i3 Crash Protection

Looking at used '14 i3's......our '15 Volt was T-Boned,,,,already have 220V charging station at the house. One BIG reason I'd like this car is DC Fast Charging,,,,,but mainly the automatic crash protection. Dealer knows nothing about it and apparently neither does BMW......what am I seeing here?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rq0Wg_h_XXQ

When you say "dealer" knows nothing about it, do you mean a BMW dealer or some other dealer ? My i3 has it and the client advisor, aka salesman, explained it to me.

dfdureiko said:

Looking at used '14 i3's......our '15 Volt was T-Boned,,,,already have 220V charging station at the house. One BIG reason I'd like this car is DC Fast Charging,,,,,but mainly the automatic crash protection. Dealer knows nothing about it and apparently neither does BMW......what am I seeing here?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rq0Wg_h_XXQ

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My understanding is that this was just a tech demo (i.e. The 360 degree crash protection) and no current i3 vehicles has this as it requires several extra distance measuring sensors. It's not even available as an option. Perhaps it might appear on 2018-19 i3 vehicles?

Current i3 vehicles (with the the right option) DO have the front vehicle collision avoidance system which works night and day for vehicles, and during the day (at low speeds) for cyclists and pedestrians, but it won't stop you driving into a wall. It leverages data from the KAFAS system; the same system responsible for the active cruise control.

Here is all you need to know about it: http://www.bimmerfest.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=468479

Just happened this morning that the semi-truck without warning on the slow lane pulled in front of my little 2017 i3 in the middle lane at the speed of 64 mph. While it was just 15 feet away about to collide, the i3 took over the steering and drifted across the fast lane immediately while I was still thinking how to respond to the situation. I didn't even step on the brake BTW. After that, the i3 reset it's course back to the middle lane. When I looked at the driver side wing mirror, there was in fact another truck on the fast lane as well. It made me wonder if the i3 sensed the road situation prior making the decision for me.

Long time I was told the per-collision system was merely a warning signal and sound effect with no actually auto-stop feature like their demo on Youtube. May be there was an angel who saved my life or there is an actual safety feature has already been updated on the software, who knows?

After all, I am glad I didn't get killed and the i3 or angel did what it supposed to safe my life.

Kelvincrunch said:

Just happened this morning that the semi-truck without warning on the slow lane pulled in front of my little 2017 i3 in the middle lane at the speed of 64 mph. While it was just 15 feet away about to collide, the i3 took over the steering and drifted across the fast lane immediately while I was still thinking how to respond to the situation. I didn't even step on the brake BTW. After that, the i3 reset it's course back to the middle lane. When I looked at the driver side wing mirror, there was in fact another truck on the fast lane as well. It made me wonder if the i3 sensed the road situation prior making the decision for me.

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You haven't added your location to your profile, so I don't know whether your i3 might have the feature that controls the steering to keeps it within a lane which isn't available in U.S. i3's. The only situation in which the i3 controls the steering in U.S. i3's is during self-parking. Regardless, the lane-keeping and auto-braking features don't operate at 64 mph in any market, so it's difficult to understand how your i3 would have done anything automatically to avoid the collision. Changing lanes as part of collision avoidance has not been claimed by BMW, probably because no rear-facing camera exists that could detect a vehicle in the adjacent lane, so an automatic lane change could cause a collision.

Kelvincrunch said:

Long time I was told the per-collision system was merely a warning signal and sound effect with no actually auto-stop feature like their demo on Youtube.

Click to expand...

i3's with the Tech package and thus a front-facing camera do implement auto-braking. In U.S. i3's, auto-braking operates only below 35 mph but operates too late to stop completely to avoid a collision with a stationary object at speeds greater than 12 mph according to IIHS tests. Our 2014 i3 has slammed on its brakes automatically when I was attempting to stop very close to a vehicle ahead so that our i3 would not be partially blocking traffic at an intersection.

Maybe someone else will be able to explain what you experienced.

The 2017 i3 is the US version with full tech package. I was planning on switching to Tesla after the lease on i3 expires but now this unexplainable miracle or feature makes me to reconsider sticking with an i3.