** This is a re-upload of the video I first made in November 2018 **
My first contact with the bmw i3 was several years ago at a london car show, back when these cars were still new. i distinctly remember that the stars of the show were the i8 and the tesla model s, hardly anyone gave a second glance to the i3, so i had the opportunity to give it a good look around, sit in it and generally
Admire it. the i3 ended up being my favorite car from that show nowadays they are quite popular in hip places of london and seeing so many of them on the road the most striking feature of the i3 is arguably its exterior design. it looks like a road going concept car, futuristic i’d say. it’s tall and narrow and the
Body lines intersect at odd angles in the front we still have the kidney shape grille but the inlet holes are now covered, which makes the weirdest things on the car are most certainly the wheels. today when pretty much every car comes with very wide tires the i3 rides on what look like bicycle tyres. they are
19 inch tall but only 155 millimeters wide, suicide doors are another unusual design element, today only found on the rolls-royce phantom were designed to aid easy entry or maybe the genius of the interior design lies in its simplicity. because it lacks many a do away with the bulky transmission tunnel inside the door
Jambs we can observe the bare carbon fiber chassis the back where we have a rear hatch made popping the boot which is also the bonnet on this car, as the electric motor lives under there much boot space. nonetheless, by folding the under the front hood we find another small cubby hole comfortable if somewhat on the
Hard side typically german. the blue accented upholstery makes for a very pleasant place to be in seats are manually adjustable without the gear selector itself now lives on lever forwards or backwards until the desired the instrument cluster is a small, floating lcd screen backed up by a larger infotainment system
Range and a prominently displayed sliding scale here we can observe the button for the various driving modes and the controls for the infamous idrive, with the rest of the switchgear is borrowed from across the bmw model range the rear doors can only be accessed while the front ones are open. interestingly the rear space
Is plentiful but only for two occupants i suspect they designed it this way to reduce total in the design of the chassis, bmw has made extensive use of carbon fiber and aluminium, all in the name of lightness. and while most electric cars are plagued by the heft of their batteries around 1200 kilograms for the
Basic versions get a very lively hot hatch. power delivery their nature have a constant torque figure in the case of the i3 this figure is 250 nm. if you’ve been paying any attention you’d realize that these figures are eerily similar to some driving is where this car shines and as it is a bmw after all. the
Ultimate 0 to 60 is a claimed 7.5 seconds but it feels quicker than that. the sensation you get airliner. it starts off without any wheel spin but then it picks up speed exponentially until about 70 mph, when acceleration tapers off it’s rear-wheel drive of course, has optimum weight balance and a power to weight ratio
That relentless torque and the car feels invincible the laws of physics will defeat it eventually as the boxy shape is not ideal, 170 hp only goes so far and the skinny tyres are not going to help. in fact the tyres are the achilles’ heel of the i3 to match the otherwise excellent chassis version will do
Between 80 and 100 miles in can easily double the effective range. so it’s not a long distance cruiser by any means to be. it is a compact car designed for so why is it the best car in the world have been terrified that electric cars will be little more than appliances, washing machines what’s more, it can
Achieve something extraordinary heads into electric car believers
Transcribed from video
BMW i3 60Ah BEV – Walkaround & Test Drive of The Best Car in The World (Re-Upload w/ Improved Sound) By Motoring Culture Magazine