I'll admit straight off for a liking of the 6, I think it looks good, and has plenty of kit in the car to keep even the most fidgety nosey people happy, but can MG give us a car that can get it back on the road to the glory days when MG was revered the whole world over and can the MG6 be that car.
What is it
Well this is the MG6 GT TSE hatchback, the top of the range car with all the bells and whistles from sat nav, electric and heated seats, rear camera, front and rear sensors and too many other toys to mention, it is a car situated above the Ford Focus and below the Mondeo, but aimed squarely at the retail customer rather than the corporate sale, but they won't say no to any sales at the moment.
What's it like inside.
MG have given the interior of the six a faux luxury air and it works in this car, yes there are some scratchy plastics, the fake carbon fibre esque look around the hand brake area , which is nasty, does not do the car any favours, it looks tacky, yet once you open the cubby hole they have a feel more in tune with a far superior car, solid and well put together, the steering wheel is well weighted and has a fine grip, yet the seating position is slightly off centre which means you look directly at the rev counter and not the centre info section.
The seats are very supportive and hold you well when cornering a little bit too hard, getting in and out is easy without banging your legs on the steering wheel, unlike a lot of cars around today, the rear seats are equally as comfortable, if not as supportive as the fronts, and entry exit is slightly more difficult due to the big intrusion of the rear wheel, again like many other cars, head room is compromised slightly by the sloping roof line on the GT, but not as bad on the saloon version known as the Magnette.
Engine and gearbox.
MG have decide that you get one petrol and one diesel and that's that, whereas with all other manufacturers you get a range of petrol, diesel and more commonly hybrids, the 1.8 petrol which I drove today was the first engine followed later by the 1.9 diesel, it is far from the most refined engine in the world, quite harsh once you push the car, and you don't need to push it that hard either, the fuel consumption, as indicated by MG is the nearest to real world driving as you will find anywhere, as most of the car makers massage the figures, which is really dishonest,
The gearbox is by far the biggest let down in a quite good power-train package, with only five yes five forward gears, in an era when seven, eight and even nine forward gears is becoming normal, having just five is down right Jurassic, however, it pulls well and even in fourth gear you can attempt a pull away, with a slipping clutch and slight decline, the gear change in this car was a bit graunchy, and not like I remember from testing the MG6 at a launch event some while ago,
Space and storage.
The boot space in the MG is not the best in class but is more than adequate, hindered by a rather high lip so getting your heavy shopping or luggage in becomes slightly more difficult, and for those of limited mobility or elderly it could be the deal breaker, the door pockets are not over sized like some cars which now provide space for a huge bottle of coke or water, the other cubbies at the front are limited to the ash tray (do cars really have them these days) and one, set in the arm rest which can be difficult to get into as it is set slightly too far back.
The glove box is a reasonable size, enough to hold the books and a few necessities, like cadburys, Polo's, mars and so on, you know, the really important things in life, there are also map pockets in the rear seats, so enough storage throughout the car.
Gizmo's and gadgets
The car comes well equipped with
- sat nav including European mapping,
- cruise control,
- Electric windows all round,
- Multi function trip computer,
- Bluetooth,
- Dual zone air con,
- Rear view camera,
- Front and rear sensors,
- Electrically heated and moving seats,
- Leather upholstery,
- 18" alloys,
So, it comes wonderfully equipped for the £19,400 price tag, for this top of the range TSE, but is it worth the near £20k price tag, and unfortunately i have to say on this occasion no, the prices for these cars should have been far lower, something which they have addressed in the MG3, which is a separate report, the lack of a decent dealership coverage does not help, and no advertising is crippling the brand, that and the fact that MG seems to like to register a number of cars from Longbridge and sell them onto independent franchises at drastically discounted prices, this hinders the decent friendly dealerships that want to sell cars, but cant.
The MG6 is a good car, priced wrong, with little coverage, even though they are doing great things with the BTCC, Jason Plato and Sam Tordoff, lots of race wins, and challenges for the title, but nothing from MG to show that they are achieving great things, yes they introduced a BTCC special edition, but it was just a basic "6" with stickers, and that's it, nothing more, no engine upgrades, not interior differences, nothing to set it apart from the rest of the range.
The dealerships around the country are crying out for sales, after all they need to pay people who work there, the lack of coverage, the lack of choice, the reliability issues, silly niggles that don't effect other brands, these need to be ironed out and then push the car, push the brand.
MG deserves far better than it is getting, the dealerships deserve far better treatment from the parent company, not shaft them with selling 50 Magnettes to Motorpoint and sell them at £11,000, for a TSE, that's about half price, the dealers can not compete with that, if these cars can be sold for this price why is MG asking over £20k for a Magnette, surely a reasonable price of £15k for the top of the range car, remove a couple of the standard items and offer them as reasonable priced options, after all every manufacture relies on the options list to boost income, why not MG.
My thanks goes to James at MG Cambridge, whose team treated me with respect and courtesy at all times, and never not once commented in the negative about the brand, their enthusiasm and foresight was a breath of fresh air, this is how all dealerships should be, even my suggestive questions never resulted in anything against MG, this was a great dealership, thank you.
Jon Mower
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