Hi everyone, back to owning another 2004 Rex, the first time was around ten years ago when my i3 was purchased from BMW reading, a year old and at the time around £25k. The car appealed to me back then for a number of reasons not least its unique build and innovation but it was my wifes daily driver and no matter how much I assured her about the range extender she was always concerned about running out of juice so after a year it went to be replaced by another mini. Fast forward to this year and I started hankering for another small frugal car for driving locally and into town which isnt something thats good for my 530 diesel. Initially I thought about the Audi A2, a car that I owned and also admired prior to the i3 but they are getting a elderly now and despite the good build quality would expect plenty of issues and then a light bulb moment occurred and I thought about the i3. This time around it wouldn't be for my missus (who still drives a mini, a JCW now) but for me so the risk of expulsion due to range anxiety has gone but I had no clue how they had faired over time and also prices. Lots of research and used car sites later and I eventually landed on a 2014 car with an identical interior to my first car (Lodge I think, the brown leather seats) but with some useful options such as pro navigation, fast charging, enhanced audio and a few others - all for less that a quarter of what I paid for the first car.
Its quite leggy at 91k (the recent Wisely video assured me that this isnt necessarily an issue) and inside looked like it had been used as a chicken coop (why do some people treat their cars that way) but clearly this wasn't down to the last owner who had it for a few weeks before finding a car that better suited his wife's needs (a man who also frequents these parts). The good news (I hope) is a very clean MOT history and a huge wad of bills with total spend since 2020 approaching £20k including replacement of the drive motor, plenty of ancillary electronics and ten months ago a new REX motor.
Its got a few issues e.g. front under tray missing (new one coming tomorrow from the local BMW dealer at £47), flickering climate control LED's (replacement and finger crossed not faulty unit in the post now) and a much better condition steering wheel arrived yesterday to replace the shiny and tired original. I'm not convinced that the air conditioning is working optimally and when the REX was replaced they recommended an aircon service but the then owner declined - its not cheap though, my local guy who is usually very good value quoted me £215 for a regas so I'm waiting on a quote from BMW to see what they want for a service (Halfords wont provide a quote BTW). The granny charger was missing and a replacement arrived yesterday via Ebay and did its job when I was cleaning the interior - incidentally its showing a range of 65 miles, 9 degrees C and according to the hidden menu the battery is holding approx 77% of its original capacity which after 91k miles and eleven years seems reasonable to me.
Yesterday, I spent five hours on an interior clean and its come up very well (probably need to remove the seats to do the job properly) and once weather permits I'll give the bodywork a machine polish and ceramic coat.
Overall its as I remember it and I'm looking forward to using it. Incidentally I did have a Tesla Model3 for two years from 2020 and although it had many attributes it was quite soulless and suffered from very intrusive driver "aids" that on more than one occasion scared me and my wife S...less with phantom braking on MWays and steering corrections - seems that this is the norm now and how good it is that the i3 has none of these supposed aids.
Cheers
Keith
Its quite leggy at 91k (the recent Wisely video assured me that this isnt necessarily an issue) and inside looked like it had been used as a chicken coop (why do some people treat their cars that way) but clearly this wasn't down to the last owner who had it for a few weeks before finding a car that better suited his wife's needs (a man who also frequents these parts). The good news (I hope) is a very clean MOT history and a huge wad of bills with total spend since 2020 approaching £20k including replacement of the drive motor, plenty of ancillary electronics and ten months ago a new REX motor.
Its got a few issues e.g. front under tray missing (new one coming tomorrow from the local BMW dealer at £47), flickering climate control LED's (replacement and finger crossed not faulty unit in the post now) and a much better condition steering wheel arrived yesterday to replace the shiny and tired original. I'm not convinced that the air conditioning is working optimally and when the REX was replaced they recommended an aircon service but the then owner declined - its not cheap though, my local guy who is usually very good value quoted me £215 for a regas so I'm waiting on a quote from BMW to see what they want for a service (Halfords wont provide a quote BTW). The granny charger was missing and a replacement arrived yesterday via Ebay and did its job when I was cleaning the interior - incidentally its showing a range of 65 miles, 9 degrees C and according to the hidden menu the battery is holding approx 77% of its original capacity which after 91k miles and eleven years seems reasonable to me.
Yesterday, I spent five hours on an interior clean and its come up very well (probably need to remove the seats to do the job properly) and once weather permits I'll give the bodywork a machine polish and ceramic coat.
Overall its as I remember it and I'm looking forward to using it. Incidentally I did have a Tesla Model3 for two years from 2020 and although it had many attributes it was quite soulless and suffered from very intrusive driver "aids" that on more than one occasion scared me and my wife S...less with phantom braking on MWays and steering corrections - seems that this is the norm now and how good it is that the i3 has none of these supposed aids.
Cheers
Keith
