DC charge port) but it’ll work fine on an MG ZS EV.
PodPoint, you’ll need the app for this one, and you’ll want it too, those free 7kW charge posts at some supermarkets are often PodPoint but you have to register your charge using the app within 15 minutes else it stops. The 15 minutes is because you may need to find a better phone signal nearby.
There are new apps that promise to cover a variety of charge providers, but a few startups have tried this path & none have yet managed it in the UK so we just get even more apps.
Wireless charging sounds great but the logistics don’t add up, EVM (ElectricVehicleMan) has done a video on this. Currently the rail company here are resurfacing their car parks whilst passenger numbers are very low, so they’ve put in lots of charging posts whilst they’re at it? No, that’d be sensible, no one does sensible for EVs yet except Tesla. Next resurfacing is probably 20 years or more away, it’s a missed opportunity.
Damn I hope they sort that out over the next few years, I want an EV in the next 3-5 years but that sounds like a complete mess.
Wow. Thanks everyone, that all sounds more complex than I realised in terms of charging away from home. Fortunately we have access to a second petrol car so we anticipate we should be able to do 90% of our journeys and charge at home.
Julie, as always, fantastic info, what would we do without you.
Thanks for your expertise.
Well, I didn’t tackle martino’s issue with the MG ZS EV, the kneel down on the ground to plug into the charge port issue. Yes, it’s very low and although OK from a low wheelchair, it’s not good if you are standing & trying to connect the car.
It’s a shame as the charge port on the front of the car is a great position, but this is let down with the low height of the port and the main problem with the hinge up design of the cover that means you need to go searching underneath to plug in. Yes, you’ll learn to do this by touch but it’s not ideal.
Alternative is the left rear side ported Peugeot e-2008, although it’s not as big inside & the boot isn’t a great size. The Pug e-2008 is also more expensive on the scheme, although it probably has 10 miles or more range per charge.
I wouldn’t rule out the Zoe ZE50 with the CCS, it has a far better range than either the MG ZS EV or the Pug e-2008, and it’s quite spacious (yes, I had a sit in one last month in a dealership), but you can’t alter the seat height and it feels like you are a couple of inches too high up in the driver’s seat. You would probably get used to that. Space in the rear seats is limited, but the boot space is better than the Pug e-2008, and the ZE50 has a split rear bench that the earlier models lacked. The Zoe ZE50 has the best range of the EVs available on the scheme currently, but you need to take into account the faster charge speeds on the MG ZS EV (max around 85kW) and Pug e-2008 (max around 98kW) and those BP (Polar) & Shell (Recharge) 150kW chargers popping up at garages.
Thanks again. I also need the electric seats on the MG. I did call Peugeot to discuss their electric SUV but they didn’t call back where as MG have been very helpful and also offered cash back.
Does anyone have one and know if it works with Android phones?
Thanks for the very comprehensive review. I’m going to stick with good old combustion engines as long as possible, not least because I don’t have off street parking and I don’t want to waste what’s left of my life trying to cope with the shambles you have described.
if i was to get EV MG and my issue with it is trying to charge it could the charging cover be hinged down the way, left or right to make charging easier
Thanks again. I also need the electric seats on the MG. I did call Peugeot to discuss their electric SUV but they didn’t call back where as MG have been very helpful and also offered cash back. Does anyone have one and know if it works with Android phones?
The MG ZS EV does have Android Auto.
but….
In the European market (including the UK), there is no MG ZS EV app support for things like remotely switching the aircon on. The cars sold in this market don’t have the 4G unit for this feature.
This was the situation a few months back.
if i was to get EV MG and my issue with it is trying to charge it could the charging cover be hinged down the way, left or right to make charging easier
There is an MG ZS EV forum somewhere ( https://www.mgevs.com/forums/mg-zs-ev-forum.2/ ) & they may have discussed some modifications such as this, but I don’t know of any that have done this. The charge port door has electronics too I think, perhaps a switch to tell the car if the charge port door has been left open & some leads for the twinkly LED lights whilst charging.
The charge port door would need to be replaced completely because of the way it hinges, so you’d need to obtain & modify a spare so it could be put back to “normal” before returning in 3 years. I think someone will likely do this, or use the other method of running without the charge port door completely. SAIC has made this far more complicated than it needs to be & a simple bottom hinged panel with a locking mechanism at the top and a seal would be a far superior engineering solution.
Thanks very much for the MG ZS EV forum link.
@Gothitjulie said:
“In the European market (including the UK), there is no MG ZS EV app support for things like remotely switching the aircon on. The cars sold in this market don’t have the 4G unit for this feature.”
The MyDS app I have for my DS3 Crossback E-Tense EV is useless. I’ve just recently got it working, sometimes, after 4 months! I can, however, set pre-conditioning up from the car touchscreen and also set delayed charging too. I wonder whether these features are available in the MG ZS software too?
@gothitjulie said: “In the European market (including the UK), there is no MG ZS EV app support for things like remotely switching the aircon on. The cars sold in this market don’t have the 4G unit for this feature.” The MyDS app I have for my DS3 Crossback E-Tense EV is useless. I’ve just recently got it working, sometimes, after 4 months! I can, however, set pre-conditioning up from the car touchscreen and also set delayed charging too. I wonder whether these features are available in the MG ZS software too?
Are there any firmware updates for your DS3, and are there any app updates to go with it? I know the Pug e-208 owners lost functionality here in the UK after Peugeot forgot to include the UK update for the app.
For the MG ZS EV there are indeed menu options for timed events as far as I’m aware, although they have just had a “Comfort Update 2” that has dealt with many of the problems so it may all be even better now. There are also more updates due later this year.
@gothitjulie said:
“Are there any firmware updates for your DS3, and are there any app updates to go with it? I know the Pug e-208 owners lost functionality here in the UK after Peugeot forgot to include the UK update for the app.”
I’ve put on all available updates but problems persist. Just a couple of days ago I had to uninstall and reinstall the app, yet again, to restore functionality.
The DS Connected Nav that my car comes with provides stuff like real-time traffic updates etc. etc. I can’t get this activated for love nor money. Apparently dealers used to activate subscriptions but now the manufacturer does, but it ain’t working. In other words, the connected nav ain’t connected!
Another annoyance is the sat nav updates. My last car, you chose the map area you wanted, downloaded it and installed it. The DS one, there’s only one update for everywhere! This means that you have to downlaod over 16 gb in total. When you come to install the new map it THEN allows you to chose which countries to include. It would be much better and easier to do this first, not last.
These sort of software issues are annoying as the car itself is great. Pull your finger out, DS!
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