[KRS_SN]

Originally Posted by Witney

450 mile trip tomorrow will test the B58's efficiency as a normal ICE as I am heading to London so the car will automatically "reserve" the battery for City.

But in a normalish week to date I have done 333 miles of which 264 have been electric and the mpg has still not dropped below the 90mpg starting line.

Not planning on boring everyone with lots of EV efficiencies going forward, but I do think large battery PHEVs are going to be game changers alongside full BEVs.

One way of looking at it is that the car is carrying a B58 instead of an extra 75kw of batteries!

this is my commute to work with a light foot in comfort mode in my 30d x5
Using £1.20 as price of a litre of diesel for 333 miles it works out to £47 ie for 12 days of commute.
I'm wondering how much it costs for electricity for those miles.
Where I live somewhere in 2023 they are planning to introduce a euro 6 standard in their ulez zone so not an issue for me but would like to know fuel costs comparison.

[Witney]

Originally Posted by KRS_SN

this is my commute to work with a light foot in comfort mode in my 30d x5
Using £1.20 as price of a litre of diesel for 333 miles it works out to £47 ie for 12 days of commute.
I'm wondering how much it costs for electricity for those miles.
Where I live somewhere in 2023 they are planning to introduce a euro 6 standard in their ulez zone so not an issue for me but would like to know fuel costs comparison.

Without doing the full calculation(!) you could do the whole commute on elec if you wished. The key thing I found when looking at the different car options was the high price of charging away from home. Others will know better but it seemed that petrol was cheaper than charging away from home....

We have a cheap tariff now for overnight charging which is 5p per KWh and so it cost only £1.25 to charge it at that time. And that gets me 42-47 miles.

The annoying thing however is the slow charger does not allow a full recharge in the 4hr cheap elec window and then it jumps to circa 16p per KWh. So If I drain the battery and need to leave very early I need to do some charging in the more expensive period. But as takes a long time to get the final 5% into the battery you are better starting it later for the max benefit of cheap electricity.

I am hoping it will work for me as a large part of my high mileage is a 103 mile daily round trip to the office and I can charge the car there for the return trip.

You also have to spend £500 for a charger on the first place!

[Witney]

I think when look you at efficiencies and costs, they all pale into insignificance with the monthly depreciation and finance costs associated with a new BMW, but it all helps with the man-maths!

[KRS_SN]

thanks Witney
.calculating electric economy is not easy I've watched some videos but still lost as I can't make sense of it. . Importantly if I lived in a current ulez zone or worked or commuted through one the 45e is the best choice out there.
look forward to further posts from you on your longterm experiences.

[dazzapb]

Originally Posted by KCH1984

Lovely car, and one I was considering but the deals on them seemed to have dried up! Did you spec M Sport Plus and Tech Plus packs then?

I've got a mate who runs both an M50d with drive pro and a Tesla Model 3. He reckons the BMW system is actually far better, although we had to code LCA (where it will physically steer you into another lane with a tap of the indicator) as for some reason this wasn't enabled on his model year despite having all the functionality to perform it.

I also like Artic Grey. It would be between that and Tanzanite for me, but I'm too tight to pay additional for individual colours!

Hey man quick hijack. I have the driving assistance pack on the x3m and it's supposed to have LCA according to the brochure. Can't get it to work.

How do you code it Can I use BimmerCode?

(Lovey car OP BTW)

[sahajesh]

I had problems with LCA, couldn't seem to make it work on my X5 but tried it today on a motorway drive and it worked a treat- you have to have assisted driving on and indicate but don't push the stalk so much that it locks into place.

You will see the arrow appear in the dashboard/HUD. If you let go of the stalk too soon, the manoeuvre will stop.

[330XDave]

Sounds like it's far easier to just turn the wheel to move you in to the next lane

[sahajesh]

It'd be easier still to let the horse decide, but things change

Having used Assisted Drive, I like it and glad it's there. I did occasionally drop back to brain cell mode but that was just for a change.

[330XDave]

Originally Posted by sahajesh

It'd be easier still to let the horse decide, but things change

Indeed they do, but they're trying to fix an inconvenience that doesn't exist. I guess they are working towards to full self-driving capability and this is part of it, but in isolation it's pointless in my opinion.

[330XDave]

To add my current car has lots of aids including slowing down for corners, roundabouts and changing the speed depending on limit. I've turned everything off apart from standard adaptive cruise control. Mind you I do use the lane keep assist, it makes motorway driving that bit more relaxing.

[KCH1984]

Originally Posted by dazzapb

Hey man quick hijack. I have the driving assistance pack on the x3m and it's supposed to have LCA according to the brochure. Can't get it to work.

How do you code it Can I use BimmerCode?

(Lovey car OP BTW)

It's not done via bimmercode sadly (at least it wasn't at the time) and had to be done via e-sys. Copy and paste from the X5 forum below, not sure whether the modules needing coded will match up exactly with the X3....

"you need esys installed on a windows device (VM/PC), latest psdzdata and an OBD2 cable.

Remove 8TR from your FA and VO Code these 3 ECU's - HU_MGU, SASx, BDC_BODY (7083)

8TR is what BMW are sticking UK users with to prevent Lane Change Assist from working."

[sahajesh]

Originally Posted by 330XDave

Indeed they do, but they're trying to fix an inconvenience that doesn't exist. I guess they are working towards to full self-driving capability and this is part of it, but in isolation it's pointless in my opinion.

You won't get to full self-driving with one snap of the fingers and no amount of manufacturer testing is the same as real-world testing.

Ultimately you will get a better product from iterative releases than a big-bang approach. Better to have the car monitor behaviour and use that data to a) improve the product and b) allow new functionality.

So yes, it may be pointless in isolation (for you) but the knowledge it brings will allow a much better product in the future.

By the time that happens though, we will either be dead or too old to drive (in which case self-driving could be useful).

Anyway back on point - nice car and there is a hell of a lot to play with (and complain about)!

[Witney]

Originally Posted by sahajesh

You won't get to full self-driving with one snap of the fingers and no amount of manufacturer testing is the same as real-world testing.

Ultimately you will get a better product from iterative releases than a big-bang approach. Better to have the car monitor behaviour and use that data to a) improve the product and b) allow new functionality.

So yes, it may be pointless in isolation (for you) but the knowledge it brings will allow a much better product in the future.

By the time that happens though, we will either be dead or too old to drive (in which case self-driving could be useful).

Anyway back on point - nice car and there is a hell of a lot to play with (and complain about)!

Agree, because once you are used to LCA on the motorways you see how small a step it will be for automated lane changes.

Tesla has the lane changes already dialled in, but in the UK I think you still need to accept it by using the indicator stalk so no material difference.

[MashinBenzin]

Originally Posted by Witney

Agree, because once you are used to LCA on the motorways you see how small a step it will be for automated lane changes.

Tesla has the lane changes already dialled in, but in the UK I think you still need to accept it by using the indicator stalk so no material difference.

It will have improved since then, I am sure, but the Model X I drove in 2018 had really abrupt lane changes. Came away from the test drive thinking it was one feature that I wouldn't use. It was 17 year old second driving lesson level for mirror signal manoeuvre, zero finesse.

Fully appreciate that these things need use to improve though. The 2020 X7 was much more sophisticated than the 2019 X5. The great thing with OTA updates is older cars improve too.