Saw the i8 in person at the BMW Spartanburg plant on my recent visit. They have one inside the building in the foyer area just before the assembly line. No cameras allowed inside the factory, so I have no pics. The wheel covers looked kind of odd. Hope they change it on production car. Beautiful futuristic car otherwise. Windshield is freakin huge.
Glimpse BMW’s Slick, Sexy Electric Future November 14, 2011 | 2:45 pm | Glimpse BMW’s Slick, Sexy Electric Future | Autopia | Wired.com NEW YORK — BMW, eager to show off its electric babies, unveiled its i3 and i8 concept cars here ahead of their North American premier at the Los Angeles Auto Show, and all we can say is, Wow. These things are cool. Yes, yes, we know. They’re concept cars. But BMW stressed that these beautiful, efficient and fast (in the case of the i8) cars with cords are just a few years from production. While the technology underpinning these cars is pretty slick — electric drivetrains, carbon fiber-reinforced plastic bodywork and an innovative platform — it’s the design that is truly mesmerizing. BMW is making a push into more sustainable motoring with its new BMW “i” brand, and it therefore wanted something unique, something that stood out from everything else on the road. “This was a dream project in 2008,” vehicle exterior designer Richard Kim told us. “We had the opportunity to reinvent and redefine the car.” BMW was so serious about setting these cars apart from the pack that it housed Kim and the rest of the team working on the “i” cars in a separate studio. The designers were told to let their imaginations roam, and the concepts were born of a sketch competition. Although the i3 electric city car and i8 plug-in hybrid sports car represent a new direction for BMW, their styling clearly draws some cues from the automaker’s palette The electric i3 (shown above), also known as the “megacity vehicle,” is BMW’s riff on the city car. Though at first glance it may resemble other commuter vehicles, a few key features set it apart. The wheels are way out at the corners, allowing maximum interior space and great stability. They’re also tall and narrow, to minimize drag and maximize aerodynamic efficiency — imperative to maximizing range. The i3 resembles the X3. It features coach doors — lawyers and marketing types don’t like calling them suicide doors — where the rear doors open opposite of those up front. That makes getting in and out a snap. Extensive use of carbon fiber-reinforced plastic ensured the body was rigid enough to allow ditching the B-pillar that usually divides the front and rear doors. Although futuristic, the i3 is still very much a BMW, so it shares design cues with other models. The first is, of course, the kidney grilles, and the rondel on the hood. “It’s still a BMW, it’s still exciting,” Kim says. Two main lines define the shape of the car. The first starts below the wheel, goes under the door and shoots out the back. The second is the wedge line from the hood that curves up and over the windows and off the back end, a design Kim envisioned giving the feeling of moving forward. This signature BMW “streamflow” is the i Series’ answer to the normal BMW line. Out back, the bumper and the diffuser are combined into a single piece. This design also appears on the i8, but in a much more stylish manner. The dash is extremely lightweight and juts out, as if floating, and the interior appears roomy because the i3 lacks the transmission tunnel that bisects most cars. Whereas the i3 is a riff on a city car and therefore a bit, well, pedestrian, the i8 (shown above) is all about emotion. It evokes the 6-Series, and Kim called it the perfect balance of efficiency and emotion. That said, it shares similarities with the i3. Both were driven by aerodynamics, because half of the energy you need to go 55 mph is needed to simply push the air out of your way. But the i8 looks sleeker. Attribute that to the “air curtains” that direct air around the side of the car to the rear, which is highlighted by U-shaped taillights. The design gives the i8 a slick shape. The i8 has a sports car persona, low and wide with doors that open upward. It uses the same headlights as the i3, but has twice as many of them. The lights use laser technology, which BMW says have 1,000 times the intensity of LEDs and use half as much energy. The cars were able to be designed with so much freedom due to a structural and technical changes, said Rich Steinberg, manager of EV operations and strategy. Previous electric BMWs — the Active-E, based on the 1-Series coupe, and the Mini E, based on the Mini — simpy stuffed a motor, a battery and the associated electronics into an existing package. Effective, but crude. But the “i” cars were designed from the ground up as electric vehicles. That allowed the engineers to put the batteries low across the floor of the car, while stacking the motor and electronics in optimal locations. As to the specs, BMW says the motor in the i3 is good for 170 horsepower (peak) and 184 foot-pounds. Acceleration is acceptable for a city car, with 62 mph coming in less an 8 seconds. Top speed is limited to 93 mph, a move common among electric vehicles. All the hardware is mounted over the rear axle to maximize interior space. BMW is keeping mum on the battery specs but promises a range of 80 to 100 miles and says it can be recharged in about six hours, presumably at 220 volts. We’d guess the pack to be around 20 to 24 kilowatt-hours, similar to that of the Nissan Leaf. It’s also saying we might see a range-extended electric version much like the Chevrolet Volt. Such a vehicle would use a small gasoline engine to drive a generator to keep the car going when the battery wound down. The i8 is a plug-in hybrid, and BMW says it was designed for performance without sacrificing frugality. The same motor used in the i3 drives the front wheels of the i8, while a turbocharged three-cylinder engine good for 220 horsepower drives the rear wheels. Together they’ll propel the car to a claimed top speed of 155 mph. Look for the i8 to hit 62 mph in less than five seconds while consuming less than 3 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers. That’s 78 mpg here in the states. The i8 also can be driven under electric power alone for up to 20 miles. Although the two cars making the rounds of auto shows are concepts, the production cars will look much like the cars you see here. There won’t be nearly so much glass for safety reasons, Kim said, but the cars will still feature quite a bit of it. BMW says we can expect to see the i3 by the end of 2013 and the i8 the following year. No word on price, but BMW has said we could see the i3 priced below the 5-Series, which starts at around $47,000. Pricey, yes, especially compared to a car like the Nissan Leaf.
So I strolled along Park Lane yesterday and discovered that BMW have opened a showroom for the i3 and i8 just two doors down from the newely refurbished BMW dealership which neighbors the Mini dealership which itself was refurbished about 1-2 years ago. It's an amazing display on one of London's most prestigious streets. Impressively the showroom for the i3 and i8 isn't just a showroom but a dealership where the cars will be sold! It doesn't strike you that these cars will be on the roads until you see them and stand in the showroom hearing that people have put money down already. What amazed me was the skeleton of the i3. It's made out of carbon fiber reinforced plastic and feels a bit odd, sort of like a broom made out of hard plastic. The entire monoqoue is made out of the material, even the A and C-Pillars! It's very revolutionary specially since there isn't a B-Pillar, so BMW have a lot of faith in the material. It's a massive leap is automotive manufacturing. Given the lack of a transmission tunnel the floor across the entire car is amazingly clear and free with ample space for moudly Tupperware and smelly gym shoes The i3 cannot be charged in your good old familiar 230v wall outlet or a USB port, but BMW will need to come over to your home or work and installer a massive charger. The paradox is that the i3 will serve its purposes best in an urban setting, however most people living in urban areas don't have a house and some even have street parking. So I'm perplexed about how BMW are going to overcome this problematic in convenience. Needless to say, both the i8 and i3 are stunning and most importantly the use of plastic reinforced carbon fiber is a massive shift away from metal to high-end Fisher-Price materials for real roads. I wonder how Audi and Mercedes are going to respond because BMW is taking us to the future of automotive.
Absolutely, especially for the target market which is people working and living in the city who don't have a garage at home where they can install a massive charger. So it's a very early adopter product. I think plug-in hybrids will remain the viable choice until charging becomes more practical. I also wonder what charging such a beast over night 2-4 times a week will do for the electricity bill.
^This is the main problem with battery and charging technology at the moment, it's just nowhere near a viable alternative to a conventional combustion engined car. But it's definitely heading this way and I am willing to bet in the next 10 years they will have cracked it.
In Bay Area lot of large companies, malls, large parking garages and now even apartment buildings have electric charging stations. #mce_temp_url#. It is the same in LA - Link. And it is only going to grow exponentially - #mce_temp_url#
^thanks for share this info because to us Brits this just shows the gap between here and else where in the world.
What's so amazing about all these electric vehicles is that they use a resource that is completely free, has no polution, and doesn't create any greenhouse gases. Oh, does anybody have any idea where electricity comes from because I haven't the foggiest.
Very good. The rest of the world isn't Denmark though, and solar and wind power is certainly a mere fraction of the world's energy sources, most of which comes from fossil fuels or nuclear power.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_power_in_Germany ~ 10% on national level, on some local levels ~ 50%
LOL, you clearly haven't met Mr Negativity before have you? British slang, gotta love it? And either way, electricity is better than oil, whatever way it is produced. Nuclear electricity is freaking clean, ya know.....The only downside is those Greenpeace maniacs who mess with the transport of the nuclear waste. And another big upside of electricity is of course when we can finally say GOODBYE to those oil producing countries that mess with human rights and stuff, like Saudi Arabia and Iran.
Not to mention the fossil fuels being burned by tankers transporting that fuel out of those areas, plus the fossil fuels being burned by the naval vessels and airplanes required to patrol those shipping lanes and keep supplies safe. And there's additional energy being used to refine that crude oil, and fossil fuels being used by tanker trucks to distribute the fuel to the various gas stations. Many people don't realize the additional fossil fuel and energy required just to get that fuel into a form that can be used by automobiles, and overlook the health costs of that fossil fuel being burned that might otherwise not be burned.
There has been so many studies debunking this stupid crap that electric cars are in the end as bad as ICE cars cause of power plants it is not even funny. -Fossil fuel power plants are about twice as efficient as an ICE (33% to 50%, even 60% for combined cycle gas turbines vs 18-20% average efficiency for typical ICE). -The emissions from a few power plants is more easily and better treated than emissions from a million cars. -A few power plants can be more easily upgraded than a million cars as better technology becomes available. -Bulk of the power consumed by electric cars will be at at night during off peak hours. -ICE in a car rarily ever operate at it's maximum efficiency (RPM at which it makes most torque) where as a electric cars almost always operates at it's maximum efficiency. In California about 12% is Wind, Solar and Geothermal. And another 15% from Nuclear. In the US the break up is something like 55% coal, 9% natural gas 4 % oil. The other 32% is from nuclear plants, hydroelectric, solar, wind and geothermal. In France almost 80% is from Nuclear plants.
I'm all for an alternative to oil. Plugging your car into a wall socket and using electicity isn't the answer.
We do have the odd charging station and parking spot for electric cars in London for the G-Wiz. However I doubt that it and the i3 have the same battery specifications, let alone charging plug. That's an area where the car manufacturers need to come together. I also forgot to mention that the i-showroom is where Lexus had its dealership and the i8 sits where a glorious Lexus LFA was on display not too long ago.
