[Aye-eight]

     Featured on BIMMERPOST.com

This past weekend, I finally took my i8 on two 200-mile trips through Germany. I've been waiting a long time (8 months, 6000 miles) to finally "give it the beans", as James May would put it.

This car is so much fun when let loose! It pulls amazingly well still at higher speeds. Flooring it at 100+ mph and feeling it go until it maxes out at 158 mph is amazing. So is the sound - artificially enhanced or not. The car is very well planted, but still nimble. You can feel that it's light and agile, like a proper sports car should be.

You can tell the the whole engine management is just very carefully and purosefully designed. At max speed, the ICE is right around its top rpm in top gear. To maintain top speed, the car seems to draw about 1 kWh per 100 km. So it seems to need just a tick of help from the electric motor to stay up there. But no worries, at this rate, you run out of gas before you run out of charge.

Accelerating hard and long does drain the battery quite a bit as the electric motor adds all its power to the pull. But then again, as soon as you coast or have to brake - which happens quite a bit as you constantly come flying up on people - you recouperate electric charge substantially. As long as I had some charge in my battery at the outset, I did not have a problem maintaining enough charge for the boost throughout the journey.

What is quite amazing is the difference in fuel consumption between Comfort and Sport modes. At constant highway speed, on a flat stretch, switching from Sport to Comfort cuts your instantaneous fuel consumption reading almost in half! Which means using Sports mode to recharge the batteries is actually quite expensive.

But using this cleverly, you can stretch your fuel quite far. I used Sports mode only if I had open road and could really cover some ground. If there was traffic or speed limits, I used Comfort. This way, I managed to get about 26 mpg (US) for a trip where I put the pedal to the metal whenever possible. I think that's actually quite impressive. My Porsche would have given me about half that figure with the same kind of driving. And I don't think it would have been any faster; other than the few moments here and there where I could go flat-out for a number of minutes and the Porsche would have just pulled away past the 160 mph mark.

In summary, being in Dr. Jekyll mode in daily driving and chasing max. e-range, I'm quite impressed with the Mr. Hyde side of things as well. What a car!

[YWGT3]

Originally Posted by Aye-eight

This past weekend, I finally took my i8 on two 200-mile trips through Germany. I've been waiting a long time (8 months, 6000 miles) to finally "give it the beans", as James May would put it.

This car is so much fun when let loose! It pulls amazingly well still at higher speeds. Flooring it at 100+ mph and feeling it go until it maxes out at 158 mph is amazing. So is the sound - artificially enhanced or not. The car is very well planted, but still nimble. You can feel that it's light and agile, like a proper sports car should be.

You can tell the the whole engine management is just very carefully and purosefully designed. At max speed, the ICE is right around its top rpm in top gear. To maintain top speed, the car seems to draw about 1 kWh per 100 km. So it seems to need just a tick of help from the electric motor to stay up there. But no worries, at this rate, you run out of gas before you run out of charge.

Accelerating hard and long does drain the battery quite a bit as the electric motor adds all its power to the pull. But then again, as soon as you coast or have to brake - which happens quite a bit as you constantly come flying up on people - you recouperate electric charge substantially. As long as I had some charge in my battery at the outset, I did not have a problem maintaining enough charge for the boost throughout the journey.

What is quite amazing is the difference in fuel consumption between Comfort and Sport modes. At constant highway speed, on a flat stretch, switching from Sport to Comfort cuts your instantaneous fuel consumption reading almost in half! Which means using Sports mode to recharge the batteries is actually quite expensive.

But using this cleverly, you can stretch your fuel quite far. I used Sports mode only if I had open road and could really cover some ground. If there was traffic or speed limits, I used Comfort. This way, I managed to get about 26 mpg (US) for a trip where I put the pedal to the metal whenever possible. I think that's actually quite impressive. My Porsche would have given me about half that figure with the same kind of driving. And I don't think it would have been any faster; other than the few moments here and there where I could go flat-out for a number of minutes and the Porsche would have just pulled away past the 160 mph mark.

In summary, being in Dr. Jekyll mode in daily driving and chasing max. e-range, I'm quite impressed with the Mr. Hyde side of things as well. What a car!

Thanks for the vicarious moment and for sharing your top end experience which, unfortunately, isn't the legally permissible on long stretches of public roads here in the U.S.

[ChiTownM]

How do u like the steering......I sometimes feel that the steering is a bit light and needs correction during mid speed highway runs. Could u tell difference in the steering between sport and comfort?

[Baron UK]

Originally Posted by ChiTownM

How do u like the steering......I sometimes feel that the steering is a bit light and needs correction during mid speed highway runs. Could u tell difference in the steering between sport and comfort?

I had a track day in an i8 recently and I loved it. The harder you push the flatter she seems. I get the whole jekyll n hyde thing.

Cannot see me giving this beaut up for a long long time. Besotted I be

[wanesso]

Originally Posted by ChiTownM

How do u like the steering......I sometimes feel that the steering is a bit light and needs correction during mid speed highway runs. Could u tell difference in the steering between sport and comfort?

I've felt this too---the car, the steering, responsiveness are so incredibly light it's almost scary----I'd like to push it on the track and find the limits----totally different feel than the V8M3

[wanesso]

Originally Posted by Aye-eight

This past weekend, I finally took my i8 on two 200-mile trips through Germany. I've been waiting a long time (8 months, 6000 miles) to finally "give it the beans", as James May would put it.

This car is so much fun when let loose! It pulls amazingly well still at higher speeds. Flooring it at 100+ mph and feeling it go until it maxes out at 158 mph is amazing. So is the sound - artificially enhanced or not. The car is very well planted, but still nimble. You can feel that it's light and agile, like a proper sports car should be.

You can tell the the whole engine management is just very carefully and purosefully designed. At max speed, the ICE is right around its top rpm in top gear. To maintain top speed, the car seems to draw about 1 kWh per 100 km. So it seems to need just a tick of help from the electric motor to stay up there. But no worries, at this rate, you run out of gas before you run out of charge.





Accelerating hard and long does drain the battery quite a bit as the electric motor adds all its power to the pull. But then again, as soon as you coast or have to brake - which happens quite a bit as you constantly come flying up on people - you recouperate electric charge substantially. As long as I had some charge in my battery at the outset, I did not have a problem maintaining




enough charge for the boost throughout the journey.

What is quite amazing is the difference in fuel consumption between Comfort and Sport modes. At constant highway speed, on a flat stretch, switching from Sport to Comfort cuts your instantaneous fuel consumption reading almost in half! Which means using Sports mode to recharge the batteries is actually quite expensive.

But using this cleverly, you can stretch your fuel quite far. I used Sports mode only if I had open road and could really cover some ground. If there was traffic or speed limits, I used Comfort. This way, I managed to get about 26 mpg (US) for a trip where I put the pedal to the metal whenever possible. I think that's actually quite impressive. My Porsche would have given me about half that figure with the same kind of driving. And I don't think it would have been any faster; other than the few moments here and there where I could go flat-out for a number of minutes and the Porsche would have just pulled away past the 160 mph mark.

In summary, being in Dr. Jekyll mode in daily driving and chasing max. e-range, I'm quite impressed with the Mr. Hyde side of things as well. What a car!

WOW!!

[Aye-eight]

Originally Posted by ChiTownM

How do u like the steering......I sometimes feel that the steering is a bit light and needs correction during mid speed highway runs. Could u tell difference in the steering between sport and comfort?

At high speeds, I thought it really firmed up. The car wanted to be told to take a turn, but then did so with precision and conviction.

I didn't really notice a difference in steering feel between Comfort and Sport. But maybe it's because I'd use the different modes at very different speeds. Comfort, when I was cruising with traffic at 80-100 mph. Sport, when I had open road and did 140 to flat out. Will try to observe next time.

Light-weight and firmly set up cars will often have a tendency to follow grooves in the road, so it feels like they need correction. But to me, it's just "road feel".

[Aye-eight]

Originally Posted by wanesso

I've felt this too---the car, the steering, responsiveness are so incredibly light it's almost scary----I'd like to push it on the track and find the limits----totally different feel than the V8M3

I think you would expect the two to feel very different - they're very different setups:

1) The i8 is about 200 lbs lighter. Think about having or not having uncle Bubba sitting next to you on every fast lap.

2) The i8 is AWD in Sport, and gets about 1/3 of its power and almost half its torque delivered to the front wheels. That alone will make for very different handling.

3) Due to the electric motors, power delivery feels different.

4) The i8 has a lower center of gravity and different chassis construction, the the suspension setup will be different.

To me, the i8 feels more similar to a Cayman S (granted, not 4WD) or other mid-engined cars, albeit with a bit more oomph and less top speed.

[wanesso]

Originally Posted by Aye-eight

I think you would expect the two to feel very different - they're very different setups:

1) The i8 is about 200 lbs lighter. Think about having or not having uncle Bubba sitting next to you on every fast lap.

2) The i8 is AWD in Sport, and gets about 1/3 of its power and almost half its torque delivered to the front wheels. That alone will make for very different handling.

3) Due to the electric motors, power delivery feels different.

4) The i8 has a lower center of gravity and different chassis construction, the the suspension setup will be different.

To me, the i8 feels more similar to a Cayman S (granted, not 4WD) or other mid-engined cars, albeit with a bit more oomph and less top speed.

Have you compared it to the R8? Would seem to have a few similarities.

[Aye-eight]

Originally Posted by wanesso

Have you compared it to the R8? Would seem to have a few similarities.

That could be very interesting. Maybe my boss will let me drive his.