I took my 2014 i3 in for a battery capacity check and BMW added capacity to my battery

[Arm]

Man it's hard to tell what is going on there. Lol...what's your bottomline conclusion?

 

[3pete]

Man it's hard to tell what is going on there. Lol...what's your bottomline conclusion?

What's the magic 8 ball response: "reply hazy, ask again later?" Basically that's where I'm at. :lol:

I definitely think *something* that BMW did impacted the way the car counts battery capacity. I suspect it was due to software upgrade but am open to the possibility it had to do with something more along the battery line (full discharge/ recharge or so).

In the meantime, my conclusion is I can drive to destinations that are within my car's range. And I can drive round-trip to destinations that are within 1/2 my car's range .

That's good enough for me for now!

 

[Arm]

Man it's hard to tell what is going on there. Lol...what's your bottomline conclusion?

What's the magic 8 ball response: "reply hazy, ask again later?" Basically that's where I'm at. :lol:

I definitely think *something* that BMW did impacted the way the car counts battery capacity. I suspect it was due to software upgrade but am open to the possibility it had to do with something more along the battery line (full discharge/ recharge or so).

In the meantime, my conclusion is I can drive to destinations that are within my car's range. And I can drive round-trip to destinations that are within 1/2 my car's range .

That's good enough for me for now!

Nice. I know mine got updated but honestly I've not noticed any difference between before and after the update. It's possible my update was performed during CPO but I doubt it. I don't think the CPO is that thorough to be honest.

That said, I honest don't mind if they released more useable capacity in the battery. I'm not planning on keeping this car for 10 additional years. Life's short.

 

[alohart]

I know mine got updated but honestly I've not noticed any difference between before and after the update. It's possible my update was performed during CPO but I doubt it. I don't think the CPO is that thorough to be honest.

That said, I honest don't mind if they released more useable capacity in the battery. I'm not planning on keeping this car for 10 additional years. Life's short.

Battery cell degradation and actual range loss seem to be limited to many but not all 60 Ah battery packs. 94 Ah and 120 Ah battery packs seem to be degrading at much slower rates. I wouldn't expect any software update of a 94 Ah or 120 Ah i3 to affect its battery capacity and range.

I'm guessing that when the i3 was released, BMW was juggling the conflicting goals of being able to claim as high a range as possible while minimizing its risk of having to replace many 60 Ah battery packs under warranty due to more than 30% usable capacity loss. So initially, the high charge level buffer was quite small, ~5%, which allowed BMW to claim a relatively high range. However, such a small high charge level buffer was resulting in a capacity degradation rate that was threatening BMW with many battery pack capacity warranty claims in the future, so BMW programmed the BMS to gradually increase the size of the high charge level buffer to reduce the rate of cell degradation. That gradually reduced the actual range which many of us have been experiencing. Then when one asks for a battery pack usable capacity measurement, BMW requires a software update which reduces the high charge level buffer size enough that the usable capacity will be greater than 70% of its nominal new capacity.

The range of 94 Ah and 120 Ah i3's is good enough that such shenanigans aren't necessary.

Either that or the cell chemistry of 94 Ah and 120 Ah cells improved so much compared with 60 Ah cells that capacity degradation isn't a significant problem.

 

[J3leung]

I'm 2014 BEV i3 driver in Toronto, Canada! I just went for a ev battery test.. it costed me 2 hours of labor, had to leave the car at dealer for a few days... my test result was 78% and I got a pass.. so bmw is not replacing my battery.. I think I will just drive this thing to the ground now. Since I'm at around 85,000km and almost 8 years in.

Just wanted to share my experience.

 

[alohart]

I'm 2014 BEV i3 driver in Toronto, Canada! I just went for a ev battery test.. it costed me 2 hours of labor, had to leave the car at dealer for a few days... my test result was 78% and I got a pass.. so bmw is not replacing my battery.

Was the system software updated during the capacity test? Has your actual range changed after the test?

 

[J3leung]

Yes the tech said software updated but failed to give me the version that was done. He simply says it's the latest one.

 

[J3leung]

How do I post image? They provided a confirmation of the test

 

[J3leung]

I'm 2014 BEV i3 driver in Toronto, Canada! I just went for a ev battery test.. it costed me 2 hours of labor, had to leave the car at dealer for a few days... my test result was 78% and I got a pass.. so bmw is not replacing my battery.

Was the system software updated during the capacity test? Has your actual range changed after the test?

My range didn't change after the software update