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

[garethj]

  Junkman said:

  Quote

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.

Coventry is one of the best for Transport Design, their course has always been good and they've got a pretty good result of pushing graduates into good jobs too.

 

Aside from that, meh. Shame for the employees but I wonder if MG/Rover/BL will always be doomed in the UK?

[Lankytim]

I think that MG6 in the auction is the first i've seen that doesn't have stickers all over the side saying "THE NEW MG6!!" I think it's a real shame it hasn't sold well but from the one's i've seen they look outdated already.

[Angrydicky]

There's a blue one round here with a personal plate on it, JN62 JAT or something like that, driven by an old giffer, which, apart from three Enterprise rental cars, is the only one I've ever seen on the road. They will be Talbot Tagora rare in 30 years time.

[freebird]

  Angry Dicky said:

There's a blue one round here with a personal plate on it, JN62 JAT or something like that, driven by an old giffer, which, apart from three Enterprise rental cars, is the only one I've ever seen on the road. They will be Talbot Tagora rare in 30 years time.

There is a red one up my way. I had a nose around it a while back and, for the money, its got to be a joke.

The only possible reason for buying one and not buying a whole plethora of other makes that are far better looking/built AND cheaper is the idea that its "British" coz its an MG.

I suspect the auctioned car will be bought by a dealer/collector and mothballed because the venture will fail and the car will become a curio in years to come.

Mind you anybody that did the same with the Rover City car obviously spunked their money away.

[Charlie Croker]

Well my opinion for what its worth is this.......

 

The M.G of old that we know and love is a different thing to the new one.......COMPLETLEY. Im not talking about companies but market's. What i mean is M.G was always a sports subsidury of a mainstream manufacturer i.e Morris - BMC -BLMC - A.R etc and NOT a manufacturer in thier own right.

 

The market M.G had was the sports market.....a niche market.

The market M.G want now is the mainstreem market.......a different beast entirley and customers of the mainstreem market have had no experience of the marque so M.G had to do something very different/special to get the markets attension.....it did'nt

The sports car market wants a sports car so i suppose most of the above applies to that too.

 

Do i like the M.G6? Its ok to look at but its the badging. i think a car should have a name not a number ( and a new one Magnette is so twee. The retro thing is sooo 1990s)

The M.G3 looks better and MAY have a chance in the Fiat 500 type of market.....I say MAY!

 

OH AND M.G ADVERTISE THE THINGS!!!!

[Pillock]

The MG6 doesn't look any worse than a Hyundai or Kia. Both those have 90% nailed the "european" look and can be mistaken for a more expensive brand, and I've seen MG6s on the road and thought it was perhaps one of those Toyota/Subaru things. Maybe that's because I expect to see one of those more than an MG (There's one locally that's sponsoring a cycling team, and I've seen three non-stickered ones on the road), but I don't think it's a bad effort.

 

Sorry, I forgot - all new cars look shit. Obv.

 

£17k isn''t bad for a car of that spec. I might even pay a visit to the dealer up the road as it's a bit unfair to comment without having parked my arse in one.... but then some of the critisisms that Clarkson has seem like he's scraping the bottom of the insult barrel. Cupholders are a bit unwieldy? Whatever.

[catsinthewelder]

Is there any truth in the idea that SAIC only bother with the UK so that the cars can be sold in China as European and therefore better than the 'only sold in China' home-market crap?

 

I read it on one of the other forums and it seems to make as much sense as anything else.

[Spiny Norman]

There was one plonked outside a local supermarket with some half-hearted sales dweeb who couldn't be arsed to get off his phone to talk to anyone a few months back that I had a brief nosey about in. It was shite, particularly inside.

It might look OK in the pictures but it's like comparing a Dixons own brand stereo with a Sony one, without the MG being a quarter of the price of the Mondeo. I cannot imagine why anyone in the UK would buy one, even over a Kia/Hyundai type car unless it was Dacia cheap.

 

I've seen more Veyrons on the road than I have MG6s, they have been a catastrophic failure.

[Lacquer Peel]

I quite like the MG6, it looks reasonably handsome for a new car, and drives well by most accounts. It just needs a more modern, frugal pez engine. At least it's not another boring VAG car on the road.

There's a fair bit of Chinese content in most new cars, they just don't advertise the fact.

Buying any new car is pissing money down the drain.

[shedvan]

  catsinthewelder said:

Is there any truth in the idea that SAIC only bother with the UK so that the cars can be sold in China as European and therefore better than the 'only sold in China' home-market crap?

 

I read it on one of the other forums and it seems to make as much sense as anything else.

 

I've heard that theory bandied about that the car is marketed over here so the Chinese home market can enjoy the perceived 'Halo-Effect' of the car being one from the European market.

 

That might be true, then again it also sounds like some dreadfully paternalistic bullshit.

 

Its hard to judge, but then the China market is very different to here and those sorts of perceptions might carry some sway, but what is abundantly clear is there doesn't seem to be any desire for MG to take actually selling cars in any meaningful numbers seriously.

[155V6]

Has anyone noticed the Jason Plato effect?.What he races in the BTCC(Chevy Cruze,then these),will sell about as many as you'll see racing all year

[Wilko220]

If I wanted a painfully thirsty, shonkily put together, dated-looking car with an MG badge on the front, I think a second-hand ZS180 would be an altogether better option.

[STUNO]

^^^^^All this comes from people who love shite like Yugo, Polonez, Lada Etc.

I challenge someone real on here to actually sit in one and maybe even drive one. Then the truth will come out

[cort16]

Take your pick of year old ones for 7500

http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201304246432606/sort/default/usedcars/make/mg_motor_uk/onesearchad/used/onesearchad/nearlynew/onesearchad/new/page/1/postcode/ka107bd/radius/1501?logcode=p

[philibusmo]

  STUNO said:

^^^^^All this comes from people who love shite like Yugo, Polonez, Lada Etc.

I challenge someone real on here to actually sit in one and maybe even drive one. Then the truth will come out

 

Already working on it.

 

I (and seemingly only I) actually quite like the look of these and judging by the way prices are tumbling, it won't be too long before they are sat squarely in my price bracket of about £20. Add the aready mentioned observation that these are the Talbot Tagoras of the future and that when you go to the MG website the first thing on there is a rolling flash banner advertising that you can 'Test drive the MG6 for a free dinner.' They must be getting desperate if they feel they have to start attracting hobos and students to drive their cars with the promise of free food.

[Richard]

If they are retailing at £7500 after a year that represents over £200 a week depreciation for the first owner.

[RedSparrow]

That's some pretty drastic depreciation!

Also, who would buy one from new and then sell it back to the dealer a year later for less than half of what they paid?

NUTTERS.

[Spiny Norman]

  STUNO said:

^^^^^All this comes from people who love shite like Yugo, Polonez, Lada Etc.

I challenge someone real on here to actually sit in one and maybe even drive one. Then the truth will come out

 

Like I said, I've sat in one and that was enough, believe me.

And while I may like the idea of a Lada or a Yugo as a fun old crate to tool about in occasionally there's no way I'd entertain one as an everyday car.

[gallondrunk]

  Lacquer Peel said:

There's a fair bit of Chinese content in most new cars, they just don't advertise the fact.

 

This. A lot more parts are sourced from China than people realise.

 

Some of the motoring journo response to this reminds me of articles from the 60's and early 70's criticising Japanese cars. People believed that they would never get better and Japan would never get a strong foothold in the European and US car markets. Then in the late 70's and 80's suddenly Japan were building some of the most reliable cars in the world and taking Detroit in particular to the cleaners.

 

Give it a decade and I bet at least two or three of the best selling UK cars will be Chinese.

[Pete-M]

I've only seen a few MG6s, to me they look like somebody shortsighted copied a crayon picture of an Insignia drawn by a blind kid.

 

The MG looks gawky, it looks too narrow and sits too high and of the very few I've seen on the road two were sitting on the hard shoulder of the M6, broken.

 

Also, £18k new, £7k a year old... these things will be sub-£500 snotters before you know it.

[freebird]

  gallondrunk said:

  Lacquer Peel said:

There's a fair bit of Chinese content in most new cars, they just don't advertise the fact.

 

This. A lot more parts are sourced from China than people realise.

 

Some of the motoring journo response to this reminds me of articles from the 60's and early 70's criticising Japanese cars. People believed that they would never get better and Japan would never get a strong foothold in the European and US car markets. Then in the late 70's and 80's suddenly Japan were building some of the most reliable cars in the world and taking Detroit in particular to the cleaners.

 

Give it a decade and I bet at least two or three of the best selling UK cars will be Chinese.

Some of those early Jap imports in the 60s were light years ahead of what we were making, surely?

The Honda S800 was 100 times better than a MG Midget, for example.

Some of those cars came with equipment like radios and HRWs and were competitively priced.

They had better build quality and manufacturing techniques, it was never a case of if but of when they would be accepted by the British motoring public.

It certainly wasnt anything to do with their cars being inferior.

IIRC, we exported Austin Sevens to japan in the 30s so they must have been pretty clued up about what to build and how to build it long before they started exporting to us?

[Spiny Norman]

Oh for sure, we'll be buying complete Chinese built cars within 10 years, and they'll be the equal of any of the Jap/Korean things that fly out the showrooms just now.

People automatically assume that Chinese build = shit. This isn't necessarily the case.

The problem is at the moment that China builds the cheapo shit for people who want the cheapest of the cheap, 'and can we have it at a huge discount but make it look expensive'. So they're slightly bling-y but the quality is really poor when you get up close.

 

Ask the Chinese to build a proper car with a decent budget to sell at proper money and very quickly they'll produce something the equal of anyone else's product.

One of the many problems that MG thing has (apart from the name, it should never have been given a British badge IMO, far too much baggage) is that they're trying to sell it far too dear. Make them £7995-£9995 out the showroom and they'll have a chance.

I keep seeing more and more of these Dacia things, I was out today and saw two Sanderos and a Duster, so cheapo cars will sell well enough if they are actually cheap to buy.

[tooSavvy]

  freebird said:

Some of those early Jap imports in the 60s were light years ahead of what we were making, surely?

The Honda S800 was 100 times better than a MG Midget, for example.

Some of those cars came with equipment like radios and HRWs and were competitively priced.

They had better build quality and manufacturing techniques, it was never a case of if but of when they would be accepted by the British motoring public.

It certainly wasnt anything to do with their cars being inferior.

IIRC, we exported Austin Sevens to japan in the 30s so they must have been pretty clued up about what to build and how to build it long before they started exporting to us?

 

Boring story [gallopinghorse/train zone...]

 

After the war the US reckoned trade would get Japan going again... and building cars.

 

Jap tech students visited Detroit to get the Goss on how it's done...

 

Question. How long to change press tooling on line?

Answer. Ohh..8hrs!

Question. Lot of downtime for line?

Answer. Well...we run 14 days on R/h fenders, then 14 days on L/h fenders.... not a problem really.....

 

Japs go home.... they produce cars in a tight 'circle' and have little steel to spread around SO >> they introduce 'DowelPin' locators for all their tooling... down time to change a line is about 20/30 minutes...

 

yes, the Japs certainly caught on fast!

 

AFAIK TrooStory

 

tooSavvy

[AnthonyG]

That does look pretty shonky. But Chinese companies in other fields are building competitive products, look at Lenovo for instance (granted they did buy IBM's laptop operations). One of the problems with the MG6 is it was designed during the 2000s as the Rover 45 replacement and as such was probably initially styled in about 2004. Progress was probably pretty slow during the MGR days (because the management - I use the word in its loosest sense - wasted time and the BMW dowry on pointless vanity projects like the SV supercar thing and the V8s). After the MGR bankruptcy and subsequent argy-bargy amongst the Chinese about who owned what just lengthened the whole development time to about a decade. As a result it looks about 5 years old when new. Now so did Kias a few years ago and Dacias now, difference is those brands are/were about simple cars at bargain prices whereas MG are over priced by a considerable degree, the CityRover self delusion all over again. I sat in a MG6 at PoL in April, the interior is frankly fairly horrible. They must be better to drive than Clarkson says because Autocar and Car say they are OK, but with the general air of cheapness and the ridicoulous overpricing, they are on to a hiding to nothing in the UK / Europe at the moment. Since Motorpoint are advertising 12 plate Insignia SRI CDTi's for £11995 currently (as an example), who on earth is going to pay more than that for something that looks like a cheap copy of one? As for the higher spec MG6's being listed at £21k, that's new Mondeo/Insignia/Passat/508 territory. Madness

[Lacquer Peel]

The Great Wall bracket photo could easily be a six month old Land Rover Defender.

[Lukas]

^ That! Or any other Offroad-car with a frame. They all come completely naked without any rustprotection from the factory.

 

And this is how it looks after 10 years without care and without additional rust-protection:

 

 

L

[mk2_craig]

I have only ever seen a MG6 over here once. That was an 11-plate on holiday when nearly new. As far as I know there are none registered here, and certainly nobody acting as dealer.

 

My wife traded in her 2008 TF last year after it became obvious that all the carefully ironed-out design flaws from the original MGF had been usurped by comedy new faults largely down to poor component quality. Recalls on front and rear suspension, leaks through some rear light cluster seals that were vastly inferior to those latterly fitted by MG Rover, intermittent groans and squeaks from the pedals, a fibreglass hardtop that let more water in than the convertible roof did, a washer pump that worked when it felt like it... and every unpainted nut and bolt completely brown after less than three years.

 

And it was orange.

[forddeliveryboy]

  catsinthewelder said:

Is there any truth in the idea that SAIC only bother with the UK so that the cars can be sold in China as European and therefore better than the 'only sold in China' home-market crap?

 

I read it on one of the other forums and it seems to make as much sense as anything else.

 

 

Well, I don't buy CAR magazine anymore, don't hang around in the Sainsbury's magazine counter while Mum does the shopping, etc. and in the last 3 years have had lots of children, wife and what have you - but do still try and watch TG on iplayer but I didn't know this car was on sale to the masses. I really think the Chinese are either quite stupid, or are simply wanting to describe their home-market cars as 'sold in Europe/UK'.

[gtd2000]

The car has an waft of Proton Gen 3 about it to me - e.g. has a bit of the look of a Mazda 3 but is really a bag of cheap nuts and bolts that will depreciate faster than a thing that depreciates fast..

 

I really DO NOT understand the pricing structure at all - hell it's a cheap copy of some nondescript car in the first place, adorned with a badge that suggests some sort of pedigree belonging to a marque that also produced shitty cars at the best of times.

 

Have the base model going out the door for £8999 and the top of the range one for £12999 and you "might" have a chance that somebody would come in and take one for a test drive - the prices are at comedy levels.

 

These things are probably produced in China for a couple of thousand dollars at the most - they should have an excellent warranty like the Koreans if they want to make any inroads on the market.

 

I still can't see any reason you'd choose this over the equivalent Hyundai Or KIA unless you were a completely un-savvy car buyer???

[STUNO]

Prices in the antipodies, just for fun..

 

MG6 Magnette 1.8 man. $30000

 

Kia Cerato $30-38500

Rio $23-26000

Mitsubishi Lancer $41-41000

Mirage $19-22000

Peugeot 308 $30-39000

Renault Fluence $35000

Skoda Octavia $34-54000 (Superb started at $46000 for an 1800)

Suzuki Swift $20-29000

SX4 $27000

Hyundai Accent $32-36000

Great Wall X240 $29000 (SUV)

Foton Tunland 2.8 D $30000 (four door utility)

Chery J3 $16000

 

So the price is good for a PREMIUM EUROPEAN SEDAN !!!

Because it is sold here as just that. Sorry I should not say SOLD, should say on the market.

I also noticed that Geely has gone from the listings so that confirms there were very few sold.