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Kia EV6 - UK

783K views 7K replies 316 participants last post by  EV6Tim 
#1 ·
Hi Everyone, I thought I would start up a thread specifically for UK-based subscribers.

I have recently ordered a Kia EV6 GT-Line S 4WD in Matt grey with Heat Pump. I had originally signified my interest by paying a £100 refundable deposit (returned last week direct from Kia). On the 4th May my dealership, Newbarn in Bognor Regis (great people to work with) took a £500 deposit and ordered my car.

As of today I have no delivery date (October 2021 has been mentioned). However the orders were well over-subscribed here in the UK so I am unsure how that will affect delivery, hopefully I will be near the front of the queue if it is based on ordering time.

I have yet to see any photographs of a grey EV6 GT-Line S (unless someone knows differently) and so have to rely on the scant written data available.

On delivery I will be asking the dealer to take the car to the local CeramicPro installer for them to clean and cover the car, glass, wheels and interior with their magic goo. Hopefully that will protect the car from Seagulls and sea spray!

Interested to hear from others who have ordered and how their experience has been to date, and what news they have been able to pick up.
 
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#59 ·
The EV6 tour has reached France. Some fabulous photographs at the link below. The Matte Grey looks amazing, but agree completely with you John. Cannot wait to see it in the flesh in 22 days time.

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#63 ·
I think it will probably be the same vehicles, probably Left Hand Drive too. The initial Mach-e tour was LHD I remember. Hopefully you are right. It would be great to see it.

I'm curious about delivery dates for other RHD countries such as Japan. If it's close to October that would be great.
 
#64 · (Edited)
Hi folks, another cancelled ME punter here. I just couldn't commit to a £50k purchase without driving the car, let alone see one!

I compared the tech to the EV6 and it wins outright for less money, so a reservation went into the Aldershot branch. GT line S. Was the heat pump an extra? I don't remember being asked, but may have. I'm not too fussed either way.

I feel I've gone a bit cheap here and stuck with the Red (my ME was going to be red).

I do have an early question. I was going to install a commando socket for my ME. It was less of a problem with the freeholder of the building. Will the EV6 come with a charger to do the same?

I will be seeing an EV6 in Epsom on 16th July. Can't wait!
 
#65 ·
Hi Djkam, welcome on board. There are a few of us ex MME guys here. Agreed that in terms of vfm, the EV6 wins hands down. Seems to be quite a few teeething problems with the MME which hopefully the EV6 will not have. The heat pump is an extra, and depending on how much you will use the car, not really essential unless you are a high daily mileage driver. I did get it because there are days when I do high mileage and in winter range can be badly affected.

I do not believe the EV6 comes with a Commando Socket compatible charger lead, but I recently bought a charger via Octopus at a discounted rate that is commando socket compliant. See the link below.


In terms of paint choices, the red is no cheaper than the others, and having originally gone for the Matte Grey upon hearing of the many potential issues with it Kia agreed to change my car to red (also my choice for the MME).
 
#67 · (Edited)
Hi Djkam, welcome on board. There are a few of us ex MME guys here. Agreed that in terms of vfm, the EV6 wins hands down. Seems to be quite a few teeething problems with the MME which hopefully the EV6 will not have. The heat pump is an extra, and depending on how much you will use the car, not really essential unless you are a high daily mileage driver. I did get it because there are days when I do high mileage and in winter range can be badly affected.

I do not believe the EV6 comes with a Commando Socket compatible charger lead, but I recently bought a charger via Octopus at a discounted rate that is commando socket compliant. See the link below.


In terms of paint choices, the red is no cheaper than the others, and having originally gone for the Matte Grey upon hearing of the many potential issues with it Kia agreed to change my car to red (also my choice for the MME).
Yes the Ohme is a good unit... clever tech.

Colours for me are down to my wife unfortunately. I liked the Blue and the Red but we ended up with black. :)

I'm probably going to fit commando sockets at our work site so might end up with both. I do bi-monthly trips between Bristol and Scotland so I need a good charge plan.
 
#66 ·
haha some old very patient faces on here. :) Yes, I guess for me it didn't help that Ford had messed me around right good and proper before I did the test drive of the MME. I left it feeling ambivalent. It was sort of OK although the brakes on my car were way too snappy. I thought the interior was very American and not all that great for the money.

The big thing however was the disappointing Charge Curve. I could live with 150Kw but I'd really want it close to that for between 10 and 80%. It's not much faster than the iPace and I discounted that for mainly this reason. I also prefer the design language of the Kia. I wouldn't say the Mustang badge added anything in my head. Ford's admin was a complete s**t shower which really didn't help.

The Heat Pump is a £900 option on the EV6 GT Line S in the UK. It's only standard on the GT. I tried to add it later but I would have had to cancel my order and start again and there's no way I would do that again after my MME experience so no heat pump for me. In the UK the heap pump won't make a massive difference and with 800v charging I won't care much. I do two to three long journeys a month and none when it's really cold.

Yes I did the maths too and even losing the £3k grant the EV6 was cheaper and it gave me the excuse to go for the AWD and the head up display which I wanted. So I'm spending a few K more but I'm getting a much better spec.

I'm going to fit a Zappi as I have two solar arrays, one on FiT and the other not and as I work from home I plan to put my surplus electrons into the EV6 when I can. When we change my wife's car it will be for an EV so probability is we will have at least one car at home.
 
#69 ·
You can buy well over 4000 KWh with the £900 and do over 14k miles so unless you really need the winter range it makes no sense in the UK. People say winter range drops by 30% for non heat pump but it still drops 20% for with a heat pump. Even if you're overly generous and say 15% drop, that would be say from 250 real world range take it to 212 miles comfortably vs. 175 miles so roughly an extra 37 miles. In very cold weather I'll just stop more frequently. The only thing that made me want to add it was residual value but I'm probably going to lease anyway.
 
#71 ·
Thanks Jon. Great news. Very happy they have decided to fly in an RHD version. They will have an EV6 on display at the Goodwood Festival this week. Sadly I cannot make it, but have someone there who will hopefully be sending me some images. Front on the car looks stunning, and the paint finish is beautiful - almost regret changing away from the matte grey, but the issue previously raised just made it an impractical choice for me.
 
#79 ·
I think you are right Jon, the embargo well and truly lifted. This review is great. Some nice camera angles and commentary.

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#82 ·
Well managed to sit in one, heavens the seats are really really comfortable. The bolstering hugs you into the seats giving it a cosseted feel.
Screens are driver centric with crisp clear imaging with the central console giving a nice resting position for your arm.

Stacks of room for both front and especially rear passengers, although the raised floor was noticeabl.

Externally the car looks stunning, this was in the matt grey.
 
#84 ·
Yes great to hear... did you car have the two tone seats? I don't really like the off white patches, to be honest. I'm off to see it in person tomorrow so will be great to see it in the flesh. It feels like we are getting closer although I hear more people talking November rather than October now. I hope the software is robust and both Ford and VW have had serious issues. Interesting that Audi used their own software on the baby etron.
 
#83 ·
Nice to hear a first hand report on the actual car - the seats look great and great to know they are really comfortable. The key fob control of the car is such a great feature, especially here in London where space is so tight and it is almost always a contortionist's effort to get in and out of the car. Roll on this week when several of us on here get to experience the car first hand.
 
#86 ·
Well tomorrow night will show me. I have a horribly busy day too and a meeting in Birmingham then a drive back to Bath and then on to Chippenham to see it. I'm going to be measuring the boot height. Lack of space under seats is not a deal breaker for me as the room in the back is huge for the kids. Goodwood looked pretty chaotic so thanks for doing such a great job answering so many questions.

I think Press test drives will be the next thing. With the Ionic5 they allowed test drives of an early pre-production model so you'd guess Kia would do the same. The cars are so close they will probably drive in a very similar way. I must say; I wish it had aid suspension on the GT Line S as at £50k you'd really hope so but then again the Mach-e doesn't.

I think a few lucky people are seeing it today at certain dealers. So I'm sure there will be lots of information coming very soon. Thanks again :)
 
#87 ·
Cannot wait to get your feedback Jon. Having both migrated over from the MME it will be interesting to see how the EV6 compares to the MME. Interestingly it appears that we might at least get the ski hatch which would be a bonus. I will be asking about the seat colours to see if there is any chance of changing this aspect.
 
#90 · (Edited)
Here are my thoughts on the EV6 launch event in Chippenham;

The car looks fabulous in matt grey. I'm regretting black now. I think I would have put up with the issues around maintenance. The build quality looks up there with BMW, Audi etc. The plastics surrounding the boot looked a little cheap but I really don't care about the boot. It's very wide! I really like the stance of this car.

The cabin was a great place to be with tonnes of room. Cockpit surround design is first class. I much prefer the EV6 cockpit design to the Mache and the ID4. Displays were fast, almost no lag and very easy to use. I didn't have long enough to learn them, but they worked very well, and I prefer the twin display to the single large central unit.

The event wasn't very slick to be honest. I don't want to be harsh as they did their best, but it was too small a space for the numbers looking. The Kia travelling staff were very good.

Focussing on the car; visibility is great front and sides but little more limited behind. There is some subtle but interesting attention to detail. Getting back into our Discovery made it feel quite dated. The height of the boot from the floor to the roof is only 26inches or 28 if you remove the floor cover. My dog is going to have to lie down! The wheels look great, better in person than online.

I think my only negative is the boot is not that large. Two large suitcases only I would estimate, maybe some small bags too, but the space inside is huge. Felt as big as my full size Discovery but with better leg room. You can only just get your toes under the front seat from the back. Almost no space at all.

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#92 ·
Thanks Jon, sounds very promising. By the sound of it, I may well regret changing from matte grey to red!

There are a couple of videos of the launch events already online, and it does seem like there are a lot of people at each time slot.

How did you find the seats?
oh! I'm feeling that. My wife was there and said "I really like the matt grey" having told me she hated it when she saw it online!! Ahhhhh!!! I should have just ignored her.

Seats where very nice. I would like to do a drive in them but extremely comfortable. Better then my Land Rover and they have pretty good seats. Much lower driving position obviously but very comfortable and I'd have no issues with the material.
 
#100 ·
Generally most cars drive reasonably well these days. What we do know is that Kia have the experience of the Niro to lean on when it comes to tuning the car for UK roads which is where I think Ford fell short with the Mach-e. A bottom weighted electric car is very different from a front engined car. The acceleration will be intoxicating, and couple that with a nice cabin to sit in and it all sounds really promising.

Off to view in 3 hours!!
 
#101 ·
Generally most cars drive reasonably well these days. What we do know is that Kia have the experience of the Niro to lean on when it comes to tuning the car for UK roads which is where I think Ford fell short with the Mach-e. A bottom weighted electric car is very different from a front engined car. The acceleration will be intoxicating, and couple that with a nice cabin to sit in and it all sounds really promising.

Off to view in 3 hours!!
Enjoy your time with it!!! :) I agree with what you say.

One point I forgot is the Demo car has no sunroof so it's quite dark and gloomy inside. I think the Panoramic sunroof will really help.
 
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