BMW’s entry-level electric car offers a possible glimpse of the future
ASSOCIATE EDITOR GRAHAM KOZAK: Another BMW i car driven, another round of head-scratching. I’ll say one thing about this new BMW sub-brand: It has made me think long and hard about the future of transportation, which is more than I can say about most of the cars (good and bad) that I’ve driven in recent memory. Mostly dark and dismal thoughts of doom and gloom, but a thought is a thought.
Might as well start with what I liked. The interior was beautiful -- almost sculptural in a Scandinavian-minimalist sort of way. This is concept-to-production styling done right. Honesty in materials is important, to me at least, so the exposed recycled-looking plastic material on the dash didn’t bother me (it wasn’t in any areas you might touch); neither did the canvas-like upholstery material on the seats and door panels complemented by visibly sewn-on leather patches.
Less coherent was the exterior, which seemed desperate to include the fragmented, deconstructed surfacing of the i8 in some way. The stubby i3 simply doesn’t have the lines or proportions to pull it off. It looks like a functional, interior-maximizing small MPV playing dress-up as its sleeker (though not to my taste) elder sibling.
I’d hate the name of the “Giga world” package, but it’s honestly so over-the-top HyperTokyo-style ridiculous that I can’t help but love it.
Driving? Well, yeah, you can drive it, although you get the feeling that it’d be better for you and the planet to simply buy it and let it sit there. Certainly, there’s nothing about this package that makes you want to hop in and turn the key. Er, press the button -- the button located on the steering column on a clumsy gear selector mechanism that seems to be different for the sake of being different.
While the batteries have juice, you’re treated to the typical electric car smoothness; effortless launches are followed by serene cruising. It’s all ruined when the range-extender kicks in. You ever see that photo of a Toyota Prius with a gas generator strapped to the back? Yeah, that’s what this setup feels like. It’s inelegant, and it doesn’t seem to supply the car with adequate power for non-city driving.
ASSOCIATE EDITOR GRAHAM KOZAK: I don’t say this for the sake of being a contrarian, but the 2014 BMW i8 is not the car of the future -- no matter how hard it tries to be precisely that. Or maybe ...
I’m pleased to see that BMW finally explored the limits of regenerative braking, though. Most hybrids err on the side of numb but more or less conventional brake feel; with practice, you can stop the i3 simply by taking your foot off the accelerator. It takes some getting used to, but this seems to be the best way to maximize efficiency -- I wish BMW would have gone as far with other systems on the car as it did with the brakes.
Though the i3 clearly isn’t trying to be a hybrid supercar like the i8, both suffer from the same fundamental flaw: they’re trying very, very hard to be the cars of 2020, yet BMW is stuck forcing 2014 technology to conform to the perceived needs of a 2014 market. As in the i8, the carbon fiber-reinforced plastic body cell shows great promise, but it’s hobbled by a drivetrain that is hardly revolutionary. Or barely even noteworthy.
Unlike Tesla’s offerings, the supposedly hyper-efficient i3 doesn’t have the guts to be all-electric. We’ve driven Chevrolet Spark EVs that have double the range. Trying to be all things to all people, the i3 ends up being a total drag to drive in range-extender mode -- for the few miles you can actually drive in range-extender mode before stopping for gas. I’d rather have a very good electric car for city driving than a so-so hybrid you could, in theory, drive coast-to-coast.
Every car represents a series of compromises: between performance and efficiency, between advanced design and present market tastes, between the flights of futuristic fancy and the realities of engineering and accountancy. Unfortunately, the i3 (and, I’d argue, the i8) simply does not represent a very good series of compromises. Interesting concept. Very imperfect execution. I’m sure BMW will have no trouble selling them.
The 2014 BMW i3 has a decent range with the added range extender, it comes in with an EPA-estimated 117 mpg-e economy.
ASSOCIATE EDITOR JAKE LINGEMAN: Get a Chevrolet Volt. That’s my advice after driving the BMW i3 for a night. I got in the car, after it was charging for three hours, and it only had 5 miles of range, along with 20 more from the gas tank. Twenty! A full gas tank will only get you 47 miles, add that to the battery range and you get about 30 more. I would spend triple the money and get the i8, that was at least fun to drive.
In addition to the ridiculous-looking exterior, the interior is weird, too. Not good Saab weird, but simply weird weird.
The materials on the seats are kind of cool, some sort of tweed-wicker hybrid, I think, and I don’t mind the drab brown color, either. But for some reason, BMW uses an unfinished-looking recycled material on the dash. It looks like naked fiberglass. I know the company is trying to make the point that this car is eco conscious, but it feels and sounds super cheap.
The dash and IP layout is OK, a little strange, but it worked. BMW’s iDrive system is front and center, but I didn’t find a volume knob down by the jog dial. If my hand is down there anyway, I shouldn’t have to reach up to the dash to turn the music down.
The i3 is surprisingly stiff on our broken roads. It’ll bounce you around in the cabin a bit. Turn-in is good. Acceleration is good with all the torque. It does get moving in a hurry. You do have to keep your foot planted firmly on the gas pedal though. As soon as you let off it engine brakes hard. I was a little worried about the drivers behind me, I don’t think the brake lights illuminate, even though you’re slowing pretty quickly (Editor's note: They do).
You could use this car like a golf cart at a retirement community maybe, though I’m not sure how many sets of clubs you can fit in that cargo area.
DIGITAL EDITOR ANDREW STOY: Imagine that Design Within Reach built a version of the Ford C-Max Energi and you’ve pretty much got the i3. It’s a well-made, comfortable compact EV, but its unique selling proposition resides solely in the beautifully crafted interior and uniquely i-brand exterior cues.
Driving the i3 is pretty unremarkable save for the aforementioned aggressive regenerative braking. Always-entertaining electric-car torque is there in spades, and unlike some other editors, I didn’t find the two-cylinder range extender particularly obtrusive when it kicked in. If anything, the i3 is notable for its smooth, stable driving dynamics and a far quieter interior than that found on most of the tinny EVs on the market.
This is strictly a city car, though: BMW advertises up to 150 miles of total range, but you really want to be in EV mode to enjoy the driving at all. Thing is, that juice gets used up quickly if expressway driving is part of your routine, and the gasoline in the tiny 2-gallon range extender tank would be gone in a hurry too. Keep it in town for 30-40 miles of driving per day and it would be perfectly at home.
So if BMW hasn’t broken any new technical ground, what have they done in the i3? They’ve made EV driving avant-garde. It was already stylish in certain well-heeled coastal regions, so why not introduce a truly fashionable electric car with everything the designers could throw at it? In a single stroke BMW created the city car in which to be seen in San Francisco and Palo Alto, all at the price of a well-equipped 3-series. Whatever else you think of the i3, there’s no denying it's a brilliant bit of product strategy.
The 2014 BMW i3 is motivated by a AC synchronous electric motor with an additional .647-liter I2 range extender coupled with a single-speed automatic gearbox.
WEST COAST EDITOR MARK VAUGHN: While my colleagues in Detroit drove the i3 with range extender, out here in LA, I had the pure electric version, battery power only. We are committed out here. Or we should be committed, if you know what I mean.
Despite its super-goofy exterior and ultra-eager lift-throttle regenerative braking, I really liked this thing. I couldn’t believe and still can’t believe that BMW actually made something so high-tech for what amounts to an entry-level car. There is a carbon fiber tub here, with extruded aluminum crush zones poking out front and rear. You would never expect to see that on a car so relatively inexpensive. Mine stickered at $42,275 before they added a bunch of silly, useless options to it and before you take into account all the Federal and state money you get back when you buy one. All told, that government money drops the sticker price of the i3 in California by 10 grand, to $32,275. Of course, it can take about a year for you to collect on that rebate money, sometimes more, depending on when you make your purchase. But a carbon fiber tub for 32 grand? Come on, man, that’s cool!
I also really liked the goofy, midcentury-modern interior, especially the wacky wood and reconstituted plastic all over. Specifically, BMW says it’s: fibers from the Kenaf plant, recycled carbon fiber reinforced plastic and responsibly forested eucalyptus. Not since the Fisker Karma has a car interior been so conscientious. I and everyone who used them loved the rear suicide doors, though BMW prefers the term “coach doors.” There is supposed to be the interior room of a 3-series on the footprint of a 1-series. While the front-seat passengers certainly have room to stretch out, the rear-seaters are merely adequately comfortable.
The ride in the 2014 BMW i3 is stiff even on our broken roads.
On the road, the car’s hyperactive regen is the most unusual thing about it. No other production car has ever offered this kind of desperately clinging regenerative braking. As soon as you start to lift off the accelerator pedal -- ka-schloomph -- the car slows almost as quickly as if you’d stomped on the brakes. It’s a good thing -- you can drive around all day and almost never use the regular hydraulic brakes. The regen will take you down to 0 mph as long as you incorporate a little planning into your driving. But I’d like more control of the regen process. I’d like to adjust it continuously the same way you can adjust the accelerator position or the brake pedal. Sometimes I want to coast, for instance. Why not have a thumb-wheel that sets the regen so you can coast when you want to and then crank down the regen to stop? Hmmm?
One day I had an 84-mile round-trip to make. That’s three miles farther than the all-electric car’s stated EPA range. I was meeting some powerful industry executives down in The OC. So I planned ahead, found some plug-in chargers within a mile of my destination and… walked the final mile! I could have brought a skateboard or a fold-up bike, but I was in a hurry and didn’t plan as well as I could have. When I started the trip I had 71 miles range showing, but that was assuming I’d be driving the way I had previously, with less concern for range. Using my best hyper-miler, energy-saver driving techniques, which included dodging overtaking traffic and using a lot of stop-and-go non-freeway traffic for better regen, I got to the plug-in spot with 57 miles range remaining… And found all plugs plugged in. OC residents with Chevy Volts who didn’t need the electricity to get home were freeloading off the system. I found a valet parking attendant next to the EV plugs who said he would plug my car in when the others had had two hours of charging. When I returned to the car about an hour and a half later the i3’s indicated range was up to 67 miles. More than enough. I didn’t even try to conserve energy on the drive home.
I like the i3, but I like all electric cars. I think EVs can form an important part of a more efficient transportation network, especially in cities and in developing countries like China and India, once those countries get cleaner power grids. OK, I’m off the soap box and into the carbon fiber box. Cheers!
To add the 20-inch wheels to the 2014 BMW i3, expect to shell out $1,300.
2014 BMW i3
Options: Giga world package including universal garage door opener, comfort access keyless entry, satellite radio with one year subscription ($1,700); sport 20-inch wheels ($1,300); parking assist package including rear view camera, parking distance control, parking assistance ($1,000); Harmon/Kardon premium sound system ($800); DC fast charging ($700); Andesite Silver/ BMW I Frozen B ($550); heated front seats ($350)
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