Born Electric Guest Blogger: Meet Harold From California

My name is Harold and I was born electric on August 19^th, 2014. 

There are two parts to my story here. The first is about my path to selecting and buying the i3, and the second is about my experiences owning and driving the i3.

PART 1:  

“IF YOU’RE NOT PART OF THE SOLUTION, THEN YOU ARE PART OF THE PROBLEM.”

When it comes to global warming, I’m embarrassed to say that for far too long my wife and I were part of the problem.  We’re a two car family, and over the years we’ve driven a series of big, luxury, premium fuel guzzlers. As recently as 2007 we each had one of the full-size Range Rovers. Yikes, and yuck!

I gradually realized this was not tenable, but I found it very, very hard to give up the comfort (I’m 6’3 and don’t fit in most cars) and sportiness of a big luxury SUV. The very thought of shoehorning myself into the ugly and painfully boring Prius hybrid was enough to make me puke.

So my first tentative step in the right direction was to sign up to make annual contributions to one of those carbon-offset charities. I even got vanity license plates that said “I OFFSET.” Wow, how big and how brave of me!

Then BMW came out with a diesel version of their X5 so I dumped my Range Rover in favor of that on the theory that at least I would be burning a lot less fuel. As nice a car as the X5 was, it ended up only getting about 16mpg, and I also came to understand that the diesel wasn’t as clean as I had thought it might be.

Meanwhile, there were more hybrid cars coming on the market, but all still seemed to frumpy for me.  I’m sorry, but I live in California and I spend a ton of time in my car and I want it to look and feel great!

And then Audi launched their stylish little Q5, and I dumped the X5 in favor of this smaller, more fuel efficient vehicle. But even that only got around 20mpg. 

So about a year ago I started the search for my next car. I did my first exploration of EV’s. The RAV4 was too clearly a Toyota. The Leaf, which a neighbor of mine happily drives, drove like a turtle to me.  The Volt was claustrophobic – and a Chevy to boot. The Tesla was way cool, but I actually don’t fit very well in it and, at least in the San Francisco area, driving one has already become interpreted as a sign that you are an obnoxious snob.

So, I had resigned myself to getting the new edition of the X5 diesel, which promised to deliver significantly better – and cleaner – mileage than the original one. And then one day while I was checking out the new X5 on one of the BMW forums, I saw something about the coming of the i3. It looked weird as hell in the photo, but it sounded intriguing. I started to follow stories about it. 

I went to a car show in San Jose to see it in person. I fully expected to discover that I could not fit in it, but when I sat down in the model on display I discovered that it had more head room and leg room and better visibility than my Q5. (Of course at this point, BMW was showing it with a sunroof – more about that later….). Plus, the interior design was stunning. And the exterior, while weird, was weird in a sexy way.  So I was hooked.

When the test drives started happening in the Bay Area, I went to them at three different dealers.  Driving the car was a total blast (all the more so with the sunroof open…..) and I had to have one. I went to my dealer and said I’m willing to pay MSRP for one of the first ones you get, I just need to get two key options – the sun roof and the REX. Can you arrange that please?

And then things started to fall apart. For one, it turned out the sunroof was not going to be offered in the US.  No reason for this has ever been provided, but that alone was enough to put me off.  I’m claustrophobic, and I always felt I needed a sunroof to have the feeling of openness they give. And then some negative stories started to appear about the REX – a review in Europe said driving with the REX was like driving in limp-home mode, and then it was revealed that the REX was being modified in the US in ways that made it seem even less desirable.  And,  being new to EV’s, I was at that point too chicken to go the full BEV route.

So, I abandoned my quest for an i3. I signed off of the i3 forums and facebook group. I went back to my dealer and started haggling over prices on the X5 diesel again. But the x5 diesel remained in hot demand,  and I couldn’t get what I thought was a reasonable price. And then the i3’s actually arrived. I saw two in one day “in the wild.” I went behind my dealer’s back and went to another dealer to test drive an i3 again.  I found that even without the sunroof it still felt very open. And it was just as fun to drive as I had remembered. 

So I went back to my CA, said you’re not going to believe this, but I want the i3 after all. He laughed very heartily. We worked the numbers for a while. I ended up doing the two year version of “owner’s choice.” (Went with owner’s choice vs. lease to get the full advantage of the federal tax credit,  and went two years rather than three just because I expect the EV technology is going to advance pretty rapidly over the next couple of years and I may want to move to the next edition sooner rather than later.) And within just a few weeks I was driving my new Andesite Silver Terra i3, loaded up with everything except for the 20” wheels.  And, surprise surprise, I even got over my fear of running out of juice and went with the BEV instead of the REX.

PART 2: 

“WHO SAYS MEDICINE HAS TO TASTE BAD TO BE GOOD FOR YOU?

As I mentioned earlier, a key factor that kept me from switching sooner to a more environmentally correct car was that they all just seemed too ugly, too uncomfortable, and too boring. I wanted to do the right thing for the planet – but I wanted to still be able to enjoy driving at the same time.

Thankfully, my i3 has solved all three of those problems for me. 

While I will admit that the exterior is a bit of an acquired taste, there can be no denying that the interior is stunning. Yes, the materials are all very environmentally friendly, but more important to me – they are gorgeous. The design is very fresh,  very high tech,  and yet very simple. Among the features I like most are the floating high definition screens (one for the instrument cluster stuff, one for the navigation and multimedia stuff) and the eucalyptus dash. I also really appreciate the openness of the cabin and the great sight lines.

The interior is also quite comfortable. I was initially skeptical about the thinness of the seats.  As a veteran business road warrior, I have equated the steady thinning down of airline seats over the years with an equally steady decline in the comfort of those seats. Well, I can only hope that the designers at Boeing and Airbus get to drive an i3 soon so they can see how to make a thinner seat super supportive and comfortable.

And as for the driving experience, well, I haven’t had so much fun driving a car since the very first one I owned.  First comes the peppiness. As the folks at BMW are fond of saying,  the i3 is the fastest car they make from 0 to 30 mph.  And I believe them now!  Zipping in and out of city traffic is as easy as can be – aided by how tight the turning radius is. Likewise, accelerating on to freeway ramps and passing at freeway speeds is also quick and easy. When we had a meet up of Bay area i3 drivers recently,  I had t-shirts printed up for everyone that carried this message: “I drive a BMW i3.  So you can eat my dust, not my exhaust. You’re welcome.” Trust me, the message is appropriate: this car hauls ass.

It's hard to see in the picture, but the blue T-Shirts everyone is wearing are the shirts Harold made up for the Crissy Field i3 meet. He was even gracious enough to send me a couple in the mail. Photo credit: Dino Ignacio

The steering is also very tight. I’m sure it has some degree of electronic assistance, but it doesn’t feel in the least bit mushy or vague. If anything it’s too responsive – you have to be attentive or it’s a bit too easy to oversteer.

The ride is firm, but in a good, BMW way. If you don’t want to feel the road at all, then this is not the car for you. But if you like to get some feedback from your driving, you should like this.

I really like the quietness of the car. If you keep the windows rolled up, it is super quiet; there is of course some wind noise at higher speeds, but I have not found it to be objectionable. And, at the same time, if you drive with the windows open, you can actually hear the sounds of nature!

I’m still learning all the fancy new tech tools.  Love the Harman Kardon stereo, love being able to use apps like Pandora and TuneIn. Appreciate that iDrive has gotten clearer and more manageable, though it still requires a learning curve. Love the collision avoidance system and the adaptive cruise control.  Haven’t yet tried the self-parking thing – but haven’t felt the need either, as this is the smallest car I have driven in ages and I would feel like a total wimp if I couldn’t park it by myself.  : )

As for downsides of the i3, anyone who buys this car has to accept that they are on the bleeding edge of technology and that things may go wrong. And they have for some of the early owners. But, knock on wood, after just about 1,000 miles, the worst thing that has happened to me so far is that one morning while I was driving along a nearly empty six lane freeway a warning message popped up on my screen that said something about “Danger – objects detected in roadway.” There were no objects to be seen, so I ignored the message and kept on driving and the message ultimately disappeared.

Also, if you choose as I did to go with the BEV instead of the REx, you will probably find yourself being more than a little bit paranoid about monitoring how much charge you have left. I have been running somewhere around 75 miles per full charge – a little less than what the EPA says, but then I drive with a bit of a lead foot and I leave the AC on all the time. So far I’ve only once gotten the dreaded verbal warning “you have 15 miles of range left,” and thankfully that happened when I was only about a mile from my house.

One other downside is that, to my way of thinking, the i3 is not practical as a family car. The “suicide”  doors (aka coach doors) make access to the back seat just too awkward for regular use, especially if you are trying to cope with child seats.

OK, so the i3 is good looking, it’s comfortable, and it’s fun to drive. But how does it do on my original overall reason for getting it, which is to help address the problem of global warming?

Well,  for one thing I have not been to a gas station since I got the car. And will never have to go to a gas station with it. Take that, Exxon and BP and the rest of you big oil companies! (The vanity plates I have on order for my car will read: “I86DGAS”) And, at least according to the i3 mobile app, so far I have already saved 530 pounds of CO2 from being pumped out into the air.

So,  in sum, thank you BMW for giving birth to the i3 so that I can at last do my part for solving global warming – but do it in a way that fits my own selfish needs for style, comfort, and fun!

PS- The i3 may not be right for everyone, but there are now plenty of EV’s on the market – surely one of them will be right for you!
_________________________________________________________




Thanks for participating Harold! If you drive an i3 and want to share your Born Electric story here, just send me an email and we'll set it up! tom.moloughney@gmail.com

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 

Born Electric Guest Blogger: Meet Jon From Norway

So Far we've had Andy from the UK , Hil from Holland , Toni from Belgium, Jan From Belgium, and Steven from the Netherlands.   We'll now be traveling to Norway to see what Jon has to say about his Solar Orange BEV i3.

Hello, I'm Jon from Norway and I was Born Electric on February 13th.

Until now I’ve been "partly electric" by cycling once a week (not in winter) to work with an electric bike. It's 17km each way and I've done 1000km in total. Living in the southwest of Norway, in Sandnes and working in Stavanger, nearby.

Electric or hybrid?

I first started looking for a hybrid vehicle that could go electric to and from work. Toyota and Lexus could just go a few kilometers in electric mode which wasn't enough for me. Then Volvo came up with one, but it was too expensive. The i3 was the first all-electric that I found interesting. In the past two years the most we have driven at any time was about 100km. If we need to travel longer than that, we go by air. After reading just about everything I could find about the i3, I decided to sign an informal agreement to buy one on July 11. Since then, Audi and VW have announced a few interesting hybrids, but the Norwegian tax system gives the all-electric cars some advantages (at the moment). That meant the all electric BMW i3 is actually less expensive then the competing hybrids, plus it gets toll free passage and is free on ferries!

I like the blue LED interior lights when you lock or unlock the doors. You can also change the color if you don't like the blue

Buying it:

In October, BMW put an i3 in front of the Oslo Marathon to serve as a pace car. The BMW shop Bavaria in Stavanger lent it for a day and had it on exibition in town. I went there, took a glance, and felt in love. Unfortunately the salespersons knew even less than I did (Hi Tom, It’s the same mess in Norway!), so I spoke with two engineers that came to look at the charging system. Together we agreed that BMW needs another type of way to sell these electric cars. Speciliasts that have been properly trained for these unique vehicles. My experience earlier was that coming in to the BMW car shop speaking Oslo dialect got them to believe that I worked with Statoil and was looking for an expensive model. The salespersons focus on status models with big engines is not suitable for electric cars! These cars are different and the sales processes should be different as well. When i3 was introduced in November, I took it for a spin and was convinced. I was about the 50th person to sign a contract out of the 550 in total in the southwest of Norway. After seven long months of waiting, I finally have it!

My son and grandson like the i3 too!

Driving it:

It is a pleasure to drive! It is fast when you need it, yet with smooth and easy ride. Small and quick in town and with an impressive turning radius! Many Norwegian families have two cars because both parents use a car to come to work and the i3 can be a perfect second car for many of them. Quite often they will have a large car to go to their cottage in weekends. However from now on, the second should be all-electric like the i3! Moreover, for some of us it is the primary car, the one that gets the most use. The one foot driving is perfect! In the morning rush, I used to step on the brake pedal hundreds of times to avoid crashing. Now I just regulate the speed by the accelerator pedal. Even better, I go into the line of cars on the motorway and turn on the adaptive Cruise control. It's possible for me to travel the whole 15 km on the motorway just steering, not touching the any pedals! (Try that, Tesla!) I have a very good second car, a Saab 9.3 automatic, but I will now use it only if we decide to go by car to Oslo (500km, We have only Japanese fast charging system here now) or if I need to fetch something with a trailer. Last week we went to visit some relatives in the Archipelago north of Stavanger. The car did fine on the 80km drive, even with 5 degrees Celsius and strong winds. I was worried about the distance and how much air conditioning (heating) I could use, but was relieved when the car showed 55km to go after driving the 80km. Since the i3 is a tall car, strong winds do affect the steering more than I am used to, but it is not a big deal once you get used to it.

Perfect choice?

As a city car, I believe the best choice for the i3 is the all-electric car version now. Agile, quick and fun to drive. I like the narrow tires because they will not float in snow and they will not follow tracks in the asphalt. Norwegian roads have often tracks from cars with studded tires. The i3 REx would definitely make my range anxiety disappear, but here in Norway, it is too expensive because of the special tax system. To have the newest in security, you must add much of the extras BMW provide!  I paid 36% extra to get the essentials! (Tyre Pressure Monitor is free). I believe i3 is the only all-electric car with adaptive Cruise Control. That is a great, but soon  the electric VW Golf comes with it as a standard feature! Relative to the range anxiety, both Audi A3 and VW Golf comes with 204hk hybrid cars that uses 0,15l/10km! If BMW does not come up with wider range of electric cars, or hybrid 4x4, then VW-Audi will achieve their European goal, being the leading automaker here, also in electric and hybrid cars. As for the sound system, the car is a virtual concert hall with the Harman Kardon loudspeakers. I have a lot of music stored on the hard disk in the car. To listen to quiet parts of classical music without disturbance from the petrol motor is perfect. The extras are from the ordinary BMWs, and suits the i3 well. To give i3 the right premium feel along with the rest of the BMWs, I think you need optional equipment like adaptive Cruise Control, stop and go and Harman Kardon loudspeakers. However, as said before, these features do cost a lot! In Norway the base i3, the Leaf and Golf cost about the same without optional equipment. For me, i3 wins even though you do not buy optional equipment.

Two practical things about the i3 that I'd like to recommend: Floor mats in white velor are nice to look at, but not to use in winter. Also do not put the electric cables under the bonnet. The wet environment might damage it, they said. Therefore, I recommend using a waterproof bag for them like I do.

US i3 Orders Limited to Special "Launch Edition" Package For First Three Months

You want one of the first i3's in the US? You'll be getting the full leather Tera World interior as seen above and every option available besides the 20" wheels then. Welcome to the "Launch Edition i3"

Just yesterday, BMW i dealers received a bulletin that informed them they can officially begin to process customer orders and place them in the pipeline. Many customers have already left deposits at their local BMW dealerships even though it wasn't an official order yet, with the hope of being one of the first people to take delivery of this revolutionary vehicle. However they didn't have an official order place in the system, that was just to have a place in line reserved for them and to make sure they got one of the few allotted cars their dealer would get for 2014. So now that these reservations can be turned into official orders, everyone must be really happy, right?

Not so fast. In a move that will most certainly anger many of the enthusiastic people waiting patiently for their i3, BMW informed the dealers that the initial first three months of US i3 production will be restricted to a special "Launch Edition" i3. The Launch Edition i3 has the top of the line interior Tera World and every option available on the car besides the 20" Sport Wheels which you can add if you would like. (Options include: Metallic paint, Parking Package, Technology and Drivers Assist Package, DC Quick Charge Option, Heated Seats and the Harman Kardon Premium sound system). The only choice the customer gets is whether or not they want the range extender, the exterior paint color and if they want the 20" Sport wheels. So unless the people waiting in like with deposits are willing to take a fully loaded Launch Edition i3, they will have to wait an additional three months for production of the custom ordered i3's to begin. The Launch Edition i3 production will run from March to May so custom ordered i3 production will not begin until June.

As expected this isn't sitting well with a lot of folks who have had deposits and reservations for many months now. I've had over a dozen people reach out to me today to confirm whether or not this was true after being notified by their dealer. Some thought the dealer was just trying to jack up the price of their car by making them get options they didn't want and were seeking clarification from me. I wish I could tell them it wasn't the truth, but this is how it's being done. The unfortunate thing is many people have expiring leases and planned to make due for a few weeks until their i3 came in but now the gap is more like 3 or 4 months and they don't know what to do. Should they bite the bullet and get an additional ~$4,000 of options they didn't necessarily want or wait till July for the i3 spec'd the way they ordered?

Here is the cost breakdown of the Launch Edition i3:

Base:141A(BEV): $41,350.00
Color:B81: $550.00
Tera world:ZTW: $2700.00
Parking Package:ZPK: $1000.00
Tech+Driving Assist:ZTD: $2500.00
Heated Front Seats:494: $350.00
DC Fast Charging:4U7: $700.00
Harman/Kardon:674: $800.00
Destination: $925.00

Total: $50,875.

If you want the range extender just add $3,850, so a Launch Edition i3 REx will set you back $54,725.


The only exception to this is ordering process is for the current ActiveE drivers like me. As a "thank you" for participating the the ActiveE trial lease program, BMW is allowing us to order our cars "a la carte" in addition to giving us the heated seats and DC quick charge options for free. BMW is also creating some unique features that only our cars will have like interior, exterior and door sill badging, embroidered front trunk liner and BMW i floor mats. Plus we get priority ordering and the first batch of i3's that come to the US will include our cars and we should begin receiving them the end of April. BMW is calling our cars the "Electronaut Edition i3" and these only be purchased by current ActiveE drivers. The ironic thing is, I ordered my i3 REx with the Tera World interior and every option available including the 20" sport wheels. So even though I had the freedom to build my car the way I wanted to that the other early i3 buyers won't have, I'm still getting the car loaded just like the Launch Edition anyway.

I'm sure this will elicit some interesting comments below.

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!