MG6 Test drive...Now with added Clarkson - Page 4

[Negative Creep]

Sad sign of the times when you need a diesel engine to compete. I do think they're a pretty smart looking car, although the fact I've tried on three occasions to order a brochure hardly fills you with confidence

[gtd2000]

There was one parked near my lockup the other day. I think it's a good looking car but they seem to think the MG brand is prestige and asking too much for them. As said in a previous topic Rover got it into their heads that they were somehow semi-prestige and a cut above Ford and Vauxhall and under BMW Merc so tried to charge more for their product than people wanted to pay.

MG should be doing whatDacia are doing and have 3 trims at £12995, £14495, £15995 with varying level of luxury and equipment. If you start pricing it at Focus's and Astra's and just forget all that prestige pish they'll start turning the heads of people who'd normally spend that much money on a smaller back hatch. It's the private buyers MG needs as company car drivers won't touch them because there's no diesel version

 

Other than Rolls Royce, Bentley & Aston Martin (and perhaps Jaguar up to come point in the 1960's) I can't honestly say I've never thought of any other British car as a prestige marque.

 

I've certainly considered many to be overly hyped brands that required a premium price but came with dubious reliability and a rose tinted heritage.

 

I think you have the right idea for the pricing and trim levels but you should revise this to be something like, £8999/£10999/£12999 at best.

 

After all, if Dacia can build a Logan for US$1069 then I'm sure the Chinese can beat that!

[Spiny Norman]

MG should be doing whatDacia are doing and have 3 trims at £12995, £14495, £15995 with varying level of luxury and equipment.

 

I didn't realise these things were so expensive. Who in their right mind is going to pay the £15-£19k asking price for an MG6 when you can have a Mondeo or any of its rivals for the same money, a Focus/Golf etc for a couple of grand less or a Kia/Hyundai for a hell of a lot less.

It's as if they just don't want it to succeed.

[cort16]

They did the same with the MGF and priced it similiarly to the mx-5. If you wanted a two seater convertible who in their right mind would pick one of them over an mx-5? The should have priced them around 11 grand and actually sold some of them. Surely it can't be costing them the same as an mx-5 or in the case of the MG6 a Mondeo to build them?

 

I wonder if they'll still give you the 2 grand if it's whistling like a kettle?

[gtd2000]

I wonder if they'll still give you the 2 grand if it's whistling like a kettle?

 

I suspect they'll be the ones whistling..."in the wind"

[RedSparrow]

So, like the CityRover and MG TF re-launch, overconfidence in the brand value = overpricing = FAIL.

You'd think they would've learnt this lesson by now. No-one really cares about the percieved added value of an MG or Rover badge anymore.

 

Interesting to read that they turn up fully fitted and trimmed and all that happens in the UK i the engine, gearbox and front panel are bolted on.

Literally the bare minimum to say it's 'made in Britian'.

 

Like many. I wanted to be positive about this, but I can't see it going well.

[The Reverend Bluejeans]

Who in their right mind is going to pay the £15-£19k asking price for an MG6 when you can have a Mondeo or any of its rivals for the same money, a Focus/Golf etc for a couple of grand less or a Kia/Hyundai for a hell of a lot less.

 

Apart from a halfwit, nobody. They are pissing in the wind, and it would be comical if it weren't so sad and utterly misguided. MG is dead and the market does not need any more marques/brands.

[Mr H Sceptre]

I wonder if they'll still give you the 2 grand if it's whistling like a kettle?

 

 

Whats the logic in offering the money off just for an MG or Rover? Why not any other makes? In fact surely it would be better to have non-MG/Rovers as other makes would have higher resale values.

[Mr_Bo11ox]

I'd love an MG6 I would. Its blue-chip SHITE so i'm IN. However I would not pay more than a grand for one.

[barrett]

Whats the logic in offering the money off just for an MG or Rover? Why not any other makes? In fact surely it would be better to have non-MG/Rovers as other makes would have higher resale values.

 

I imagine their logic is that the only people who would even consider buying an MG6 are dyed-in-the-wool Austin-Rover-MG traditionalists. Anyone who currently drives any other marque is already a lost cause and not worth pursuing. There should probably be a catchy name for that specific market (in the same way there is one for the gay and OAP markets), I'd suggest calling it the "beige pound".

[Pete-M]

Rovers last properly designed and built car was the P6, and they managed to stretch that out from '63-78 which is far too long. Since then they've made two decent looking cars - the SD1 Vitesse and the 820 Coupé - and they managed to chuck 'em together without including any build quality at all (or any suspension in the 800 Coupé)

 

The MG ZT 260 was a brilliant thing, but have a close look around one and you can tell it was a 'skunk works' project. Bodgery abounds, and it's blatantly obvious that it was built by blokes in a shed as opposed to by what was allegedly a 'prestige' manufacturer. However, the ZT 260 is cool as fuck and drives brilliantly, so it's excused.

 

This MG6 thing looks like someone has been in a hall of mirrors squinting at an accident damaged Insignia.

[trigger]

I saw a MG6 funny enough tonight in a nice blue with a AY11 *** plate leaving my work and there's a black one with a private plate that lives a few doors away from the in laws, in fact I've seen a few about in the local area.

[ProgRocker]

Likewise with the MG6, it seems that Alfa Romeo were lining Quentin's pockets in 1992/3 when he made this video (provided by flat4alfa of this parish):

 

164

 

Mind, had I have been a thrusting executive (ooer) in the early 90s, I'd have gladly pissed away £20k on a new one. However, the MG6 will take much more convincing, especially with the Hyundai i40 and Kia Optima posing a serious threat.

[willswitchengage]

MG should be doing whatDacia are doing and have 3 trims at £12995, £14495, £15995 with varying level of luxury and equipment.

 

I didn't realise these things were so expensive. Who in their right mind is going to pay the £15-£19k asking price for an MG6 when you can have a Mondeo or any of its rivals for the same money, a Focus/Golf etc for a couple of grand less or a Kia/Hyundai for a hell of a lot less.

It's as if they just don't want it to succeed.

 

Same story with the Cityrover. Rover underestimated the intelligence of buyers - marking them up from cost price by about five grand to a "competitive" price, and obviously therefore didn't sell many. Dacia's got the idea with make 'em cheap sell 'em cheap, not sneak in some ULTIMATE BUSINESS PLAN high profit margins.

[cort16]

No matter what we think of the MG6 I think we can all agree Quentin Wilson is a complete fanny.

[Mr H Sceptre]

There should probably be a catchy name for that specific market (in the same way there is one for the gay and OAP markets), I'd suggest calling it the "beige pound".

 

 

...the "shite shilling"

[Pete-M]

Likewise with the MG6, it seems that Alfa Romeo were lining Quentin's pockets in 1992/3 when he made this video (provided by flat4alfa of this parish):

 

164

 

Mind, had I have been a thrusting executive (ooer) in the early 90s, I'd have gladly pissed away £20k on a new one. However, the MG6 will take much more convincing, especially with the Hyundai i40 and Kia Optima posing a serious threat.

 

To give the 164 a bit of credit, I've had four of them and I'd have another like a shot if I could find one in the exact right spec. Ok, they have their foibles and can be expensive to fix but the 3.0 engine is brilliant when it's on form. They handle well (once you learn to drive around the torque steer). A black 24v manual with the black leather in mint condition will always be desirable car to me.

[gtd2000]

I always liked the look of the 164 and certainly 20 years ago would have loved to be wafting around in one.

 

Trouble was at the time a friend of mine had an Alfa 75 - and it was a case of listening to what bits fell off or broke off each week - truly awful car but he loved it - it was only about 3/4 years old at the time too!!!

[Pete-M]

The list of stuff that broke on the 164s I had was remarkably small. None of them ever actually 'failed to proceed' in my ownership.

 

One of the TS ones I bought cheaply because the oil pressure gauge read zero. Trader had it, saw the gauge, shit a brick and offered it to me for a tiny amount. Because I've had them before it was obvious to me that the oil pressure was actually fine on the thing. There's a low level light that is hypersensitive on 'em, and the oil pressure light has a different sender. They were both fine, it was just the gauge sender that had packed in. I ran that one for about six months and it was great. I sold it because someone offered me five times my initial purchase price for it..

 

My other TS was also reliable. It was a bit tired but it still went indecently well for a normally aspirated 2.0 in a big car.

 

I had a 3.0 12v manual in blue that I loved. Unfortunately that one suffered from stepper motor failure on the climate control which meant it was always insanely hot in the cabin. I ran that one through winter then flogged it in spring.

 

The other one was a new company car, so doesn't count.

[RedSparrow]

Thread resurrection!

 

Clarkson predictably slates the MG6:

http://www.driving.co.uk/clarkson/mg/mg6/the-clarkson-review-mg6-magnette/11796

 

And MG's response:

http://www.aronline.co.uk/blogs/news/mg-news/mg-motor-uk/news-the-clarkson-review-mg-motor-uks-response/

 

Interesting that they only sold 13 in April. Not going to well then.

[Junkman]

The styling of the car was led by talented British Design Director Tony Williams-Kenny, educated at none other than Coventry University.

 

Well, talented is very obviously in the eyes of the beer-holder, but at least I now know which University to veto out, should my kids decide they want to study industrial design. That thing so ugly that I can't even drink it nice and for that reason alone I'll probably never enter one to find out about its alleged engineering brilliance. However, 148PS merely yielding a dismally mediocre 120 mph top speed leads me to believe I wouldn't have to bother even if the car looked less appalling.

 

According to Jeremy Clarkson, the new MG, designed and engineered in Birmingham, England is ‘as Chinese as Chopsticks’. To the 300 Designers and Engineers based at the MG Birmingham site who were responsible for the design and engineering of the MG6 this is clearly an insult.

 

I rarely agree with Mr. Clarkson's outlook on cars, and also in this case the 300 Designers and Engineers who were responsible for the design and engineering of the MG6 shouldn't be insulted by his remarks. They should rather be ashamed by their sorry effort.

[Cavcraft]

If Clarkson wrote it it's only ever going to be sensationalist nonsense anyway.

[Mr_Bo11ox]

Heres a brand new one being auctioned!

 

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/261223401557

 

Be interesting to se what it makes. List price £19k.

[Spiny Norman]

I'm surprised it's at £10k already.

[tooSavvy]

....Clarkson, the f*ckwitt, keyboard jockey 'et superiorre!'.... oh, laa!

 

OK, MG, organise a 'club meet', with the 35,000 models you sell over the next 5 years - venue his drive... or, F*CK OFF!!

 

*no sensitivities of UK [nominally] employed designers of MG [AKA 'chopstick monginn'] were trampled on during this rant*

 

*see BNP 'white is right' handbook

 

tooSavvy

[RedSparrow]

Seems a little desperate if a dealer is auctioning them to get rid.

 

The dealer's name is a slightly ironic twist too.

[freebird]

So are we supposed to shoot the messenger here?

Why should he gush over it if its a pile of crap?

Are we supposed to all cum in our underpants because the Chinese have invested all that money on its creation ( but fuck all on its marketing ) when the car isnt even being made here and, because of that, we have lost the potential to have created THOUSANDS of jobs.

So its been designed here, so what? It doesnt automatically mean that they will have a fuggin clue how to put it all together in Shanhai or wherever its made.

Its not an MG, its not British and the Chinese can fuck right off.

[freebird]

So there.

[Mr_Bo11ox]

What a load of old shit

[freebird]

What a load of old shit

So you dont like the car either then.......