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My name is Harold and I was born electric on August 19 th , 2014.   There are two parts to my story here.   The first is about my path to selecting and buying the i3,   and the second is about my experiences owning and driving the i3. PART 1:    “IF YOU’RE NOT PART OF THE SOLUTION,   THEN YOU ARE PART OF THE PROBLEM.” When it comes to global warming,   I’m embarrassed to say that for far too long my wife and I were part of the problem.   We’re a two car family,   and over the years we’ve driven a series of big, luxury, premium fuel guzzlers.   As recently as 2007 we each had one of the full-size Range Rovers. Yikes, and yuck! I gradually realized this was not tenable,   but I found it very, very hard to give up the comfort (I’m 6’3 and don’t fit in most cars) and sportiness of a big luxury SUV. The very thought of shoehorning myself into the ugly and painfully boring Prius hybrid was enough to make me puke. So my first tentativ...

The Challenge Last week I was contacted by High Gear Media Senior Editor, John Voelcker and asked if I had interest in doing a head to head comparison piece between my i3 REx and a Chevy Volt. Green Car Reports contributor David Noland (who happens to own a Volt and a Model S) wanted to pit the Volt against an i3 REx and asked John to reach out to me and find out if I was up for it. I liked the idea of swapping cars and driving side by side for a few hours and that met David's needs as well. David wanted to do an efficiency test and measure the miles per kWh's used driving 15 to 20 miles in a city environment, and then do the same thing at highway speeds of 65 to 75mph. Going in, David expected the i3 to be more efficient in the city driving test, but the Volt to be more efficient on the highway test where weight plays a lesser role and aerodynamics are more important. The i3 is tall, has a large front area and is a bit boxy compared to the Volt. This creates a much higher CdA ...

Horatiu Boeriu of BMWBLOG recently did a piece titled "BMW vs. Tesla - Which Company Is A Bigger Innovator?" in which he mentions that while both companies are competing in the premium automobile segment and are committed to electric mobility, they are taking different paths to achieve success. I'm not going to try to analyze who has it right or who is a bigger innovator, but it's clear that both companies have chosen to focus on different aspects of their respective vehicles. With Tesla, it's all about the batteries. Unlike every other automobile manufacturer, BMW included, Tesla's approach isn't for their electric cars to complement their lineup of gasoline and diesel offerings since they don't have any. Instead, it is to render gasoline vehicles from their competitors obsolete. In order to do so, their cars have to be at least as good or better than most features of competing gas cars; and that includes range, performance and utility. BMW on the ot...

*Hat tip to insideevs.com for finding this first! BMW has been holding i3 training events to get the new BMW Product Geniuses up to speed on what they need to know about the car. As I have written here many times, there is so much about this car that is completely different than anything BMW has ever sold before that they really need to dive deep into the training of their client advisers and especially these new Product Geniuses. As good as the car is, if they fail to have the ability to properly help the customer decide if the car is right for them, then they won't sell nearly as many as they could have. This is going to have to play itself out before we can gauge if BMW did indeed do everything they could have to give the dealers the tools they need to sell these vehicles. However in my opinion this video is promising. Not only is BMW holding training sessions where the Product Geniuses will learn about he cars, but they are getting the chance to take once out and do an autoc...

Much has been made about the tall narrow tires on the BMW i3. They are really unlike any tire on any other car currently in production and they certainly don't look like they belong on a BMW. However BMW and Bridgestone did their homework on this, and accomplished the goals they set out to. That was to develop a tire that is not only efficient, but also delivers the performance expected of any BMW. How did they do it? Ologic technology. Yep, they developed something so new and advanced you have never even heard of it before! So while I as the Geneva Motor Show a few weeks ago, I made it a point to stop by the Bridgestone exhibit to ask about this new mysterious "Ologic Tech". As I approached the Bridgestone area, I could see they had a Capparis White i3 on display with it all lettered up promoting this new Ologic technology, and they even had an award in a case next to it that proudly displayed that Bridgestone won the 2014 Tire Technology International award for Tire Tec...

  Ross and his new baby in front of  Chatsworth House, Derbyshire Hello, I'm Ross from The UK and I was Born Electric on Saturday, March 1st, 2014. Why an i3? I will start this blog by saying that I am totally obsessed by cars.  I love cars, I always have, and the cars that find their way into our household are usually of the performance variety, ranging from TVRs to Hondas with even the occasional 4x4.  To be perfectly honest, electric cars had never really appeared on my radar.  I was aware of them obviously, but had never considered owning one.  My view was that most of them were slow, couldn’t go very far and generally a bit dull.   However, one of my favourite websites is Pistonheads , and I happened to read their review of the new BMW i3 back in October.  Wow!  This sounded like one exciting little car.  So, at this point I started doing some more research, reading every i3 review I could find.  At this time, my car was an E92...