LONDON — A near-production-ready version of the 2014 BMW i3 debuted June 14 at the opening of BMW's first i showroom in London. BMW i Park Lane will officially open for business on July 25 — just ahead of the London Olympics — but the first i3s won't be ready for delivery for another 18 months, in late 2013.
The latest preproduction versions of both cars were on hand at the BMW i Park Lane showroom in the heart of London, where Ian Robertson, BMW's global sales and marketing boss, said the cars are "85-90 percent close" to the real thing.
The production i3 will feature the same pillarless construction as the concept, with much of the structural strength coming from the car's pioneering carbon-fiber construction. The rear doors will be rear-hinged, opening on a parallelogram system to reduce their arcs, which will make it easier to get in and out in a confined space. Both i3 and i8 will feature doors that are solid rather than transparent below the beltline, following market research.
The manufacturing time required to make an i3 is now less than it is for an equivalent conventional car. BMW began molding pre-production carbon-fiber panels in February at its Leipzig plant, using fibers sourced from the U.S. and its joint venture with SGL. A carbon-fiber sub-assembly is now the same price as the equivalent piece in aluminum. BMW says the alignment of the fiber strands within the panel is absolutely critical to its strength, and has devised methods of ensuring this is repeatable at a sensible cost.
Beside the wood in the dash, the i3 interior features some organic materials — BMW describes them as "sustainable natural materials" — including hemp and wool for the trim. Wool is particularly attractive for electric cars because its warm-in-winter, cool-in-summer properties help the A/C system and therefore reduce the battery load.
Robertson said suppliers are developing lithium-oxygen battery packs that promise three times the energy capacity and half the charging time of today's batteries, but the challenge is safety, with a pack like this potentially being highly volatile.
Robertson said he reckons the market penetration of pure EVs will be low, but for plug-in hybrids like the i8, "it could reach double digits in the premium segments in the next 10 years."
BMW is developing a so-called "360" package of electromobility services that will address a lot of the issues surrounding EV ownership. It has designed its own wallbox power source for home charging, is developing a pre-booking system for commercial charging bays and more.
In addition to more traditional showrooms such as BMW i Park Lane, the company said its i-series cars eventually may be offered through "new customer contact points such as a mobile sales force and online purchasing channels."Du––Paul Duchene
