Disappointed with range

[PipPip]

Just looked at the app data. Mine is showing 52.5 miles for distance driven on one charge vs 79.3 for the community.

 

[noakey]

Today I pre-warmed/ preconditioned it & the car still said 63 miles range so I remain concerned. Does anyone know what "battery preconditioning" is. Or how long it takes? I am running the car interior pretty cool - 18C in a 14C climate so I would be surprised if the resistive heating dropped 20 miles off the range. 2 I could believe, but not 20.

Geoff

Hi. My BEV always indicated a 64 mile range whether or not I precondition. .. but always get 80 without too much difficulty (with eco pro on non highway).

PS .. got down to 1 mile range yesterday. .. Was exiting. .

 

[PipPip]

Just to follow up. My i3 went to the garage for testing over the last few days. They just called me to say that it did have an issue and they have replaced a component responsible for power management. Apparently it took a lot of hours and a £1,000 component so the guy said its a good job it was a warranty job. They tell me the power readings are now all much better. We'll see. He also let slip that this fix is required on a number of i3s as part of a "campaign", which I believe is BMW speak for a recall.

 

[WoodlandHills]

Just to follow up. My i3 went to the garage for testing over the last few days. They just called me to say that it did have an issue and they have replaced a component responsible for power management. Apparently it took a lot of hours and a £1,000 component so the guy said its a good job it was a warranty job. They tell me the power readings are now all much better. We'll see. He also let slip that this fix is required on a number of i3s as part of a "campaign", which I believe is BMW speak for a recall.

KLE replacement?

 

[PipPip]

Not sure what they did but it was a "major" job. Its a company car so I dont get to see the paperwork. Happily its fixed my issues. Just drove home 18 miles after fully charging at work and it used only 15% of my battery compared with about 30% before the fix. For the first time since I bought it I've seen a number bigger than 80 miles on the guessometer. I am glad it was a repairable fault and not a design flaw!

 

[MikeS]

BMW changed my KLE for the same loss of range problem. For the first charge the car showed 86 mile range ( I think the algorithm has been reset) and I achieved about 64 miles(temp hovering between 0and 4 deg C) which is better than before. All driven in Eco Pro. I will monitor it for a few weeks to see what happens.

Still find it frustrating that when i stop the car the range may for example show 68 miles remaining and when start it again 15 mins later the range shows 64 miles!

I think it is of note that the I3 range seems to suffer significantly if it is used for lots of short (less than 1 mile) journeys - I assume because of the temp.

 

[jadnashuanh]

Each time the car has to start up from cold it takes a fair chunk of battery capacity so it would depend on how long it sat in between legs of the trip. When preconditioning while on an EVSE, I typically see it bouncing between 12-19A until the car is nearly warmed up. Especially if you do not have a heat pump, resistance heating is quite fast, but power hungry.

 

[Vne]

First cold day for our area this winter (+10C). Fully charged range dropped from the usual 120-130km to 100km = about 20% drop. Nobody is telling you this when you bought the car.
"Electric range (mean customer value)" of 160km as per BMW's website is highly misleading.

However besides the short range, I love the car.

 

[uktechie]

Not sure what they did but it was a "major" job. Its a company car so I dont get to see the paperwork. Happily its fixed my issues. Just drove home 18 miles after fully charging at work and it used only 15% of my battery compared with about 30% before the fix. For the first time since I bought it I've seen a number bigger than 80 miles on the guessometer. I am glad it was a repairable fault and not a design flaw!

So what has been the range since your fix? My i3REX has been down to around 60 Emiles in recent weeks.

Do you know what was done as would be useful when I contact BMW.

 

[MikeS]

I think they did the same fix to mine when I believe they changed the KLE as advised by BMW. As others have said, I’ve no idea why this should make a difference and I’m still monitoring the consumption by at first look there does seem to be an improvement. I’ve also noticed that the range prediction changes much more when I toggle between comfort/eco pro/eco pro+ and if I switch the fan off when in eco pro I also see an increase in predicted range of around 8 miles which I never noticed before.

 

[jadnashuanh]

One of the stated 'improvements' in the s/w after the new KLE is a more accurate range estimation...IOW, the algorithm has changed, so before/after would need to be analyzed very carefully to see if there was a real difference in observed range verses predicted.

 

[BrianStanier]

My Rex is down to around 60-65 miles. Just as expected and the same as the Leaf we had for three years. That;s why we have the Rex. Nothing wrong with the car at all, it's the time of year.

 

[MikeS]

Brian - however, my car which I got in Sept when it was still relatively warm never gave me more than around 75 miles……...

 

[jadnashuanh]

The thing to look at is your indicated miles/Kw. The community average (don't know if this is worldwide or regional) shown on my iRemote app is 4.0miles/kw, I'm averaging a bit better than that. The battery in the i3 only has a certain amount of available energy that can be less in the winter, but figure a bit over 18Kw. So, depending on how, where, and what you have running, you can figure out about how far the car will actually go verses what it reports. Supposedly, the new software coming that supports the newly designed KLE adjusts the range estimate to become more accurate based on current conditions...time will tell.

 

[TheCyclist]

I've just got my i3 back after the recall for the replacement of the driveshaft between the REX & the generator. But they mysteriously kept it for a week longer than expected & it will be very interesting to see if the range has miraculously improved after I complained about it. I will let you all know

What is a KLE?

Geoff

 

[jadnashuanh]

There are two modules in (many) i3's that are part of the ac-dc charging (regen) system - one of them is called the KLE. The original ones have an issue under some situations with heat, and can fail, reducing the ability of the car to recharge. In the interim, BMW changed the software on a recall to limit how fast and therefore the heat to preserve that module until new ones could be designed and built. Assuming your car has one (in the USA, they all do, but it seems that some, the KLE was optional, and therefore the max current was limited to about 1/2 that of those that have one...since it's tough to know what's offered everywhere, take that with a grain of salt), when the inventory is sufficient, all vehicles needing one will get a new one to restore the max recharge rate.

 

[MikeS]

The thing to look at is your indicated miles/Kw. The community average (don't know if this is worldwide or regional) shown on my iRemote app is 4.0miles/kw, I'm averaging a bit better than that. The battery in the i3 only has a certain amount of available energy that can be less in the winter, but figure a bit over 18Kw. So, depending on how, where, and what you have running, you can figure out about how far the car will actually go verses what it reports. Supposedly, the new software coming that supports the newly designed KLE adjusts the range estimate to become more accurate based on current conditions...time will tell.

My miles/Kwh shows and average of 4.3 and the last trip as 4.6. It was showing a similar figure before the change when i was getting less than 65 mile range!

 

[jelloslug]

The thing to look at is your indicated miles/Kw. The community average (don't know if this is worldwide or regional) shown on my iRemote app is 4.0miles/kw, I'm averaging a bit better than that. The battery in the i3 only has a certain amount of available energy that can be less in the winter, but figure a bit over 18Kw. So, depending on how, where, and what you have running, you can figure out about how far the car will actually go verses what it reports. Supposedly, the new software coming that supports the newly designed KLE adjusts the range estimate to become more accurate based on current conditions...time will tell.

My miles/Kwh shows and average of 4.3 and the last trip as 4.6. It was showing a similar figure before the change when i was getting less than 65 mile range!

Showing or actually getting 65 miles of range?

 

[MikeS]

The thing to look at is your indicated miles/Kw. The community average (don't know if this is worldwide or regional) shown on my iRemote app is 4.0miles/kw, I'm averaging a bit better than that. The battery in the i3 only has a certain amount of available energy that can be less in the winter, but figure a bit over 18Kw. So, depending on how, where, and what you have running, you can figure out about how far the car will actually go verses what it reports. Supposedly, the new software coming that supports the newly designed KLE adjusts the range estimate to become more accurate based on current conditions...time will tell.

My miles/Kwh shows and average of 4.3 and the last trip as 4.6. It was showing a similar figure before the change when i was getting less than 65 mile range!

Showing or actually getting 65 miles of range?

I was getting less than 65 miles range.

The car has since been at the dealers where I m told they changed the KLE. The range did seem a little better but I’m still monitoring. Still struggling to get 75 miles range in eco pro with the ambient temp around 8 to 10 degs. Put it on charge last night and indicated range in comfort is now only 62!! (Please no responses about driving style and temp as I have read them all! I typically get efficiency in excess of 80% and my average mils/kwh shows 4.3!)

So I remain disappointed with the cars actual range. Now seems like I either have to take it back to the dealer again or wait for spring and hope for some improvement. Seems strange to blame the weather so much considering how relatively mild it is in UK. Also frustrating when others ‘claim’ they are getting in excess of 75 miles in similar conditions.

Also notice that if I do a number of very short trips that i ‘lose’ lots of range. That is I can get in the car with an indicated range of say 50miles, drive for a mile, stop and when I get back in the car the range has dropped to 46. Drive another mile, stop, get back in 15 mins later and ind range now shows 42! After that, even if I take a long gentle drive the ‘lost’ range is never regained!!!

 

[TheCyclist]

Well Mike, I don't get 75miles at 10C either - more like high 68's. What's happening with the stops is the car & battery have to re-warm themselves after each halt & it consumes 4-5 miles of range..... Another thing we weren't told. ICE cars of course warm themselves on waste heat from the engine or exhaust, but I am suddenly very glad I have a REX.