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The BMW i8 is a kind of black sheep of the brand of the German manufacturer "i". When BMW launched the i3, we thought they would make "BMW i" a 100% electric brand, but instead they opted for the BMW i8 as a hybrid plug-in.
It was disappointing, but to be fair to BMW, it's still the "most electric" roadster / coupe on the market years later. It is being upgraded this year with a little more battery capacity and a convertible version.
So we decided to try it. Here is our review:
BMW i8 Roadster Design
I am told that it is a polarizing design. Some hate him and some like him.
I certainly fall into the second category.
The car seems superb. I was not completely on board with the original BMW i8 because I thought it had too much "electric design accents," like the BMW i3, but I think that They have smoothed some of these during the latest design updates. much easier to get on board with the design.
They also made specific improvements to the roadster version, which, in my opinion, is even better than the coupe.
BMW has lent us a 'copper' and I do not remember having ever seen a vehicle of this specific color. I do not hate him.
Here is our video review of the BMW i8 Roadster with some great pictures from our videographer Scott Buscemi to help you get a good idea of the design:
BMW i8 Roadster Driving Experience
I had a lot of fun driving the BMW i8 Roadster. It is an ideal car for a relaxing weekend or fun on winding roads.
And speaking of winding roads, we fully exploited the canyon routes around Malibu, where it was fun to drive.
The car handles well and feels comfortable even with aggressive steering, but it also feels a little underpowered for a sports car.
In my opinion, BMW has not been able to take advantage of the benefits of an electric power train – especially with regard to instant torque.
You can feel the delay of the gas engine when you press the throttle for any kind of relatively aggressive acceleration. This is understandable with only a 105 kW / 143 hp electric motor and a small 3 cylinder engine, but that's not what you would expect from a car that looks like this.
The performance aside, it's really good to drive the wheel in the BMW i8 Roadster.
BMW i8 Roadster range, efficiency and load
At 69 MPGe, the BMW i8 is certainly effective for a sports car, but not very effective for an electric car.
With the release of the new Roadster version, BMW has updated the powertrain of the i8 with a larger battery (11.6 kWh, instead of 7 kWh).
It makes a decent difference.
At the launch, they claimed a range of 53 km with this new battery pack, which powers a 105 kW / 143 hp electric motor driving the front wheels, while a three-cylinder gasoline engine with BMW TwinPower Turbo propels the rear wheels for an all-wheel drive system.
The actual range of the EPA is only 17 km and the system of the car we tested had a full range of 22 km.
It's not bad on paper.
Technically, many people can only move with the power supply, especially if they have a charger at work (the BMW i8 only has an integrated charger 7 kW, but it is sufficient if you have a battery of about 12 kWh). However, the problem is that the gas engine often comes into action during strong acceleration.
Therefore, it is very difficult to drive the BMW i8 with a power supply only, unless you want to drive like your grandmother.
Nevertheless, we are only talking about switching to "power badistance" mode for short periods.
If you drive the car most of the time in increments of about 20 miles, which, believe it or not, is the way most people drive on a daily basis and make refills between two trips, you can potentially go for months with a single tank of gasoline.
That said, I can not help but think: why not go all electric?
BMW i8 Roadster Conclusion
And that's the main advantage I had to drive the BMW i8: make it all electric. It would be a perfect car to be all electric.
To be fair to BMW, it's the most electric sports car on the market. You have to give them that.
Today, many electric vehicles are powerful, but they do not really look like sports cars. The BMW i8 certainly seems part of it.
Some are coming, but BMW has been here for years.
My main problem here is that it seems that making the i8 100% electric would only make it better. The car only showed a range of about 200 km with a full of gasoline. The EPA actually says a full range of 320 miles.
If the question of distance concerned him when deciding to make the i8 a hybrid plug-in, it makes no sense because you could have obtained a longer battery life with something like a battery of 80 kWh.
At the high end, it would have provided more power to the front electric motor and you could replace the gasoline engine with a second electric motor.
I do not want to take anything away from the BMW engineers, because it's really an impressive powertrain, but look how complex it is:
I can not help thinking that it would have been better to create a more twin-engine platform with a bigger battery.
The cost should not be too much of a problem either. The vehicle starts at about $ 150,000 – with the Roadster version with a bonus of $ 15,000.
I think the price would be more justifiable if it came with a fully electric powertrain, which would undoubtedly lead to superior performance.
It was rumored that BMW is killing the i3 and i8 programs before the next generation of electric vehicles.
I really do not want them to kill the BMW i8. It's too cool of a car for that. I just want them to make it all electric.
What do you think? Let us know in the comment section below.
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