My first 6 weeks....

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prettig

Well-known member
Joined
Dec 11, 2017
Messages
51
First love the car, 2013 rex, latest software.
Although really happy with car, some off my experiences that I have not seen many people talk about.
Some feedback as a commuter (daily 50km total), some local trips, a few longer highway trips done. 99% ecopro driving.

Steering general for cars (and BMW’s):
12 a clock: means going straight (12).
The rear wheel drive cars I am used to: steering goes to 12 after a corner. You can feel the pressure on the steering wheel going out of a corner and it will gently follow the corner and go to 12 (straight).

BMW i3 steering:
The first 5-10 minutes past 12: it STAYS in that position. You always need to help the car the last 5-10 minutes. Being a BMW (owned a few) I find that very strange. On straights you keep correcting the steering (highway speeds even more).
If I need to take something (glasses) out of the center console I really have to watch it going straight, you do not feel any feedback in the steering the first 5-10 minutes past 12.
Since I only commute 98% of the time: not a big issue, but strange for a BMW !

Handling/performance:
Have some fast driving/track experience. And this thing handles really well and is fast as well (up to 80 km/h it is actually really fast).
But ….. going faster (not that fast) into a corner, let go the pedal fast and regen kicks in strong and STAYS in the corner. Means you are going into a corner with brakes applied to the back. Not what you normally want. Going really fast into a corner: just full on the brakes (kills regen) and push out: no problem. Damn fast handling! (you can E-smoke a lot of cars).

Winter and tires:
- Regen lockup (search on it: written enough about it)
- Summer tires: great for summer, worst EVER invented tire for winter…..should be improved so we can drive with one set in mild climates (now you basically need to sets of wheels).

Commuter RANGE:
As a commuter with enough range: battery pre-heat does not matter.
Using energy to get more range but you never drive that range !
I drive 25km, park at office, charge. Drive 25km back home and in the morning back to the office (only charge at the office most of the time). Drive away cold in morning or end of day.
As a city car…. Range is never close to what they claim…. No ones drives 150km in a city in one go !
Would I keep it if I had to make more longer trips every week (beyond the cars e-range): NO…. would buy another car.


Noise level:
People find it a silent car, it is, but not that silent (mostly wind noise). The outlander is better inside, my old lexus (v8 petrol)….better. As a city car…… perfect.

Missing settings:
- Seat heating: always on with timer PLEASE (winter I do this: ecopro, seats on and off after a few minutes…every day twice .....get us a setting !
- pre-heat cabin….. uses your last trip setting! Would be nice to configure that… I don’t not want the car to be 21 degrees when I get in….. 17/18 is ok or just enough to de-ice or clear the window.
- In general….. being able to configure more options to be set when you start the car, it is SOFTWARE so easy… and not a critical car system….

Rex:
Rex: inefficient thing, noisy if you got an empty battery (so you want to engage it earlier). A Toyota aygo uses less fuel ! Not designed for driving, designed as emergency option.

Fast charging (public):
Perfect…. 20 minutes to 90% (50kw DC) but expensive charging (euro 0.60/kw…. Same cost as driving with the REX…… emergency option as well for me.


Home/office charging (non-public):
Very important point for me.
I want an e-car that has the range I need without the need for public charging.
Public charging: MORE time and/or EXPENSIVE (almost same as petrol car….), want to avoid.
Even if just 5 minutes would get you 80% charge: it will be as expensive a s petrol, so want to avoid that.
I can charge at my office and home and have PV panels. Already have fast charging, so I can charge fast cheap and always have enough range (we can go up to 22kw).

So my next car: how fast/easy can it be charged at HOME will be KEY ? ….. prefer 3 phase AC (cheapest to get in most homes/offices). Don’t want a car with “proprietary” fast charging technology (creates lock-in and not future proof…..).
Goal: home/office being able to get 400-500km range within an hour (that will determine the choice for the next car).
My MBW i3: charging ok (single phase), new version 3-phase… way better.

Driving electric cars will be the future but it will be as expensive as petrol (if we do not do something about it)……. they have to get the tax from somewhere!
 
Wow. Lots of info.
I agree that for EV's to be widely accepted, cars need to be charged quickly and range needs to increase. And the charging network needs to be more ubiquitous. For this to happen, battery technology needs to improve. I don't know where you live but here in the US 3 phase is not common in homes and offices. Industrial plants, yes, but not much outside of that. So it would require a huge infrastructure investment to go to 3 phase. I would rather invest in battery technology and use regular household 110V or 220V single phase.
 
The first prototype 350Kwhr CCS unit is in operation at the Porsche headquarters in Germany. The finalization of that enhancement will take awhile, and it also requires over double the voltage batteries to keep the maximum current levels down. Europe has pledged to expand that network...the US is having trouble expanding the existing 50Kw CCS units. with the current administration, and their love of fossil fuels, that probably won't happen anytime soon in the USA, which is sad, meaning newer cars with that tech won't be sold here, or the company will have to build two distinctly different versions to overcome that issue, and, relegate the USA to waiting forever to recharge their now, much larger capacity battery packs. This is progress?
 
prettig said:
BMW i3 steering:
The first 5-10 minutes past 12: it STAYS in that position. You always need to help the car the last 5-10 minutes. Being a BMW (owned a few) I find that very strange. On straights you keep correcting the steering (highway speeds even more).
Cars designed to have low rolling resistance tend to have less front wheel toe-in than most cars which results in the car being affected more by road irregularities. This could explain what you experience. However, our 2000 Honda Insight hybrid was also designed for very low rolling resistance and had very little front wheel toe-in, but its electric power steering felt much better than that of our i3.

When driving our 2014 BEV, I experience the deadness around 12 o'clock that you have described. The steering on our i3 feels almost like there's excessive friction in the steering around 12 o'clock such that the unconscious corrections necessary to continue driving straight ahead at highway speeds take more effort than expected. As I apply more effort, suddenly the steering wheel moves with an overcorrection because of the excessive force required. Our steering just doesn't have much self-centering force, or the force cannot overcome friction somewhere in the steering linkage.

prettig said:
Handling/performance:
Have some fast driving/track experience. And this thing handles really well and is fast as well (up to 80 km/h it is actually really fast).
But ….. going faster (not that fast) into a corner, let go the pedal fast and regen kicks in strong and STAYS in the corner. Means you are going into a corner with brakes applied to the back. Not what you normally want.
I am pretty certain that relatively recent system software versions reduce or maybe eliminate the regen force when cornering. Some i3 owners have complained that it feels like their i3's accelerate when cornering when actually regen braking is being reduced. I have noticed this regen force reduction when cornering in our i3.

Maybe the problem you are experiencing is due to letting go of the power pedal fast although recent U.S. software versions have delayed the onset of strong regen giving the driver time to either accelerate or friction brake before regen begins. If the software on your i3 isn't reducing regen while cornering, instead of letting go of the power pedal, try adjusting the power pedal position so that coasting occurs (i.e., with the power meter centered). This is different from what an ICE car driver does and would take some practice.

prettig said:
- Summer tires: great for summer, worst EVER invented tire for winter…..should be improved so we can drive with one set in mild climates (now you basically need to sets of wheels).
You must have 20" wheels for which only summer tires exist. All-season tires are standard on 19" wheels in many markets.

prettig said:
Commuter RANGE:
As a commuter with enough range: battery pre-heat does not matter.
Using energy to get more range but you never drive that range !
A warm battery cell is more energy-efficient than a cold cell, so the trade-off is the energy used to preheat the battery pack vs. the energy saved while driving with a warm battery pack. If a battery pack is cold enough, its maximum output power is reduced which could be a safety issue for those drivers not paying attention to the power meter.

If sufficient range is available with a cold battery pack, I don't know whether it's more energy-efficient overall to preheat the pack or to just drive with a cold battery pack. Some i3 owners living in cold climates probably know the answer.

prettig said:
- In general….. being able to configure more options to be set when you start the car, it is SOFTWARE so easy… and not a critical car system….
BMW's attitude seems to be that its typical drivers don't care about such settings or maybe shouldn't be bothered with them. This is in contrast with Tesla which makes all sorts of settings available to those drivers who care. I prefer Tesla's approach as long as the user interface that exposes these settings isn't awful. iDrive reminds me of the rather awful old feature phone menu user interfaces, so I'm not confident that additional settings would be easy to access and change using iDrive.
 
Battery life somewhat is affected by the cumulative percentages of discharge where ten cycles of 10% equal one from 100-0. With that in mind, if the battery pack has less capacity because you did not warm it, the percentage used would go up for the same number of miles driven...degrading the battery more overall in the process. For example, say in the cold, without prewarming, you used 30-miles and got to 50%. In the summer, or if you prewarmed, those thirty miles might represent a range decrease of say from 80-50 miles, and only a 37.5% discharge for the same miles driven. If that's true (it's what I read from one source I tend to trust), then prewarming, while maybe not saving energy costs, may save money overall by making the battery last longer. Prewarming the cabin certainly is more comfortable than waiting for the car's battery to do that before leaving, so I try to set a departure time and prewarming whenever I can, summer or winter, while attached to an EVSE. Only time will tell whether it is only a comfort/functional benefit, or if it really does end up extending the life of the battery (assuming I keep the car long enough to be able to tell).
 
theothertom said:
Wow. Lots of info.
I agree that for EV's to be widely accepted, cars need to be charged quickly and range needs to increase. And the charging network needs to be more ubiquitous. For this to happen, battery technology needs to improve. I don't know where you live but here in the US 3 phase is not common in homes and offices. Industrial plants, yes, but not much outside of that. So it would require a huge infrastructure investment to go to 3 phase. I would rather invest in battery technology and use regular household 110V or 220V single phase.

good point ... in western Europe 3 phase is more common (live in the netherlands and 3 x 25A is pretty common).
Going higher 3 x 35A: higher fix cost (like 700,-/year extra) on the electricity bill.......but if needed i would do it to get faster charging.

I guess USA, if single phase is common, charging/battery technology is KEY.
 
theothertom said:
Wow. Lots of info.
I agree that for EV's to be widely accepted, cars need to be charged quickly and range needs to increase. And the charging network needs to be more ubiquitous. For this to happen, battery technology needs to improve. I don't know where you live but here in the US 3 phase is not common in homes and offices. Industrial plants, yes, but not much outside of that. So it would require a huge infrastructure investment to go to 3 phase. I would rather invest in battery technology and use regular household 110V or 220V single phase.

good point ... in western Europe 3 phase is more common (live in the netherlands and 3 x 25A is pretty common).
Going higher 3 x 35A: higher fix cost (like 700,-/year extra) on the electricity bill.......but if needed i would do it to get faster charging.

I guess USA, if single phase is common, charging/battery technology is KEY.
 
@alohart

Steering... glad I am not the only one noticing this (and we have 3 hybrids at the office... none do this).

Handling….not a real problem once you understand what is does with regen, just strange behavior for a car. Same as it is very light on the front wheels, so it slides faster on the front wheels (noticed it with the wet leaves on the road).

Tires:
Yes on 20”, so if 19” all-season is ok (did not know), we just need the same for the 20” (I like those… just looks).

Settings:
iDrive…. Works but a bit old-fashion. As long as they put them in… we will find them haha (still keep turning the wrong way in menu’s).
 
jadnashuanh said:
The first prototype 350Kwhr CCS unit is in operation at the Porsche headquarters in Germany. The finalization of that enhancement will take awhile, and it also requires over double the voltage batteries to keep the maximum current levels down. Europe has pledged to expand that network...the US is having trouble expanding the existing 50Kw CCS units. with the current administration, and their love of fossil fuels, that probably won't happen anytime soon in the USA, which is sad, meaning newer cars with that tech won't be sold here, or the company will have to build two distinctly different versions to overcome that issue, and, relegate the USA to waiting forever to recharge their now, much larger capacity battery packs. This is progress?

In Europe Fastned will implement 350kw charger next year. But your point is exactly what my concern is:
- Large batteries needed to get EV cars widely accepted
- But then.....how can we get these charged fast enough
- One is technology (faster/smarter charging, batteries tech): will get them..... just takes years

But then the most difficult point: you STILL need to put 60, 80... 100 KW into a battery, no matter how, looads of amps and voltage needed.
It will not get less....it will stay the same.

Huge burden on infrastructure and my issue: I want this at HOME/OFFICE so I do need to wait and pay premium at public fast chargers.
In europe we have thousands of public chargers (3-7 kw) ..... will only be usefull for overnight charging, new cars have to use fast/chargers during a trip (not that many).

I guess oil companies will step in......Shell already invested in charging and will have 20 stations operation next year in the Netherlands.
They don''t want to loose revenue they want you to fill up your EV at their stations.
 
prettig said:
I guess oil companies will step in......Shell already invested in charging and will have 20 stations operation next year in the Netherlands.
They don''t want to loose revenue they want you to fill up your EV at their stations.
Shell is the exception and is ahead of the curve. I'm not holding my breath waiting on the oil companies to "step in". They want to protect their investments/infastructure. IMO the oil industry is in for some upheaval.
 
FWIW, the F/R balance on the i3 is similar to all of their other cars, very nearly 50:50, so the front end is NOT light! Depending on the model, the front tires may be narrower than those in the rear, but given the rear-wheel drive, that normally isn't an issue. To get the best performance out of any car, it takes some practice taking into account any quirks it may have. The i3 is no different, and handles pretty well for its stated design purpose. The new i3S takes that up a notch but at a cost in efficiency, if you really want it.
 
theothertom said:
prettig said:
I guess oil companies will step in......Shell already invested in charging and will have 20 stations operation next year in the Netherlands.
They don''t want to loose revenue they want you to fill up your EV at their stations.
Shell is the exception and is ahead of the curve. I'm not holding my breath waiting on the oil companies to "step in". They want to protect their investments/infastructure. IMO the oil industry is in for some upheaval.

Who else does have the money and infrastructure to do this ?

Car producers ? (Yes....Tesla, in EU several alliances setup .... mainly fast charging focused)
Energy companies ? (in europe we have Allego, state owned infrastructure company.....interesting one)
Governments maybe ? (do not see this happening)

I bet oil companies will not let the money flow out of their HUGE infrastructure of gas-stations..

And if it becomes mainstream........would not surprise me we get proprietry fast-chargers that are only available at gas-stations.
Car and oil industry teaming up.... they are already in bed with each other and gorvernments can get their taxes.......... just like we have now with fuel.
 
Steering re-zero issue..... almost gone !

BMW pickup the car for a free software update (and a recall) and the NO re-zero steering is almost gone. Steering much better now.
I guess they really listen and what helps: car is still a model that they sell and easy to update.

Rest... no idea what should be improved.....this one I noticed after the first corner.
 
I have a 2017 i3 with REX.

So far, great.

It is seven months old, with 9,000 miles.

Except for a minor problem the first month, totally reliable.
Averaging 110 mile range in the Summer, 80 mile range in the Winter.
It has been as cold as 3 degrees F here.

It is nice, to get into a warm car every morning.

Now, I need to remember how to turn on the steering wheel heater.

I have never needed the REX unit.
But it is nice to have.
 
prettig said:
theothertom said:
prettig said:
Who else does have the money and infrastructure to do this ?

Car producers ? (Yes....Tesla, in EU several alliances setup .... mainly fast charging focused)
Energy companies ? (in europe we have Allego, state owned infrastructure company.....interesting one)
Governments maybe ? (do not see this happening)

I bet oil companies will not let the money flow out of their HUGE infrastructure of gas-stations..

And if it becomes mainstream........would not surprise me we get proprietry fast-chargers that are only available at gas-stations.
Car and oil industry teaming up.... they are already in bed with each other and gorvernments can get their taxes.......... just like we have now with fuel.

Most gas stations aren't owned by oil companies/distributors, they make their money on their attached convenience stores. If we hit the critical mass where it makes financial sense to install DC fast chargers and setup a payment infrastructure that works for them the gas station owners will be more than happy to sell you 20 minutes of electricity, a cup of coffee and a bag of chips while you wait. Why do you think charging stations are so common at drug stores, grocery stores and restaurants? It's not because they live giving away parking to charging companies, it's that they hope to sell you some stuff while you wait.

And frankly the oil companies don't care that much either, that electricity that you are filling your car up instead of gas likely came from their natural gas operations anyways and that is why more difficult to export than the oil you were going to use otherwise.
 
prettig said:
And frankly the oil companies don't care that much either, that electricity that you are filling your car up instead of gas likely came from their natural gas operations anyways and that is why more difficult to export than the oil you were going to use otherwise.
Yeah, but I think ultimately big oil's revenue will decrease because, well, they won't be selling that much oil (in the form of gasoline). This will be a huge game changer. Think of the implications in the middle east. For this reason, I think the price of oil will remain relatively low. If the price of oil hits 100-110 $/bbl, and gas prices double from where they are today, that will accelerate the acceptance of EV's. Big oil wants to forestall this, so they will keep prices down. Just my humble opinion.
 
theothertom said:
prettig said:
And frankly the oil companies don't care that much either, that electricity that you are filling your car up instead of gas likely came from their natural gas operations anyways and that is why more difficult to export than the oil you were going to use otherwise.
Yeah, but I think ultimately big oil's revenue will decrease because, well, they won't be selling that much oil (in the form of gasoline). This will be a huge game changer. Think of the implications in the middle east. For this reason, I think the price of oil will remain relatively low. If the price of oil hits 100-110 $/bbl, and gas prices double from where they are today, that will accelerate the acceptance of EV's. Big oil wants to forestall this, so they will keep prices down. Just my humble opinion.


The saving on oil is nothing changing to a battery car.

https://newatlas.com/shipping-pollution/11526/
 
and the pedal response is way better after the new software........

Regen is not that abrupt, more pedal play, acceleration smoother. Way easier to drive in traffic, easier to keep it gliding, braking with the pedal is smoother. Just less nervous (feels more like a big smooth petrol engine attached to the pedal). Just more pedal play.

And more range (first day with full charge... but same temp outside), testing the new response a lot and still more range (looks like I got 10% more .... city driving). Will know within a few days.

Not sure if I had this before: I can see how much kw/100km I am using or charging while driving (I always use SOC %, so not sure if I had it before).

Way to go BMW......thanks.
 
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