Potential purchase - spec questions

[TriggerFish]

Hi all,

I'm looking to lease an i3 (REX), and have a few questions.

I've currently got an old 330d, but at 236k miles, it's starting to show its age a little, and could do with replacing. I've also got an E30 325i Sport, which will be staying alongside the i3.

Anyway, onto the i3. I've been dealing with North Oxford BMW, and have got one on a three day test drive (which ends this evening ), and I love it, as does everyone who's been in it (two friends are seriously considering replacing their cars with one of the back of my test drive).

My only gripe so far is that it's not that stable at higher speeds compared to my 330d (not what it was intended for, I know), and that I can't disengage the cruise control without invoking a really aggressive regen. I'm sure I'll come to work out how to avoid that with time though.

I've got a few questions I'd like clearing up, some trivial, some fairly important.

The car I have on loan has the suite interior (I think - it's the first one up from the base spec), and it's got the ambient lighting, which I know the base spec doesn't have (booo), but does the base world have the blue LEDs which fade to white when being unlocked? (I know, focusing on the important things!)

This one I think I know the answer too, but with standard nav, and standard bluetooth, I can still audio stream bluetooth music from my phone? (I can in my loaner, which has prof. media, but not enhanced bluetooth)

More importantly, I can charge the car at work for free, so obviously I'd rather do this than charge it at home! However, I would like to make use of the preheat functionality in the mornings before work, and I know that this can be turned on for the cabin when not charging, but then it doesn't heat the batteries (which may prove not to be a problem, but until winter comes, I won't know for sure).

Is there any way that I have the car plugged in, but not charging, but still preheating? I tried doing this by setting the off-peak tarrif settings to be outside the preheat window, but it just started charging immediately? I guess it's not a deal breaker, but it would be nice to know. I can always use a physical time to restrict charging to certain times to limit our electric bill if needs be....

Finally, just to check, the base interior world does have buttons on the steering wheel for radio/cruise, right?

Sorry for the questions!
Joe

 

[janner]

Disengaging cruise control is just matter of pressing the accelerator to where you think it should be for the speed you're doing then when you toggle off the cruise control the transition is smooth. You'll get used to it, I did.

If you want Drive Assist then you have to upgrade the interior from base.

Charging the car at work for free is good - will it be a 32A (2-3hours) or 13A (6-8 hours) charger? How far from work are you and what charge will that leave you with on Friday night - you'll probably need to charge again before Monday mid-morning.

On 13A/240v you can precondition interior on 13A. The battery heater is a one kW heater so it should also pre-heat on 13A (in the USA on 110v it's a different matter). Preheating the batteries in winter is only a range issue. Charging the batteries also heats them - the pre-heater is turned off during charging. It you calculate when you need the car charged by then you could delay the charging to finish when you're ready to leave so you then use charging waste heat to pre-heat batteries.

Hope that's helped on some of the questions.

 

[PhilH]

Finally, just to check, the base interior world does have buttons on the steering wheel for radio/cruise, right?

Yes.

 

[TriggerFish]

Yes.

Good, cheers!

Disengaging cruise control is just matter of pressing the accelerator to where you think it should be for the speed you're doing then when you toggle off the cruise control the transition is smooth. You'll get used to it, I did.

Cheers for the reply

I feared that would be the case In the 330d, you can turn it off to coast for a few seconds then turn it back on without the jerky motion. I'll get used to it as you said, I'm sure. (I started to on the last day, but wasn't sure if I was missing something).

If you want Drive Assist then you have to upgrade the interior from base.

Charging the car at work for free is good - will it be a 32A (2-3hours) or 13A (6-8 hours) charger? How far from work are you and what charge will that leave you with on Friday night - you'll probably need to charge again before Monday mid-morning.

I don't like any of the interiors apart from the leather one (I forget the names), but I'm not prepared to pay £2k on some different fabric, so I'll forego the drive assist.

It will be a 32A charger (chargemaster unit, but there's new ones on the way, hopefully). I'm 22 miles from work, so on a Friday evening I should have about 50 miles of range left. I've also got my E30 as a weekend car though in the summer, so hopefully that can take some of the duties. I don't mind charging it at home, it's just cheaper to charge elsewhere!

On 13A/240v you can precondition interior on 13A. The battery heater is a one kW heater so it should also pre-heat on 13A (in the USA on 110v it's a different matter). Preheating the batteries in winter is only a range issue. Charging the batteries also heats them - the pre-heater is turned off during charging. It you calculate when you need the car charged by then you could delay the charging to finish when you're ready to leave so you then use charging waste heat to pre-heat batteries.

Hope that's helped on some of the questions.

That makes sense, thanks. Sounds like I will just need to plug it in for an hour or two overnight in the depths of winter if range becomes marginal to preheat the cabin without draining the range.