[vlvte90]

     Featured on BIMMERPOST.com

Considering leasing an i3 in SoCal for commuting purposes...and because I wouldn't be caught dead in a Prius. Anyway, my commute would be about 140 miles round trip,5 days a week. With the range extender i3, would it be able to make the trip? Don't mind filling up the 2cyl each way either.

[Epirali]

Originally Posted by vlvte90

Considering leasing an i3 in SoCal for commuting purposes...and because I wouldn't be caught dead in a Prius. Anyway, my commute would be about 140 miles round trip,5 days a week. With the range extender i3, would it be able to make the trip? Don't mind filling up the 2cyl each way either.

If you are willing to stop and fill up that shouldn't be an issue. Count on maybe 70 miles electric, and after you have coded the car to be able to use the entire content of your fuel tank you may get another 70 miles on Rex. But that would mean daily fill ups.

Also this assumes you are probably driving 60-65, not 75 mph on freeway.

[afadeev]

Originally Posted by vlvte90

Considering leasing an i3 in SoCal for commuting purposes...and because I wouldn't be caught dead in a Prius. Anyway, my commute would be about 140 miles round trip,5 days a week. With the range extender i3, would it be able to make the trip? Don't mind filling up the 2cyl each way either.

140 miles each way, on a highway, with AC ON, is really pushing your luck.
Expect ~70 miles off full batteries, then another ~55 miles off REX until it empties 1.9 gallon tank. Then you have to refill the gas tank before you reach your destination.

Mileage would increase as speeds drop. But even under ideal circumstances you would need to drive w/out AC, or seat heaters, or headlights to extract 140 nonstop miles out of a REX.

I would say you need to shop for another car.

a

[vlvte90]

Originally Posted by afadeev

140 miles each way, on a highway, with AC ON, is really pushing your luck.
Expect ~70 miles off full batteries, then another ~55 miles off REX until it empties 1.9 gallon tank. Then you have to refill the gas tank before you reach your destination.

Mileage would increase as speeds drop. But even under ideal circumstances you would need to drive w/out AC, or seat heaters, or headlights to extract 140 nonstop miles out of a REX.

I would say you need to shop for another car.

a

Would be 70 miles each way.

[vlvte90]

Originally Posted by Epirali

If you are willing to stop and fill up that shouldn't be an issue. Count on maybe 70 miles electric, and after you have coded the car to be able to use the entire content of your fuel tank you may get another 70 miles on Rex. But that would mean daily fill ups.

Also this assumes you are probably driving 60-65, not 75 mph on freeway.

Could you explain what exactly the coding would do? I understand non European vehicles can't turn on the generator manually. Is that what the coding feature enables?

[Epirali]

Originally Posted by vlvte90

Could you explain what exactly the coding would do? I understand non European vehicles can't turn on the generator manually. Is that what the coding feature enables?

There are two things you would want:

1) Coding allows the i3 w/Rex to use the ENTIRE fuel tank for Rex, rather than artificially leaving almost 1/3 of the tank unused for US regulation. This increases your full tank Rex range by quite a bit (so definitely do that),

2) The other as you said is the "Hold State of Charge" which lets you manually turn on the Rex on demand. This wouldn't be as useful to you, but you could try to save your battery for stop/go traffic vs highway cruising, etc.

[jadnashuanh]

Modern cars are rolling computers. BMW customizes many options by region to conform to the local laws and expectations of the respective area where the vehicle is sold. To save a lot of money, most of these things can be changed with software changes, verses requiring numerous different versions of hardware. So, while not supported by BMW (they specifically state that the OBD port is for BMW use only, and you need to use it to reprogram the car), many people customize their vehicle so that the default options are more to their liking. The i3 is no different than other BMW's in that respect. While many of the software switches would or should never be touched, there are still probably many dozens that people may wish to tweak in the thousands available in the software. There are forums where you can download the required pc software to accomplish this, and info on where you can buy the required cables and interfaces (none of this is expensive, but some of the files are huge - not counting the learning curve to figure it all out). There are some people that do this as a sideline, and some can accomplish it from remote control to your car if you network a laptop and have the proper connection to it. Keep in mind that for the most part, if you car goes in for service and it requires a software update, it generally erases any changes you may have made, and restores the factory defaults, requiring you to redo any changes (and maybe need to get newer data files to make it happen).

[afadeev]

Originally Posted by vlvte90

Would be 70 miles each way.

Then it's a totally different ball game.
Your primary concern now is whether you can recharge the batteries at the end-point of your commute.

If your commute destination (work?) has an L2 charger available, you have nothing to worry about and either BEV or REX will work (I would still go with REX for extra margin of error). If no L2 charger, go to chargepoint.com web site and see if there are any public charging stations nearby. Finally, you can request that a new L2 charger be installed for you either by singing the green song at your workplace, or requesting an install via ChargePoint, or just buying the hardware and installing it yourself.

a

[Epirali]

Another though: you are looking at a lease with a LOT of miles per year, is that wise?

[nicknaz]

slightly off topic, but where do you guys get the latest residual and money factor for the i3 leases?

The other forums have a pricing/ask a dealer section where this is posted as a sticky, but this doesn't seem to be the case with i3

[afadeev]

Originally Posted by Epirali

Another though: you are looking at a lease with a LOT of miles per year, is that wise?

At this point, NOT buying an i3 is wise. Period.
There is no active secondary market for these cars just yet, and given the tepid sub-1K/month sales, there may not be one for years to come. I would not want to own the depreciation risk for these cars at any price.

Historically, BMW FS charges $0.20/mile for excess mileage on leased cars. If you pre-buy miles before lease termination and pay in advance (solicitations to do so will flood in about 6 months before lease termination date), they throw in a 20% discount, so your effective excess mileage cost is $0.16/mile. Given my marginal electricity cost of charging the car at ~$0.02/mile, I will do that all day any day.

If you run the #s, the effective cost of getting a lease with larger per year mileage allotment (12K or 15K vs. 10K) ends up costing between $0.12-0.14/mile. However, you have to max out that allotment, else any miles you under-drive are lost. Basically, pre-buying a larger lease allotment is only worth it if you are SURE you will drive those miles. Else, stick with paying $0.16/mile at the end.

Originally Posted by nicknaz

slightly off topic, but where do you guys get the latest residual and money factor for the i3 leases?

The other forums have a pricing/ask a dealer section where this is posted as a sticky, but this doesn't seem to be the case with i3

Mostly from other people pricing out their leases, and sharing the particulars on these boards. Unfortunately, there aren't enough i3's sold in the US, so the information flow is more of a trickle.

As of this May (BMW refreshes financing terms on 2-months cycle, so the #s below were good for May-June), my '14 REX had the following lease terms:
REX Residuals 24-month 30-month 36-month
10K/year ....... 63% ....... 58% ....... 53%
12K/year ....... 62% ....... 57% ....... 52%
15K/year ....... 60% ....... 55% ....... 50%


MY'14 & MY'15 residuals were the same in May, buy sales subsidies were significantly more aggressive on MY'14 cars.
BMW NA has been incrementally increasing residuals over the past 12 months to spur sales, so I would not be surprised if they bump them up again in the future.

a