Backup camera for bmw i3 ad no free#
They all have warranties out to 48 months, and the first 36 months includes free dealer service, including inspection stickers. But most owners charge at home, or at work, if they are lucky enough to have an enlightened employer.īuying a used i3 REX is a totally valid option. These will fully charge a depleted battery in about 40 minutes. I do live in an area with a handful of available high-amperage DC chargers. And it comes pretty close to beating a Tesla, from range-anxiety point of view. That beats a Chevy Bolt or a Nissan Leaf, as far as I'm concerned. I rarely use gas, but it's nice to know that I can. But it has neutralized range anxiety with the backup gasoline power. I have now "test driven" over 20K miles, and I am sold. If you test drive this car, you will want one. And I will be putting on Nokain R3 winter tires on my 2018 this winter, both for winter safety, but also to save the tread on the summer tires.Īgain if you hate buying tires, and you want to own this car, then drive gently, corner reasonably, and avoid jack-rabbit starts. In the end, the dealer who accepted the car at the end of the lease commented on the worn rear tires, but let it pass, ultimately.Īnd I am okay with buying new tires, if I have to. But then I realized that it is a high-performance car, and the rear-wheel drive dynamics do put a lot of stress on the rear tires. (there are two other companies that make winter tires for the i3, but only in the 19" rim size).Īt first, when I realized I might have to buy new tires on the 2017 that I turned in, with about 18000 miles, I was a tad upset. As a consequence, there is only one company that manufactures that tire size for all-season tires.
It is a very odd tire size, and no other car on the planet uses that size. if that bothers you, stay away from this car. You have the option of "buying out" the car at the end of the lease, but I suspect that nobody does that, either, because the pre-determined 'residual value' is set at an artificially high level, in order to decrease the monthly lease payments.īut because they are so fun to drive, the tires will wear out. Particularly if you are buying at the end of the model year. With some effort, you can lease one for less than $300 per month. The pundits don't seem to grasp that virtually nobody BUYS a new i3. As if that is what you really have to pay. People get hung up on the list price of the car. Try driving a Chevy Bolt or Nissan Leaf 650 miles in 13 hours. This is not ideal, but it is possible, if you don't want to find chargers. But none of our routine drives are more than 75 miles, and we have a level 2 charger in our garage at home.Īs an experiment, I once drove round-trip 650 miles in one day, to visit my daughter at college, using frequent gas fillups. This car is not for everybody, of course. Highway driving is okay, but sketchy on days when there is a strong crosswind. It is particularly fun and zippy around town. So, we will now have a 2019 model, with the larger battery pack. Now that the lease is up on the 2017 model, we got a nice promotional offer from a New England dealer, and took them up on it. From 2018 on, all i3's now have the integrated camera, and it is a good one.
We have had short-lease ownership of both a 2017 and a 2018 model, They are virtually identical, with the main difference being that the 2017 did not have the backup camera.