Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?

One of the things many of us EV drivers are guilty of, is plugging in whenever we have the opportunity to. We may not even need the extra range, but if there is an available 240V EVSE, or even a simple 120V outlet, and we're going to be at that location for a while, it's just too tempting not to plug in and grab some electrons while we're there.

Not that there is anything wrong with that, but I wonder how many i3 owners know their car records everywhere you've plugged in and stores the exact location? I've known this for a while now because a few months ago one of the readers here sent me an email pointing it out because it almost got him in trouble but I'll get back to that later in the post.

I'm bringing this up now because I had to bring my car in for service for BMW to inspect something. I'm beta testing new i3 software which will be released to the public in a few months so if I see anything out of the ordinary they want to check it out. So I dropped the car off at JMK BMW and a nice Ionic Silver i3 REx was waiting for me to use as a loaner. I had used this loaner before a few months ago when I had the new software installed on my car and love that JMK offers i3 loaners. It's a practice that all BMW dealerships that really want to sell i3s should employ, in my opinion.

My previous charging locations were still recorded, months after I used this loaner car. All I had to do is choose this entry and the car would direct me to my restaurant in Montclair, NJ. I could have also visited the homes of some of my fellow local i3 owners.

So as I headed out of the dealership I started the navigation system, and instead of entering the destination, I scrolled down to "Last Charging Stations" just to see if the addresses I charged at a few months back were still saved there. They were. My restaurant in Montclair and my home address were saved as destinations in the loaner's nav system. Then, as I scrolled down the list I saw addresses of all my friends who live locally and drive i3s. Their names weren't listed, but the navigation system stored the exact location of their homes - which I know because we are friends. Evidently they too had used this loaner i3 while their car was in for service. Since they charged the car at home, their addresses were recorded as "Last Charging Stations" and stored in the nav system. I erased all the entries that were addresses of the people I know, but I wonder how many of them realized they were leaving a record of where they live and charge for anyone who had the car after them to see.

I suppose it's not a problem if it's your personal car, but if you do use an i3 loaner from your dealer, and you don't want a record of where you plugged in logged in the car's navigation system, I'd suggest you delete the entries that were made while you had the vehicle before you turn the car back in. I know this isn't all that different from how navigation systems work on other cars. Many store the previous destinations that were entered in the system. However this seems a little more intrusive to me because your home address is being stored without you entering it into the system like you would have to do with a navigation system. Simply by plugging the car in you create a saved entry and the exact location is stored. I just want the readers here to know this, so they can decide if they want to delete their charging locations whenever they feel the need. I'm sure many i3 owners don't even realize this is happening.

Now getting back to the original person who pointed this out to me. About six months ago I got an email from one of the readers here. He wanted to tell me a funny story of what happened to him with his i3. One day his wife was using the car for the first time by herself and was getting to know the iDrive system. She came across the Last Charging Stations category. Scrolling down the list she saw an entry which was a street in a town that wasn't too from where they live. Unfortunately for him, it was on a street and in the town were an old girlfriend used to live. When he came home that night his wife asked him about it, and he had to explain why he was there and that it was a public charging station which he needed to stop off at for a little while so he could make it home one night. He explained and they laughed about it, and it wasn't some serious inquisition to begin with, but it was a little reminder about how this feature could get someone in trouble if they went somewhere they shouldn't have.

This may or may not be a concern for you personally, but I want to at least point this out so i3 owners are aware of it. It's very easy to delete an entry; you just hover over the saved destination, press the options button and then delete. Unless you're doing something you shouldn't be doing I don't see any reason to delete entries in your personal car, in fact storing them for future use is a great feature, and is the reason why the car does it in the first place. However, when using an i3 loaner from the dealership, I'd prefer that my home address isn't permanently stored in the nav system and I'll be deleting the entries I created when I return the cars I have on loan from now on.

BMW Working on a REx Upgrade to Increase Performance

The 650cc twin cylinder engine used in the i3 is borrowed from BMW's Motorrad division and modified for the REx

From the first word that the North American version of the i3 REx would have restrictions not found on its European counterpart, i3 enthusiasts and customers in the US and Canada have wondered how well it would work under strenuous driving conditions.

In fact, it is by far the topic I now get the most correspondence over. I have probably received over 100 emails through this blog from followers that want to know how well the range extender works and how capable it is. People want to know things like what speed the car can maintain in charge sustaining mode and for how many miles can the car maintain highway speeds on a certain percentage upgrade, and so on. I even have had people ask me if I could conduct specific tests with my car to confirm it can do what they need it to. The reason being is the 34hp REx engine can only deliver about 25kWs (although some reports say BMW upped it to 28kWs) of power. That is plenty of power for nearly all normal driving needs, but not enough for continued high speed or long upgrade driving. The problem then arises if you continue to consume more energy than the REx can deliver.

My i3 when the REx turns on. Notice the tiny little bar of electric reserve to the left of the triangle. That indicates the 6.5% SOC position where the REx initiates and tries to maintain. There isn't a lot of buffer there for strenuous driving conditions.

The root of the problem reverts back to BMW's desire to have the i3 REx certified a BEVx vehicle by the California Air Resource Board. This allows BMW to get the most ZEV credits per vehicle, and also allows the i3 REx to qualify for other perks, like sales tax exemption in New Jersey and Washington State. It also allows the owner to get the full $2,500 California CVRP rebate, unlike all other PHEVs which only get $1,500. However this came with a cost, one that everybody with an i3 REx from every state has to endure. BMW had to restrict the REx use to comply with CARB's BEVx classification. The European i3 REx can be manually turned on any time the state of charge is lower than 75%. This is called a Hold Mode and allows the driver to hold a higher state of charge and keep a higher battery buffer which they may need for continued strenuous driving conditions later in the journey. The North American version has no Hold Mode, and the range extender only comes on when the battery is reduced to a critically low 6.5%. For normal driving that is fine, but when really pressed for continued periods, the car cannot maintain full power.

The European i3 REx has a Hold Mode which allows the driver to manually turn on the range extender if they need to. This feature is disabled for North America and is that is the root of the problem.

This creates a problem when the driver needs to drive for an extended period which demands an energy draw of more than 25kWs. The meager 6.5% battery reserve can quickly deplete in these conditions. When this happens, the car goes into a reduced power mode and can only maintain a speed of about 40mph. To make matters even worse, the driver gets no warning and the car just slows down. This is not what you want happening to you when you are on a highway and cars are whizzing by you at 70mph. This is a real issue, and compounded by the problem that most BMW client advisers didn't know how to communicate this to the customers and sold them the cars without informing them how to properly operate the vehicle in REx mode. I've had people contact me that were completely unaware of how the range extender worked and said they were told by their client adviser that "the car can do anything in range extender mode as it can in all electric mode, it just doesn't have quite as much power." That isn't true, and many early i3 REx customers were disappointed when they found out they couldn't drive up that mountain to their summer home, for example. In fact, one the Born Electric guest bloggers here mentioned an instance where he went into reduced power mode with a car full of friends.  

Don Parsons of Denver, Colorado recently took his i3 REx to the summit of Mt Evans which is the highest elevation with paved road in the US. He did experience the REx reduced power mode, but it didn't stop him from completing the14,000 ft ascent to the summit. This, of course is about as taxing on the range extender as it gets!

All that said, I now have over 10,000 miles on my i3 REx and not once have I ever gone into reduced power mode, and I've actually tried to make it happen! The "problem" I'm having is the highways are relatively flat here in New Jersey and the REx can basically handle anything I give it. The times I have tried to make it happen the flow of traffic wasn't fast enough for me to maintain a speed of over 75mph for a long enough period. 75 mph on relatively flat ground seems to be the upper limit the REx can handle for continued driving. There is plenty of energy to go up and down the hills I routinely drive over, and also to have short bursts of power well past 80 mph for passing if needed in REx mode, so for me the car works perfectly and I really don't need a modification. However my friends in California and other areas of the country that have long, steep inclines to negotiate disagree, and want to see some kind of modification to allow the range extender to turn on at a higher state of charge so the vehicle has a larger electric buffer. In fact, there will soon be a two-part post here by an i3 Rex owner in California that has been obsessing a bit over this very topic. (well, I call it obsessing, he calls it studying - I'll let you be the judge when you read his post next week!)

The Chevy Volt has a much more robust range extender engine and can operate under just about any condition without an issue. However it has about half the electric range as the i3 REx, meaning you will need to use it much more, so it has to be more capable. With a 70-80 mile all electric range, most i3 owners will not need to use the REx frequently.

So now that we understand the problem, what is the solution. Should BMW simply give up the value of the BEVx designation and allow the driver to initiate Hold Mode as the European i3 REx owners can? That isn't happening as far as I can tell. What I do believe is going to happen? Well for starters there will be software updates that include better indicators that the car may be headed to reduced power mode if you don't take action to alleviate it. Perhaps by slowing down 5-10 mph you can completely avoid having a problem at all. I also expect there will be a better state of charge display so the driver has more accurate display of how much power they have left. I would also love if BMW could add a display that would show the actual power draw you are using, so the driver can see if they are drawing more energy than the REx is producing. That would be an awesome tool for the driver to use in these situations and I do hope the BMW engineers consider adding it.. However I'm saving the best for last. It is my belief that BMW is working on an update that will indeed allow the range extender to turn on much earlier than the 6.5% threshold if the car determines you will need the extra power. This will work with the navigation system which accounts for topography. Once a destination is entered, the car will determine how early the REx will need to be turned on so it avoids reduced power while climbing an upgrade at the end of the journey. 

The i3's range extender sits next to the electric motor above the rear axle

While this isn't quite as good as having the ability to manually turn on the range extender, it's pretty close. The bottom line is people just want to be able to get to their destination without worry of a reduced power "slowdown" while driving on the highway. If the modifications that BMW are working on do indeed work, I don't think anyone will complain. In fact, I've privately asked this very question to quite a few current i3 REx owners and every one said as long as it works, and they can use the car to drive up long, sustained inclines at highway speeds, then they'll be very happy. From what I understand the update could be available as early as the first quarter of 2015 and will indeed be available as a software update to existing i3 REx owners.Of course it would have been better if this was available right from the launch, but at least BMW is working quickly (the i3 has only been available for about five months in North America) to correct the problem.

BMW i3 Delivery Tips

Did you know your i3 has a little tab to hold the charge port cover while it's charging? Bet you didn't!

Over at our Facebook i3 group we have complied a list of a few "Getting to know your i3" facts. I've put them together here to give new i3 owners a quick run-down of some of the things you may not find in the owners manual or be told by your dealer. The electric vehicle community has proven to be an invaluable resource for new LEAF, Volt and Tesla owners and I expect the same to happen with the i3. There is so much new ground to cover that the dealers simply can't provide all the information the customers need. That being said, they need to do better than what we have seen so far. If you have more tips and suggestions, please leave them in the comments section below and I may even add it to the post.

• Your car is delivered with both charge rates purposely set to low. If you took delivery and are wondering why it's taking much longer to charge than you expected, this is the reason why. You need to go into the idrive settings > Charging and adjust to maximum setting.  Be aware that you can set these yourself and you might need lower settings depending on available current when charging.

• Both seats will be likely be set up to the maximum height. Pull the lever to go down so your wrist can rest on the pad by the iDrive. The height of the armrest is also adjustable. Pull the tab on the leading edge up and you can set the height to your liking. The steering column not only adjusts up and down, but it also telescopes outward and is adjusted by the lever underneath the steering column.

• Be mindful of the speed restriction setting in ECOPRO (75mph) and ECOPRO+ (55mph). You may need to adjust it. The car doesn't actually have a hard speed limit at those marks, but when you reach those speeds it temporarily holds the car from accelerating past them. If you want to go faster you really need to push the accelerator further to bypass the "soft" speed restriction. It is more of a gentle reminder to watch your speed than an actual speed limit.

• The rear passengers can let themselves out by pulling the front seat headrest cable and pushing the seat forward to reach the door pull. 

• To lay the rear seats flat, there is a fabric loop that you pull on the bottom corner of the seat back.

• The front trunk is not water tight and under certain conditions water may spray up into it so don't put anything in there that can be ruined it if gets wet. If you need to do so, buy a watertight bag to store it in. Many people will keep their 120V occasional use EVSE up there. While it is indeed fine for outdoor use, I'd recommend storing it in a waterproof bag up there also so water doesn't pool up in the connector frequently.

• There is an extra drink holder under the arm rest that you can insert at the front of the center console.You can also purchase an additional one and have three cup holders in the center console.

• Check to make sure the AC and charging system is working before you leave the dealer; BMW disables both for shipping and the port or dealer needs to enable it before delivery. There were quite a few people in Europe that had this issue and now a few in the US are reporting  it also. It is evidently a 15 minute fix to enable the A/C at the dealer, provided your dealer has been trained on this and knows how to do it. Unfortunately not all dealers know this yet!

• Download the BMW i Remote app from the iTunes store and have your CA register you for it.  More detail: There are two BMW apps , MY BMW Remote app and BMW Connected app. Which is correct?BMW i remote and BMW Connected (both for US) are correct. My BMW Remote was used for the ActiveE and is no longer applicable. Is the BMW Connected app used to monitor charging, precondition etc.. or is that a different app? The i Remote is for pre con and opening the doors etc. The Connected one does have some monitoring but it's mostly to run apps in the car (via a standard USB-to-phone cable rather than bluetooth) Go to iTunes App Store, put in search string �BMW� in search box, Filter for iPhone Apps only. (See photo of resulting apps, loaded as a separate file under the title "BMW iPhone Apps for i3")

• Ask your insurance company for the Hybrid or Electric Vehicle discount.

• Press the end of the turn signal stalk on the left side of the steering wheel to display the external temperature on the driver info screen.

• Press the small button on the left side of the Driver Information Screen to reset the trip odometer displayed on that screen. The other trip computer is reset from within iDrive.

• To play Pandora in the car, install apps from ConnectedDrive menu in idrive, then plug your phone into the USB cord and launch Pandora. The Pandora icon will appear in the radio menu. You can then use idrive to control Pandora in the center screen.

• Download the BMW ConnectedDrive App to get many other features and apps like BMW Radio, Audible, Glympse, Amazon Cloud Player, Rhapsody, Stitcher, Aupeo, Facebook, Wiki Local and Twitter. You have to connect the USB cable to make it work.

• When charging you can use the hook on the charge flap to hold the plastic "gas cap" cover. there is a small slot under the plug cover that aligns with it.  Or you can drape it over the top of the J1772 plug rather than letting it dangle in the wind against the paint.

• Before you leave the dealership, put the car into reverse with no surrounding obstacles and verify that the sensors all work.

• If you didn't order your car with the Technology Package, you may be missing the default code 606 navigation package.  BMW acknowledged that they was a problem and some cars didn't have the basic navigation installed:     
  
  "Today, we have identified a number of i3 Rex (Model 14iB) that have not been equipped with the standard Navigation Business system (Option 606). Your dealership has taken delivery of one or more of these vehicles. We are actively investigating and considering all avenues (option retrofit, option credit, vehicle reorder, etc.) for a dealer/consumer friendly resolution. We will have further updates as new information arrive."

 Followed by:

 "We expect to know by Monday, June 2nd, the status of the retrofit for the missing Navigation Business system (option 606). The affected vehicles include all i3 Rex vehicles without ZTD (Technology + Driving Assistant Package) produced weeks 10 through 22 and half of week 23. Any vehicles that arrive at your dealership without Business Navigation can be retailed but you must disclose the missing option to your customer. The remaining affected vehicles will not be released until we have an update."

• When you get home, press the BMW Assist button on the overhead console (open the button cover to reveal it) and speak with a representative to activate and set up your account. It takes about 5 minutes.
•  
• There seems to be some capability issues with the i3 and EVSE's made by Leviton. I know of three people that have reported their i3 won't charge on their Leviton unit. I have personally reported this to BMW engineering and contacted Leviton to help put them together on the issue so hopefully they will figure it out and correct the problem quickly.

• Send a place to your car:  You can send a place in Google Maps to your car using the Send to Car feature. The first step is to add your car: Go to https://www.google.com/maps/sendtocar. Click Sign in and enter your account information. Click Add car or GPS device. Select �BMW" from the car type dropdown menu. Type in your account ID (email address) provided by your car manufacturer in �Account ID� field. Go to Google maps, look up a business or address and click the More link to send.  Once you send it from your pc google maps to the car you click my messages under bmw connected in the iDrive. Open the message and you will see the checkered flag to initiate navigation.

• The radio will continue to play for a few minutes after you exit the vehicle. If this bothers you then press the Start/Stop button again with your foot off the brake pedal and it will shut off.

• Check to make sure the tow bolt is located in the front trunk of the car or elsewhere. Page 195 of the owners manual says the tow fitting is located in the storage compartment under the hood. It should be wedged into the foam caddy for the tire inflation kit.

• Here's a YouTube video that may help you set up the universal garage door opener for Giga and Tera models: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s11Y5qGf04s

• You can set your presets (above the AC 1 thru 8) to different functions to fit your own needs. I did this in the ActiveE, and to simplify the process, hopefully this will make sense.  Go into the idrive and select your sub menu, example click on vehicle info, then choose trip computer.  Don't select trip computer, but turn the idrive controller over it until the check mark shows.  Then select the preset you want, and press and hold until it confirms.  it should then show up on the top of the screen with the rest of the presets in blue.  You can absolutely go into the sub menus and select options to save on some things, but not on others.  Play with it.  I also selected all of my radio/satellite presets and saved the presets as a preset.  When you leave the radio is preset mode, you can then scroll thru the radio presets on the steering wheel while in other menus.  

• Download the following apps to locate charging stations and set up the associated accounts. It's good to have a few of them as none seem to have all the charging stations available listed: Chargepoint, Greenlots, Plugshare, Recargo, Blink, Carstations.

Do you have any more i3 delivery quick tips and suggestions? If so, please help out the i3 community and leave them in the comment section!

Born Electric Guest Blogger: Meet Bill from The UK

Hi, my name is Bill and I was born electric on 14 March 2014. 

I've done 2,000 miles in my i3 so far so I thought it was time to contribute first impressions viaTom's blog (thanks Tom). As you can see from my photos, this i3 is definitely not a city dweller, although in the south of England you're never that far from a city to be honest. Driving country lanes so much makes it really tough to keep clean though.

I came to the i3 via a curious route, because I had really been looking for an electric motorbike. Sadly, there are not many to choose from and none from the established mainstream motorcycle producers. The more I looked into things the more I was convinced I could live with the range limits inherent to EVs; my daily commute (25 mile round trip) is very compatible with the range of most pure electric vehicles. Coupled with the luxury of having other family vehicles available if needed, it made it really easy to make the switch. But when I started looking to replace my ICE car, nothing really excited me, until the i3 that is. The focus on weight reduction resonated with what I look for in motorbikes; the development of new car construction technologies was unusual in the EV market and designing the car to be an EV from the ground up rather than converting an ICE model seemed much more satisfactory. All this indicated to me that BMW have a level of commitment to this EV which is very welcome as a consumer. Although the price point of the i3 comes in for some criticism, next to the competition I think it is amazing considering the development. And, in the UK at least, the price benefits from a plug in grant which is not the case for electric motorbikes.

Car specification and options assessment

This car was bought primarily for my daily commute and circumstances meant that I decided early on to go for the pure electric model. The REX is a great choice if you need the daily range or you are buying one as your only family car, but that wasn't my situation. As I was buying a BEV I initially specified the following options to help with range on the odd occasion that I might want or need it.

ZWT Winter pack, includes 494 (heated seats), and ZHV (high voltage battery preparation).

4T9 Auxiliary cabin preparation

4U7 DC rapid charge   preparation

As for the cosmetic options, I will probably keep the car for some time so went for the Suite interior hoping that the leather will wear well. I added turbine 428 wheels and LED headlights, and finally added parking assist when I realized it was the only way to get front parking sensors. The Pro navigation system and real time traffic info was a free of charge upgrade. I chose Arravani Grey as my colour option.

Of the options I didn't chose I'd make the following comments. I've had cars with sun roofs before and never used them. I don't like how cruise control takes away my control of the car so the idea of the driving assistance package did not appeal at all. My commute is virtually traffic free down country lanes so it would not have much use anyway. I don't need to make much use of my phone when on the move so enhanced bluetooth was an option without much benefit. I was coming from a 20 year old Mazda which had no remote central locking so I'm still enjoying the �thrill� of opening it without using a key making comfort access seem like overkill. I don't need the car to have the internet (I have a smart phone) and couldn't justify spending the extra on the premium sound preparation when it cost more than I spent on my home hi-fi speakers. I won't often take more than 1 passenger so the lack of rear speakers is not a worry. On the specification front I would say that a lot of the details about what these options actually do were only filled in after I placed the order, and having owned it for a couple of months I'm still not sure what the adaptive part of the headlight function refers too! 

Having lived with the options I thought scoring them might be of interest to potential buyers:

Winter pack �  heated seats hardly affect range at all, even on full chat � a must have for temperate climates 10/10

Auxiliary cabin preparation � not sure how much this helps so difficult to score.

DC rapid charge preparation � time will tell but a potent game changer in functionality terms so I wouldn't be without it 10/10

Suite � love the mix of leather and wood so 10/10.

LED headlights are an expensive cosmetic option which I think I could have done without. As is common on modern lights they produces a blue halo around the edge of the beam which is off-putting for me and other drivers and I quite regularly get flashed by cars heading in the opposite direction even though I only have had dipped beam active. In the past I've had motorbikes which produce a light with a blue halo and I've had cars in front of me on a motorway brake hard and pull onto the hard shoulder because they thought I was the police � not ideal! 2/10. If I did it again I would probably drop LED lights in favor of the premium sound preparation.

Park Assistance front sensors are very handy but the rear camera takes some getting used to using and trust. Park assist parallel parking works very well although day to day I don't have much call for it. 10/10 for how well it works but 5/10 in value terms as it is an expensive option if like me it's just to add the front parking sensor functionality.

Efficiency, Range and average speed

My daily commute is 25 miles and at the end of two days commuting I typically have 25-30 miles of range left, but I haven't tried a third day without charging yet. I commute in Eco Pro mode with the speed limit set to 55 mph. When I can get away with it I just use heated seats (climate control only being used for demisting). Bear in mind that morning temperatures for the bulk of my mileage were rarely above 10 C here and most of the time I've owned the car the evening temperatures have been similar. My 2 day cycle therefore normally includes one pre-warm while attached to the mains and 3 pre-warms without mains. My longest trip between charges was 84 miles with 4 miles remaining. The trip was made early morning at temperatures between 6 and 10 C, the last 15 miles was warmer, up to 14 C. This was in Eco Pro mode with no climate control apart from some occasional demisting, along mostly country lanes and A roads, rarely breaking the 55 mph limit I have set in Eco Pro. The car tells me my average speed is 29.0 mph, average consumption is 4.2 miles/kWh and I've done just over 2000 miles. The car once told me I had 111 miles of range, but I didn't believe it!

Accessories

Public charging cable, cargo net, all weather floor mats and additional 13 amp UK charger. These all work well and like others I find the mats slippery in the wet but this doesn't bother me and I like the way they look. The additional 13 amp UK charger was bought because I wanted to mount the one that came with the car to the wall of my garage but also wanted one to carry around in the car. I've swapped the main beam bulbs for a cooler light as I didn't like the mix of white and yellow beams. I don't have a level 2 charging station at home yet but have started the ball rolling.

Reliability

The app needs a bit of work, both in terms of the functionality it offers and whether it reliably updates. I find the algorithm behind delayed charging (which makes it difficult to predict whether the car will take a charge when you've plugged it in but told it not to) hugely frustrating and wish BMW had included a simple �charge controlled by smartphone� option in the car's charge settings. If I want app control over charging I have to fudge it by swapping from charge immediately to charge using off peak time settings. I've had the car report interruptions to charging a couple of times and I've had it fail to precondition a couple of times but other than that it's been trouble free. A slight grumble with the climate control is that it tends to noticeable oscillate from warm to cold air but I will get used to that. I'm still confused by the preheating function which appears to leave my car with less that 100 % in the battery when attached to the mains. The attachment of the charging socket protective cap to the charging flap leaves a lot to be desired and I still don't have a manual for the Pro-Nav system.  

Public charging

This is my first EV and reading stories about charging points being out of service, ICE'd or otherwise not available has left me nervous about committing to a public charge as the only means of completing my journey. By scouting potential destinations I have confirmed the need to do this as the information about public charging points can be hit and miss. I have come across points listed as operational which were no more than concrete standings and other points listed as public which are really intended for the sole use of the company who have installed them. So when I set out for Bristol which is a 120 mile round trip requiring a charge to complete I was quite nervous, despite having visited and found that the listed charging points were mostly available (most common problem I saw there was being ICED, about 25 % of bays). But the trip went without a glitch and I was pleased to see the BMW app updated the availability in real time which is useful for all users. I moved the car off the bay once fully charged so that another EV could use it. When I returned to the car after the gig I'd been to, the EV bay I'd been in was ICED!

In summary I hope you can tell from my photos that I love the car. The only option I regret including is the LED headlights and if I was buying again I would have swapped the LED lights for the premium sound package. That's not to say that the standard sound is bad, on the contrary it is very pleasing. I could go on as there are so many aspects to this car to but overall so far I'm a  happy EV driver and a very happy i3 owner.

Cheers for now

Bill 

Comprehensive i3 Video Review By Nissan LEAF Owner in the UK

It seems that nearly every day now there are new short video clips of i3 reviews posted on YouTube. When I come across one that I feel is done very well, I'll post it here. Such is the case with the above video made by Grant Thomas from the UK. Grant maintains a blog called "The Grant Thomas Blog: Sustainability, Electric Cars & Technology News and Comment" where he posted this i3 video review.

Grant owns a Nissan LEAF so he is an experienced electric vehicle owner and in my opinion that gives his review a little more credibility than some others done by journalists with very little real life electric vehicle experience. The video is about a half hour long and he does manage to cover a lot so pour yourself a nice cup of coffee (or a glass of wine), and kick back and enjoy!

BMW i3 Born Electric Guest Blogger: Meet Toni From Belgium

A while ago I announced that I would be starting a new series here called, "I was Born Electric on...". The series will be featuring readers who are i3 owners and who are willing to share their thoughts on the car after owning it for a while. They will begin the post by introducing themselves and stating the date they were Born Electric, which is when they picked up their i3. Andy from the UK kicked off the Born Electric series and we then visited Hil from Holland. We'll now be traveling to Belgium to visit with Toni and his new Capparis White i3:  

My name is Toni and I was Born Electric on Monday, 27th January, 2014.

The first time I realized that there was an alternative to fossil fuels for propelling a car was in early 2011, when I came across an electronic brochure about the Opel Ampera, the European sibling of the Volt. The more I read about it, the more I was convinced that my next car had to be an electric one.

The reason why I didn't go for the Ampera back then was stupidly financial : 50.000� for a car was way above what I was willing/able to pay. 

Of course, there were other more affordable electric cars out there. But maybe I was not ready for the leap of faith into electro-mobility yet. Range anxiety was clearly an issue I had to deal with while I waited for my savings account to be able to take the hit of a new car.

Three years later, things had clearly evolved. Both on the EV market and in my personal situation. In the latter, I had enough spare funds to afford a reasonable down payment on a premium car. Moreover, the extensive immersion into electric car literature helped me to come to the conclusion that I did not really need a range extender since more than 95% of my daily commuting could easily be covered by a BEV. The question was then : which car was going to be the one. Ampera/Volt? No, though it definitely is a fantastic car, it still has a tail pipe and I did not want to buy an end-of-cycle model. Tesla? No, too big and too expensive, I did not want to take out a mortgage for the sake of buying a car.  Nissan Leaf? Er, no.  

The BMW i3? Well ... I must admit that my first impression was negative. Not because of its design; actually I am fond of its looks since the very first concepts that appeared in 2011.  But rather because it is a BMW! I never liked BMW. I always considered that BMW was making cars to suit arrogant petrolhead jerks (with all due respect, of course!).

And then I test-drove it. And fell in love.

Was I ready to overcome my prejudices and become a BMW driver myself?  Definitely. Biases are wrong, the car drives like a breeze, the technology inside is outstanding and I too can be a jerk sometimes. : )

So, in order to do penance for my past biases, I decided to devote this blog post to crushing some preconceptions that have been floating around the i3 in some reviews.  And I'll do that from the authoritative position of being the happy owner of a "Shamu Edition" (Capparis white & black - think Shamu the whale)

It is a city car:

No, it is not. Though the car handles incredibly well in an urban environment, it has nothing to be ashamed of when cruising at highway speed. It is fast and responsive. Steering is precise and forgiving at 130 km/h (80 mph).  Overtaking on motorways is a feast. It is a BMW after all, is it not?

The i3 is particularly noisy at high speed:

No, it is not. My first extended drive of the i3 has been the trip back home after delivery at my iAgent dealership. 50 km (30 mi) from Waterloo (Brussels area) to the Mons area where I live. Since the battery was almost fully charged, I decided that I could afford the luxury of squandering away precious kWh's on the E19 motorway. In addition to discovering the driving dynamics described above, I was also curious to put to the test the recurrent criticism I read about unpleasant airflow noises.  I can confirm that in-cabin noises are like taste; there is no accounting for them. I, for one, was not inconvenienced by the airflow at all. I even enjoyed it.

The trunk is too small and the suicide doors are a hindrance:

The question is : Compared to what? 

I am a small car guy. Before the i3, my car was a Mini Cooper. Before that, I owned a Mercedes A-Class (2004 model). Before that, a (discontinued) Rover 220sdi. I know what a small car is. And the i3 is no small car at all by my standards. The trunk offers enough space to generously accommodate the weekly shopping for a family of four. There is plenty of space for my Victorian longbow, arrows included, or for my eldest son's guitar, amp included. 

As for the coach doors, once again it all depends on where you come from. Compared to the coup�-style doors of my Mini, the i3's "antagonist" doors, as they are called in French, are a major step forward in terms of ease of access and comfort. Or to put it in my youngest son's words : "Sooo cooool!".

Materials used for interior trims do not feel "premium":

That was a tricky one.

As I said, price was an important parameter for me, as it surely is for most of us. Given that I accepted the idea of disbursing 40.000+ � for a car, the outlook of spending my driving time in a sleazy environment was distressing me. Of course, I did have the opportunity to feel, touch, smell the interior materials a couple of times before I ordered the car. But assessing the quality of a dashboard or of a leather upholstery is like testing a spring mattress at the mattress store.  No matter how long you try to figure it out, the only way to be sure is to turn the lights off and literally sleep on it.

Though I have not slept in my car (yet), now, I know. The interior is largely up to the price paid. Comfy, stylish, extremely well finished down to the most minute detail. I am almost ashamed of having doubted.  By the way, my i3 has the Lodge interior (Giga world). 

The i3 is just an overpriced Zoe: (I've been reading this one a lot in the French-speaking press).

For the non-European reader, let me first explain that the Renault Zoe (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renault_Zoe) is a sort of cute good looking Nissan Leaf, with a French touch.  Don't get me wrong; I think that the Zoe is a nice little car but, c'me on! 

How can a professional journalist put the i3 and the Zoe on the same footing.  How can you compare the past to the future? A car made of steel to the first mass produced car made of aluminum and carbon fibre?

I wish I were an engineer and be able to explain why and how a car with a CFRP body drives so much better than a conventional one. But I am just a linguist and you'll have to bear with my poor description : in the i3, you're just in control!  

The rigidity of the thing makes you feel that there is nothing the car won't take.  You feel light and super secure at the same time.  If you don't believe me, just arrange your own test drive.

Considering the technology, range is unimpressive:

My take on that may sound unconventional.

More range would have been inconsistent with the concept of �great driving experience in a sustainable way�. If my average daily need is 40, why should I store in my car 4, 6 or even 8 times the energy and resources that are necessary?  

In all fairness though, I must confess that I am still struggling with an instinctual range anxiety.

And this is where technology comes to the rescue. The amount of information that comes through the screens is just impressive. The dynamic range assistant, the Eco-route guidance, the graphics, everything has been thought and designed in order to alleviate whatever range fear that I still could have. And it works. On top of that, the resolution quality of the 10.2" screen (professional nav) is remarkable.

I know that there is a bit of controversy as to why BMW did not include a State Of Charge reading in the i3 as in the ActiveE or the Mini E.  Since I never had the chance to drive an EV with a SOC, I guess that my point of view may be considered as neutral on that.

The i3 is an expensive high-tech toy for tree-hugging geeks:

Yes.

It is.

But it is much more than that at the same time.

It's a car.

With all the features, functionalities, looks, behavior, style, technology and feel of a great car.

And yes, it is electric.

So is my i3 living up to all of its promises?

Not quite all of them, for the moment at least.

In Belgium, some of the much anticipated 360� Electric services have not been fully rolled out yet. The Add-On-Mobility (Access or Alternate Mobility program as it is called on other markets) is still largely undefined and the ConnectedDrive services are having a bumpy debut.  Nevertheless, the local BMWi team is working hard on it.

As far as the actual car is concerned though, I can happily report that I haven't found the least flaw yet.

My i3 is the second BMWi to have been registered in Belgium.

And I am very proud to be among the first owners. 

2/5/14 EDIT:
Toni has had a few people ask him about the range since this post went up so he asked me if I could add these words to the post to cover what he has observed so far:

Hi, thank you all for the the nice words!

As for the range, I haven't pushed it to its limits yet. And I doubt I'll ever try to; I'd rather do away with my range anxiety in a non-traumatic way :)

Apart from the maximum range, I think you have to consider the "comfortable" range the car is giving you. By "comfortable" range, I mean the distance you can cover without ever bothering about modes, driving style or even outside temperature and this includes short highway portions. In the case of the i3 (BEV), my experience of the "comfortable" distance is ~62mi (100 km) on one charge.  Remember that, within this range you can drive the way you want. Of course, this "comfortable" range can be jeopardized by a particularly aggressive and non-responsible driving. But, as far as I know, only anti-EV journalists are capable of driving this way.

If your daily commuting includes larger highway portions and/or represents between 62 and 80 mi (100 to 130 km), then I recommend using ECOPRO. Mind you, ECOPRO is not a sub-standard COMFORT mode. The car behaves much like it does in COMFORT mode with only slight differences. Most of them remain unseen by the driver. The only one you do notice is the max speed capping. This speed capping works much like a speed limiter on a conventional car, i.e. you can adjust it in the settings and override it by pressing the right pedal down to "full throttle" when overtaking or in case of emergency. For Europe, ECOPRO default setting is 110km/h (~68 mph).

If you really need to go much farther than 80 mi (130 km) on one charge in a consistent way, you'll probably have to master hypermiling techniques and accept that the ride may become stressing sometimes :)
In this case, I'd recommend going to for the REx version.

If you own an i3 and would like to participate in the Born Electric series here, you can email me at: tom.moloughney@gmail.com

BMW i3 Born Electric Guest Blogger: Meet Hil from Holland

My i3 was delivered to my home on a flatbed truck, more than 300 kilometers (180 miles) from my i Agent. Traveling that distance in an i3 BEV on one charge isn�t possible and the i3 being my first EV, we agreed that the car be delivered! As it stands, I�m probably the first i3 owner in Frysl�n, Holland and I�d like to report on my first month�s experiences!

A while ago I announced that I would be starting a new series here called, "I was Born Electric on...". The series will be featuring readers who are i3 owners and who are willing to share their thoughts on the car after owning it for a while. They will begin the post by introducing themselves and stating the date they were Born Electric, which is when they picked up their i3. Last week we had the pleasure of kicking off the series with a post from Andy, who lives with his new i3 in the UK. We'll now be hopping over to Holland to visit with Hil and his new Ionic Silver i3:       

    Hello, my name is Hil and I was Born Electric on Monday, December 30th 2013. 

My recent BMW history
My BMW before the i3, was a 5 door 118i (F20) which I bought for it�s economy and comfort. It was less the sports car than the Z4M Coupe I had before it, but with more room and an adjustable suspension, it meant super daily driving pleasure! Just after the �1� came, BMW launched their ActiveE program with a preview of the concept i3 and i8 in Rotterdam. With my eldest son Tom (also a motor head!) our short, snowy test drive in the ActiveE sold us to the i concept!

The big wait...
This past summer, BMW made production slots for the i3 available in Holland. An i3 in the autumn? Great! In early September the i3 was ordered and after a few glitches in the ordering process (an other color and not fully optioned!), the i3 turned up in the early winter, on snow tires, in Ionic Silver (which is more blue than silver) and with it�s cool Adaptive LED headlights.

Daily Use:

I use the car mostly for local trips, from one village to the next.  As a rural Family Doctor, it�s great to do my rounds in the pre-warmed comfort of the i3! To now the only EVSE I use is the standard socket plug-in, delivered with the car. It charges at 3.4 kW which is fast enough for my daily trips. Occasionally I make a longer trip to meetings, for post-grad education or visits to family and friends.  Those trips are between 100 to 140 kilometers (60 - 87 mi), but according to my i Agent (and BMW), form no problem to the all-electric i3! For on the road charging, there�s also a growing network of quick DC chargers in Holland, thanks to Fastned!

Adventurous Start:

True to the EV pioneer calling, on New Years Eve, the family traveled with the i3 to our traditional  New Years celebration at good friends. They live 103 kilometers (61 miles) away.  At the start, the i3 gave me a range of 120 kilometers, more than enough! But beware,  this figure is based largely on previous driving habits and I had only driven 70 km! But 120 km should be enough! We left at 6 pm, outside temperatures 5 degrees Celsius with a stiff southwesterly headwind and 3 adults in the car with the trunk packed. My normal ICE driving style is to limit my freeway speeds to 115 kmh (70mph) and on two lane roads, I drive 100 kmh (60mph). That evening I set out to copy my 118i driving style to see how the i3 fared. After 40 km (26mi) the battery had just 50% charge left! What??? Total i3 range as claimed by BMW to be 130 km (80mi) per charge, not a scanty 80 km (50mi)! At this rate we�d have to walk 20 km to our friends house. What now? Turn back and take the reserve ICE car or charge up somewhere?

I knew of a quick charger along the freeway nearby, so we decided to drive on! In the confusion we took the wrong exit and drove an extra 10 km to get back on track.  My first encounter with a public EVSE was a disappointment. Fumbling in the dark with wind and weather. the quick charger didn�t charge! I called the ANWB help desk number (=AAA in the US) who told me that there was a working charging point 30 km ahead on my route. The question again: press on or turn back? Well, we decided to "Go (South-) West"!

By now I had become a bit more EV savvy and after studying the settings and menu of the i3,  it seems I had started out in the standard, uneconomical but sporty �Comfort� mode! In �EcoPro� mode (EP) the range sprung from 55 to 65 km and in the EcoPro+ (EP+) mode, all of a sudden I could go 81 km! I kept it at EP+ and drove on with the Southwesterly storm at full head. On the freeway ahead, a Motor Home drove a leisurely 85 kmh (50mph) so I slid behind it and slipstreamed further. Meanwhile my hands and feet had turned to ice, as had everyone in the car! EcoPro+ is a spartan experience, with no heated air or seats, but it got us to our friends house, with 3 km to spare. We had become true pioneers on New Year�s Eve!

A Second Go�

The next week I had a meeting in Utrecht, at 138 km (84 mi) from home. After the cold experience on New Year�s Eve you might think that I wouldn�t consider an even longer trip. But that�s not what EV pioneering is all about my friends, and to be honest, the first trip turned out fine! But for this trip, I prepared myself. To ward off the cold, I took a hot water bottle along, put it on my lap, covered with a fleece blanket. From the start, I drove moderately (max. 100kmh=60mph) in EP+ mode and strictly followed the EcoPro route chosen by the BMW Navigation. It takes you over roads with lower maximum speeds but the route is shorter. My planned 1st destination was a public charging station 10km (6mi) from the meeting place and I had a folding bicycle in the trunk (yes it fit!) for the last leg. But the range expanded as I drove! I left with a calculated range of 124 km (77 mi) and after the first 25 km (15.5 mi), still had 119 km (74 mi) left! With this kind of magic the i3 grew on me! Once on the freeway I hit headwinds, so chose a truck to slipstream behind at 93 kmh (58 mph) on the cruise control.  Except for some wind buffeting I really enjoyed my radio in the quiet of the cabin! I reached the meeting venue at 138 km (86 mi) without the wayside charge! Range anxiety is a thing of the past!

DC Quick charging at 50kW's on a Fastned CCS Quick Charge Station

In the parking garage there was an EVSE which only charged at 3.4 kW instead of the expected 7.4 kW. After 2.5 hours the state of charge increased from 5 to 27%, not enough to get home! But I had enough range to get to the nearest Fastned DC 50kW quick charger, 40 km away. Within 30 minutes I had more than 90% of charge, enough to get home comfortably. When the Fastned network is expanded from the present 5 to the planned 100 stations at the end of 2014, cross country trips in Holland with the i3 will be no problem! At the end of 2015 the projected planning even calls for 200 stations, one for every 40 to 50 freeway kilometers!

EcoPro EcoPro+ and Comfort:

The difference between Comfort and EcoPro modes is purely performance. The i3 Comfort mode would be the Sport mode in an ICE BMW mainly because of the incredible acceleration! EcoPro differs from EP+ more because in EP+ the Seat and Main Heaters are turned off.  In cold seasons, choosing EP+ mode makes the cabin icy cold, even with a hot water bottle and fleece blanket!

My lesson is: when range is at issue, put the i3 in EP mode but turn the heater off with the dashboard button. The seat heater still works and hardly reduces range, but keeps you warm! If the windows fog, the heater rapidly clears them and when done, switch it off until needed again.

In Conclusion:
Yes, the i3 is the future of mobility, now! It�s quick, quiet, economical and clean! Range anxiety is unnecessary if you drive the i3 according to your purpose (range or fun!) and because this car also happens to be a BMW, that fun begins on your driveway!

 

The future has never looked brighter

Big thanks to Hil for sharing his experiences and thoughts here! If you own an i3 and would like to participate in the "I was Born Electric on..." series here email me at: tom.moloughney@gmail.com and I'll get you in the queue.

BMW i3 US Option Pricing Released

This afternoon, BMWBLOG along with other news outlets reported that BMW has released the pricing details for i3 options for the US market. You can use this link  to download the full list of i3 options pricing.

Nothing really new to report other than the pricing. The only odd thing I see is that sunroof isn't listed anywhere and it has been previously reported that it comes standard with the Giga and Tera World packages. For now I will assume it still is, and that someone at BMW NA just made a mistake and didn't list it here, but it is something to keep an eye on because it's very odd that there is no mention of it here. I've previously looked at the options pricing for Europe, so I pretty much knew what to expect and there are no surprises for me here. Here is a quick summary of the options:

Exterior paint:
The non-metallic paints (Arravaini Grey and Capparis White) are standard with no extra charge. Although Jacob Harb, head of electric vehicles sales and strategy recently said that the Capparis White will not be available in the US, at least for the first model year. That means if you don't like the Arravani Grey you'll be forced to pay the extra $550 for a metallic paint option and choose from Ionic Sliver, Solar Orange, Laurel Grey and Andesite Silver.

Worlds:

Mega World is standard, Giga World is a $1,700 option and Tera World will set you back an extra $2,700. All three interiors are pictured on the left (click to enlarge) with Mega on top and Tera on the bottom. The interiors only come in the colors shown, you cannot select Tera for example and get Grey leather, it only comes in the Brown trim shown. Giga adds 19" Alloy Turbine wheels style 429 and Tera adds 19" Turbine wheels style 428. For an additional $1,300 you can get the Sport 20" Double Spoke wheels style 430 regardless of the World package you choose. All of the wheels are lightweight and designed for minimum aerodynamic drag. The base wheels on Mega World is probably the most aerodynamic but will likely be viewed as the least visually appealing.

The 19" Mega World Wheels are on the far left followed to the right by the 19" Tera World Style 428 which is next to the 19" Giga World Style 429's and the 20" Sport Style 430 is on the right.

Electronics:
The Parking Package costs $1,000 and gives you the rear view camera, Park Distance Control and Parking Assistant (which is self parking and I've personally tested it on an i3 and it works perfectly). The technology & Driving Assistant package costs $2,500 and with that you get ACC Stop & Go + Active Driving Assistant (which is a self-driving feature for slow congested-street driving), the professional navigation system with wide screen Nav (Basic Nav is standard), BMW Online and BMW apps as well as Advanced Real-Time Traffic Information.

Heated front seats is a $350 option and if you live anywhere where the temperature drops below 50 degrees during the year I urge you to get the heated seats. In you happen to live in an area where it gets really cold, like below 30 degrees, this option in mandatory in my opinion. That's because for some strange reason BMW linked the battery warming system to the heated seat option so if you don't get the heated seat option, you cannot pre-warm the battery pack - odd indeed, but that's how it works. Luckily it's only a $350 option.

The Harman Kardon Premium sound system is an $800 option. Every i3 I've driven so far had this option, so I don't know how good the standard sound system is, but I can say the 12-speaker HK option is a great sound system. It's probably the best sound system I have ever had in a car and I'll definitely be getting it. The sound is so clear and with the quiet cabin of an electric car you can really appreciate the clarity of a great sound system even more so than in an internal combustion car.

At only $700 the DC Quick Charge option is priced reasonably, but will there be CCS stations to charge at?

DC Quick Charge:
The DC Quick Charging option is reasonably priced at $700. I believe BMW didn't charge more because they know the value of this option is directly tied to the amount of CCS DC quick chargers there are and right now there are only a couple of them. I'm pretty confident the deployment is going to occur, but at what pace I can't be sure. I also believe BMW is going to help with deployment in some degree, but exactly what level of participation is yet unknown. For certain, BMW isn't going to install and maintain the CCS chargers, like Tesla is with their Supercharger network. However that doesn't mean they aren't going to get involved in the deployment, perhaps by subsidizing the cost of the stations in certain areas, helping their dealers install them and perhaps forming partnerships with other stakeholders to help with deployment. I suspect we'll hear news on this front relatively soon too.

So what's an i3 really going to cost?
Finally, destination & handling is $925. So if you wanted to pay the least possible amount and still drive home in a BEV i3 the price after destination and handling is $42,275. However, if you want the i3 with range extender, along with the top of the line Tera World package, and every single possible option available, your price before incentives would be $56,025. That makes the options spread a whopping $13,750 if you consider the range extender an "option" and not a different model entirely. If you look at it that way, every available option offered increases the i3's price by $9,900. Is it cheap? Certainly not, but BMW doesn't sell "cheap" cars, they are a premium brand. However the tax incentives really help to make the i3 much more affordable, especially if you live in a State like California that offers additional incentives on top of the Federal tax credit. Whether or not it's "worth it" is going to be a personal choice and people assign value to different characteristics. I happen to really like the unique architecture used, the fact that it's the first volume production car made primarily of CFRP and aluminum and how BMW considered sustainable manufacturing processes including a high degree of renewable energy during the entire manufacturing process. Others may not care about that but it's important to me. However nothing matters much if the driving experience isn't good and after four test drives I'm satisfied that the i3 delivers the performance and fun-factor that I want in my car. Ok BMW I'm ready to order now... just take my money and give me my i3! Laurel Grey, range extender and every damn option there is. I've waited this long for it, I might as well spoil myself!