Meeting a BMW i3 for the first time

Published by lucy rigley on

A bit about how we are able to make eco-friendly family road trip. The lovely Motor Vision who picked me as one of their 2018 Motor Vision Award winners are sponsoring me and Best Car Finder helped arrange a BMW i3 supplied by Vines Group BMW Mini for us to do our 2 week journey in. Thank you to all the sponsors!

The best shot we could get of the small one!

Thanks to a lovely lady in the next village to where we live, we had a tour of her 2019 i3 and I’m now much more equipped for when we get the i3 at the end of July for our trip. What is unusual about our trip (and why I hope you’ll be following it) is that we are only going to have the car for a few days before setting off over 1000 miles in 2 weeks with 2 kids. Eek!

Having a tour around the i3 and getting some handy hints has definitely helped me worry less about the trip. The BMW i3 seems a fantastic, comfortable family electric car and I’m looking forward to driving it.

Looking round the interior of an i3

So let me tell you what I’m excited about:

The one pedal driving! We have an automatic car which is apparently a great help in driving an Electric Car. There is a pedal but there is no need for it – it runs a bit like a dodgem car in that if you take your foot off the accelerator gradually it goes slower until you take your foot off altogether and you come to a full stop.

The Sat Nav and entertainment system. I’m used to DAB radio and no integrated Sat Nav and I’ve heard great things about the BMW i3’s system. I do think that it may take a bit of getting used to in terms of using the control – it’s where the gear stick would normally be! You turn it on, into reverse etc on the steering wheel!

The clever computer which tells you how much speed you have left, as well as speed etc!
To the left you can see the sat nav and entertainment system.

Charging – although I’m slightly nervous about this too now I’ve seen it being charged it is much less confusing. There is a large and small plug in the car in the same place you’d put your fuel in on an ICE (Internal Combustion Engine) car – we don’t have to worry about the small one as that’s for certain chargers and they’d have that cable attached to them – one less cable to take around!

The i3’s charge point – just like a diesel or petrol car’s except so much easier – no fuel spillage!

What is going to take a while to get used to:

The back doors. What is brilliant is that for our kids it will be so easy for them to get in and out of, BUT the back doors cannot be opened unless the front doors are open too. And as the front passenger’s seatbelts are attached to the back doors, it could get a bit confusing as which order to do things.

Getting to grips with the seatbelt

The small boot! Sorry I’m still worried about fitting all our new things in – I even bought a new canvas bag so we don’t have to put suitcases in!

Silent engine. We were told that what is strange at first is not hearing the gears change – in our auto we can hear it when it goes up gears so know roughly when we’re doing 30 etc. However in an electric car there is no such indication- it’s pretty silent and there are no gears to change. We’re going to have to keep an eye on the speed!




1 Comment

Matthew Sweetapple · June 28, 2019 at 11:47 am

Will you all fit in it? :-)

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *