drb said:
Mindmachine, we all knew fairly early in the game that the REx would not be manual as in Europe and that it would turn on automatically when the battery was fairly well exhausted. The discussion of this was so frequent that it was hard to miss if you are a regular reader of this blog and I believe you are. So, instead of trying to sue BMW, let us work with the company in the spirit of making even better a great car. As for me, knowing the limitations of the REx, I plan my routes and my charge so that I know I can maintain highway speed or climb a hill. This is all part of learning to drive differently and efficiently in a different but exciting new car. The i3 is so much fun to drive in part because it makes us a participant in the driving experience. Mindmachine, don't sue--enjoy.
Yes I agree to some extent, but the original turn on point was 20% SOC which would make a lot of difference with the safety issue we now have. I am not going to start legal action myself, but would encourage it if a legal firm were willing to take the case. This is a rip off by BMW to those of us who live in non CARB states, oh and all of Canada too. The only way this is going to be fixed is when someone dies because of the ill thought BEVx CARB game they played instead of just settling for a PHEV rating. The safety of the low auto REx point of 6.5% SOC just isn't sufficient, it needs, no it must be fixed or people are going to have accidents related to it and someone or even several people will die. Then BMW will have a bigger problem.
Again I love the car and the concept, it just was bastardized too much in the interest of greed for CARB credits. Either they should fix it or we should be compensated for the theft of functionality.
Back in late March and early April when I put down my (non refundable) deposit, little was out about the additional de-rating of the REx functionality. Yes we knew we would not be able to engage it manually. But on this forum talk about how that would impact drive ability and the lower auto rex point wasn't even know in detail and was being put down as a non event. Most everything I read at the time involved people saying the rex was perfectly capable in europe and BMW officials for BMW NA were publicly stating that the REx was capable of driving across the USA if you were willing to make frequent gasoline stops. Questions were raised about mountainous driving conditions and statements were made that there should not be any issues. We now know those were lies.
A bigger deal back when i placed my order was the sun roof, which we are not getting even though we are paying for it. The sunroof was still on the USA web site when I built my own and the price I paid included the sunroof. Guess what the price was not lowered.
Then the SOC auto rex discussion started to pick up steam in late April and the gas tank size reduction followed, adding insult to injury. Are you beginning to see a trend here. BMW was scrambling to save their precious CARB credits, the hell with our other customers who don't get anything out of the CARB programs in the various states. The old robbing Peter to pay Paul concept.
I am really surprised at all you educated people who keep saying be happy. Oh they took the sunroof option away, oh well be happy! Guess what they won't let us turn on the Rex manually in the USA, oh well that's not a big deal it will still run when needed. Oh did you know they reduced the SOC auto Rex point to 6.5%, so what, BMW NA says you can drive it anywhere and even across the USA. Guess what they just reduced the size of the gas tank for the Rex, ho my really don't worry be happy!
I guess many out there are asleep as to what is going on here, there are legal issues here. There is no reason why there couldn't have been two versions of the REX, one for CARB states and one for the rest of NA including Canada. I personally would be willing to pay $ 1000 more for a non CARB full functioning with manual Rex turn on i3 Rex. But I suggest you suck it up and be happy with your crippled Rex and relish the thought about how you are subsidizing the people who purchase a BMW gas guzzler in the CARB states.
Oh I forgot you are also subsidizing people in some CARB states with additional tax breaks that you don't get.
Lets face it, these issues were poorly handled by BMW, they were dished out like Chinese water torture. Customers were left groping for any shred of information and there was way more disinformation then truth presented. Facts about the true impact of the d-rated
Rex were not truthfully reported by BMW and we only started learning how much damage was done after people started reporting on their actual experiences here in the US.