i3 Do Like To Be Beside The Seaside - BMW i3 Range Extender Road Test

The BMW i3 is the Munich marque's interpretation the future of urban motoring will look. It's packed with clever little details and impressive tech, as highlighted in my previous post on the i3, BMW's city car for the future aims to be compact, quiet and sustainable, all while still retaining the driving dynamics their customers have come to expect. Powered by an electric motor driving the rear wheels, supplemented by an optional 2-cylinder petrol range-extender engine, it straddles the divide between the past and the future.

Thanks to this, the i3 has the snappy, instant power response you'd expect from a pure EV. Combined with the range extender, it has a comfortable quoted range of 150 miles. Around town, you'd have to neglect charging the thing for a couple of days before needing the extra capacity afforded by the petrol motor, so that extra range opens up the possibility of venturing beyond the city walls.

The i3 - breaking the barrier between then and now.

Which is why, when Eastern BMW let me take one out for the day, I decided to first head out of town, to the seaside, to show this very new interpretation of what a car can be some very old roads.

First impressions from the driving seat - and I mean to get this trope out of the way early - this car is electric. Both literally and figuratively.

The power delivery is predictably smooth, with the electric motor's 250Nm of torque and the equivalent of around 180bhp available from standing, That power constantly at the disposal of your right foot, and the sharp, city-oriented steering, whilst slightly lacking the sensitivity of a traditional mechanical system, still manages to engage the driver when the going gets twisty. On the hotch-potch A- and B-roads to the northwest of Edinburgh, the i3 revealed it still has plenty BMW tricks from up it's sleeve.

Take your foot off the accelerator whilst moving and you'll find the BMW slows rapidly thanks to regenerative braking, which takes excess kinetic energy and turns it back into useful juice for the car's lithium-ion batteries. To begin with it's strange, but quickly becomes second nature, and adds to the dollops of smoothness the i3 supplies. In normal driving, you almost forget that there's a brake pedal, but it's nice to know that it's there.

Charging points are becoming more widespread,
meaning the i3's usefulness looks set to increase.

South Queensferry, my first destination, clings tightly to the southern shores of the Firth of Forth. Here, the gradient drops sharply down to water level, and the town's winding, cobbled, and often single-file streets are as good a place as any to give the i3 a quite literal shakedown.

The i3's agility shines through in these sections, much more so than the somewhat upright profile suggests. BMW uses a combination of lightweight carbon fibre and clever positioning of the heavy batteries in the floor of the car to preserve giving it that desired low centre of gravity.

The little i3 copes well over cobbles, and draws many a gaze.

Thankfully, lightness doesn't mean compromise in the structure; carbon fibre's other strengh in building car body's is its, er, strength. Outside noise is dampened easily,  and even wind noise only begins to penetrate the cabin at motorway speeds. Impressive, considering the lack of engine note to drown it out.

Over the cobblestones of Queensferry's 17th century high street the i3 kept it's composure It rides firmly, but more so in a sporty way than in a bone-shattering race-ready manner. Even on ancient surfaces like this, rattling and shoogling is almost imperceptable, whilst the i3's tiny footprint and abrupt, ever-ready responsiveness meant it navigated the tight spaces of South Queensferry with ease.

Looking northward, across the Firth of Forth, it's impossible not to notice the bridges - each a monument to progression in personal transportation. Since the 11th century, South Queensferry was the port from where ferries crossed the water to Fife.

In the 19th century came the railways, and with them, the magnificent cantilever bridge that jumps to mind every time the place is mentioned. The speed and ease of rail travel soon saw it become the method of choice for those crossing the Forth.

In the trains' wake came the growth of  car ownership, and with increasing numbers of people taking to the roads, the Forth Road bridge, which opened in 1964, replacing the ferry altogether. It's swooping cables dangle the roadway high above the water, whilst the carriageway itself appears to lead straight into oblivion on days when the haar descends.

"My other car is a bridge."
Erm, what?

Beyond the road bridge, the parapets that will soon carry the future crossing tower high in the air. I sit in the BMW and gaze out at these three monuments of transportation tech progression. Each one overtook the chosen method of the age that came before it.

In a sense the i3 is something of a kindred spirit to the innovation that has taken place on these shores. It is a statement of intent from BMW - a 'look at what we can do' showcase, combining the best of economy motoring whilst managing not to dilute the driving experience people have flocked to the company for decades in search of.

It's BMW sticking its neck out, parading in a manner much the same as the rail bridge must have seemed to upon it's completion in 1890. These are very different times to the industrial revolution that spawned the bridge however, and today's revolution comes with it's own, more personable monuments.

The styling is definitely eye-catching - the i3 somehow turned more heads than a gleaming, red Ferrari 488 that burbled 'neath the gala bunting. As I passed through Edinburgh's orbital villages, people would stop and turn, perhaps taken as much by the looks as perturbed by the eerie silence that accompanies the i3 in electric only mode - a silence which became all the more obvious when I pulled up at traffic lights very exuberantly enjoying the Harman Kardon audio.

Sustainable materials, and excellent audio
from a car that's virtually silent.

Heading back towards Auld Reekie, a brief stint on the M8 revealed the i3 to be a comfortable motorway cruiser, though this is hardly it's natural habitat. Realistically, this is a capability of the i3 that will be tested only in short bursts, but one that is important for BMW to get right. Many large cities have an interconnecting system of ring-roads and bypasses, allowing a quick slingshot from one end of town to the other, and no doubt these will be utilised by the majority of i3 owners.

Edinburgh is a notoriously difficult city to drive in at the best of times - seemingly endless roadworks combine with an archaic criss-crossing of one way streets and legions of irate cabbies, meaning a degree of 'elbows out' driving is necessary. Scything into Corstorphine, I switched the i3 from Comfort mode to EcoPro+, which dampens the throttle response and ups the regenerative braking to conserve range. Whilst not entirely corking the car's teeth, this does have a noticable effect behind the wheel, taking a touch of zing out of the i3's get-up-and-go at the lights.

Maneuverability is a bonus in Edinburgh, something the i3 has in droves. BMW have had the foresight to bless the car with a teeny turning circle of just 9.86m. This proved ideal when, spotting a parking space outside a boutique cafe near Murrayfield, I was able to quickly wheech the car round and nab it before it was filled.

Fitting in well: slick steering and suicide doors
 add to the i3's city credentials.

Here, parked up amongst the bright leaves and chic hatchbacks of the suburbs, the i3 blends in well. It's well suited in the grey the example I drove wore, and the glossy surfaces and contrasting tones give it that multi-layered effect that sells the Minis, DS3s and 500s of this world in their millions.

i3 has the looks to take on more traditional city cars.

It's these details that build awareness and draw people in, and BMW's fine tooth comb has been run over the interior as well. Not only are all the materials lightweight, but sustainable, too. The dash is made from a mixture of kenaf fibres, extracted from a mallow plant which coverts more CO2 into oxygen during it's growth than most other plants, and intersected with swooping wood cut from fast-growing eucalyptus trees. Sitting in the olive-tanned leather seats stuffed with pure new wool, you really get a sense for the huge amount of thought that's gone into this fairly small car.

Pointing the i3 eastward, I pop it back into Comfort mode, ready for the sudden ducking and diving vital to survive a drive through Edinburgh City Centre. Cutting through Haymarket, even the tram lines don't manage to unsettle it, and progress is speedy as I head towards Charlotte Square.

Will it be long until this sight becomes commonplace in cities?

Sleuthing along one of the New Town's secretive alleys, the i3 feels sturdy, safe, at home. It should contrast these streets violently, the clashing of ancient and futuristic rarely easy to stomach.

And yet it doesn't.

Edinburgh is a city that has stood the test of time. Creeping between it's monuments, along ancient cobblestones, you can almost see the city move from one era to the next, changing with the seasons but still holding on to what makes it what it is at it's core.

It's a neat trick to pull, and I'm pretty convinced BMW has managed it with the i3. Wherever I took it, and whatever I threw at it, it remained prescient that the i3 is a BMW as much as an M3 is.

Think of it as a West Highland Terrier, with the M3 as BMW's Greyhound. Yes, the greyhound is much faster and bigger, but the terrier is compact and far suited to the cramped environs of the city. And day-to-day, the wee Westie's just as energetic and fun a companion to live with.