Electric Vehicles: General topics

Eric said:
Yeah it's a 2026. My wife is wishing she had gotten a hybrid now but it's a little late for that. We'll see where we're at in 3 years on both the X5 and the i4, the X5 has the driver assist package and that's a huge thing for me on these long trips, I regret not opting for it on the i4 but had no idea how much better it is than the Tesla or I would've pushed for it.
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First commute in the new car today. About 20 miles, half on 85, half on 280, and a short amount on regular streets. I let the BMW drive itself for 90% of that. Went great. It never tried to crash me into the divider, and it didn’t randomly break for tree shadows. On the regular streets it wasn’t as useful, but that’s fine.

It also did a great job automatically parking in our garage at work. Did a little back/forward/back deal to back into the spot without any intervention other than clicking the button to start it.

The funny thing is my daughter didn’t notice my hands were hardly ever on the wheel :-)
 
Citysnaps said:
I didn't notice the misspelling. I thought a car braking for tree shadows was pretty funny. It would be a long wait for them to get out of the way. :)
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This was actually a reference to a situation where it appeared a tesla mistook a tree shadow as some sort of obstacle, and veered left across a lane of traffic and crashed into a tree (at least that’s what it looked like to some of us from the video). So it’s both funny, and kind of sad.
 
Cmaier said:
First commute in the new car today. About 20 miles, half on 85, half on 280, and a short amount on regular streets. I let the BMW drive itself for 90% of that. Went great. It never tried to crash me into the divider, and it didn’t randomly break for tree shadows. On the regular streets it wasn’t as useful, but that’s fine.

It also did a great job automatically parking in our garage at work. Did a little back/forward/back deal to back into the spot without any intervention other than clicking the button to start it.

The funny thing is my daughter didn’t notice my hands were hardly ever on the wheel :-)
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My wife actually uses it because it's so friendly and she hated it on the Tesla because it scared her, I think mostly because it's so rigid as to where it feels more organic with the BMW.

Mixed results on the auto parking, on the i4 it nailed it a couple of times but the X5 nearly sideswiped a car while parallel parking and I had to slam on the brakes.
 
I meant to add, but will make it a separate post:

We've had a PHEV for 4+ years as well, so I understand the pros/cons, and we almost pulled the trigger on an X5 50e (the X5 platform PHEV), before we decided on the iX. My previous post was just pointing out the other side of the coin, since there's some terrific positives too!

PHEV PROS
  • No "range anxiety" since it can fall back to ICE only mode
  • Can run on electric only like a BEV (so can be cost effective, quiet - but also see below, i.e., electric range)
  • Electric + ICE provides excellent power and efficiency
  • Some offer V2x like functionality
PHEV CONS
  • Retains the extra complexity and maintenance (ex: oil changes) of ICE, plus the additional EV components (which also add weight), ICE requires some operation
  • Drivetrain still has notable losses, gears, shifting, not as smooth, less power
  • Electric range typically in the 25-45 miles, kind of a wash depending on your use case
  • Can't run for extended periods on battery / still has ICE considerations like an exhaust (a BEV can run for hours and hours with no emissions - for example: in a garage, at a camp ground)
  • Really needs daily charging to make use of the "electric value"
 
DT said:
I meant to add, but will make it a separate post:

We've had a PHEV for 4+ years as well, so I understand the pros/cons, and we almost pulled the trigger on an X5 50e (the X5 platform PHEV), before we decided on the iX. My previous post was just pointing out the other side of the coin, since there's some terrific positives too!

PHEV PROS
  • No "range anxiety" since it can fall back to ICE only mode
  • Can run on electric only like a BEV (so can be cost effective, quiet - but also see below, i.e., electric range)
  • Electric + ICE provides excellent power and efficiency
  • Some offer V2x like functionality
PHEV CONS
  • Retains the extra complexity and maintenance (ex: oil changes) of ICE, plus the additional EV components (which also add weight), ICE requires some operation
  • Drivetrain still has notable losses, gears, shifting, not as smooth, less power
  • Electric range typically in the 25-45 miles, kind of a wash depending on your use case
  • Can't run for extended periods on battery / still has ICE considerations like an exhaust (a BEV can run for hours and hours with no emissions - for example: in a garage, at a camp ground)
  • Really needs daily charging to make use of the "electric value"
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This is why spotty rumors of a “range extender” for future bmw’s interests me. Just a little gas engine to generate power for the battery when needed.
 
DT said:
If you don't have home charging (the real game changer), then I'd say a PHEV is very possibly worse than a BEV.
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With Ford’s only PHEV, the Escape, it has a 38 mile range, but can fully charge with a standard 110 outlet in 10 hours.

While 38 miles doesn’t seem like much, if you live 15 miles from work and can charge every night, you might not buy gas for months. And if you need to go on a trip, you have the ICE engine.

But yes, home charging is a game changer.
 
Cmaier said:
This is why spotty rumors of a “range extender” for future bmw’s interests me. Just a little gas engine to generate power for the battery when needed.
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Yeah, it's a neat idea, heck the i3 had the REx flavor years ago. Scout will have models with the same idea (we reserved a straight up BEV), just generates juice to the battery, no connection to the drivetrain (so basically don't run the ICE gen, it's a pure BEV for all intents).
 
Yoused said:
You have to admit, though, the car did end up pretty broken. But, AIUI, it was not the the fault of the autopilot, because it always switches itself off shortly before crashing.
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Yes, by definition no car on autopilot has ever crashed. It’s tautological.
 

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