Electric Mini Cooper - Ride Along

Take a short ride along with me in one of the 500 electric-powered Mini Coopers in the US. This is the car I drive at work as part of a year-long field trial of these vehicles. The car is 100% electric, not a hybrid. It gets plugged in at night. As you'll see in the video, it is a pretty neat little car -- it's powerful, comfortable, and handles well. It gets the equivalent of 102 mpg city/94 mpg highway. On the down side, it only gets about 90 miles out of a charge and has very little storage (the batteries take up the space behind the front seats). I'll do a video of a walk-around of the car soon.

I have always been pretty environmentally-minded, so being a part of the program to test these cars is very cool.

Here's the web site with more info on this nifty little car: http://www.miniusa.com/minie-usa/

Category:

Autos & Vehicles

Tags:

• electric car
• Mini
• Mini-E

[DanFrederiksen]

looks quite quick even though the bastards limited the acceleration. I'm guessing they knew that if people got the full power of the acpropulsion drivetrain they would like EVs too much.

[RobertGMuller]

@DanFrederiksen: They may have limited the power for a couple of reasons that I can think of: 1. They were test vehicles, so allowing for too much speed might have liability concerns 2. I am sure they wanted to avoid too much concern over range ("range anxiety"), and limiting power increases range. At higher speeds, the power usage goes up (probably partly a function of the battery heating up). I would expect EVs to become faster with time and technology.

[DanFrederiksen]

@RobertGMuller a stronger accleration capability doesn't affect range significantly. high speed does but I wasn't talking about high speed.

don't look for excuses for the bastards. see them for what they are or they will forever betray you. there would be no electric cars if it weren't for good men forcing these bastards to do the right thing. they are hardly doing this of their own accord

[RobertGMuller]

@DanFrederiksen I'm not sure that the acceleration was governed in any way, as the car always wanted to spin its wheels (it would be undrivable without traction control). The top speed was certainly governed, though. You don't think BMW is trying these cars because they think there might be a market (read: profit) for them? The many conversations I had with people in my year in the car seemed to indicate that there is a market for such a car.

[BMWpower414]

WOW this is surprisingly very mini. would like to drive it my self. so you said thay are pretty fast. how much do you think it takes to go 0-100?

[RobertGMuller]

@BMWpower414: I don't think I have seen any acceleration stats. They are limited to 90mph (or so I am told). It has a slight hesitation off the line, as the motor gets past the inertia, but it pulls hard from there. It is definitely sporty (Just so illustrate my idea of sportiness: I have been a motorcyclist for years and currently ride a Honda CBR1000 and Ducati S2R1000, both fairly fast bikes).

[Raven00088888]

I love all electric cars... love it so much....

[SOPM2007]

I often ask myself If and when I'll have the chance to drive an electric car. Hopefully it will happen one day - would love it for sure. My dream of a e-car so far is the Model S from Tesla Motors. A 5-seats sedan with up to 300 miles of range and sporty driving performance. Can't wait to see the first one on german streets!

[snootzie78]

A couple friends of mine drive mini coopers.  Neat!

[davepamn]

What is the prices range? 200 hp is impressive and 100 mpg equivalent in city should be popular. However, I don't like the 3 hour recharge time. I was hoping for 8 minute recharge times.

[DanFrederiksen]

@RobertGMuller if BMW actually believed in electric cars they would not have hired the very expensive ACPropulsion company to make a few conversions as a way to circumvent california eco laws. all you have to do is look at where the cars were placed to know why they did it. they are full blown super douches. top of the line. cliche bad guys. and they don't actually know what they are doing. remember that Audi USA said electric cars are for idiots and a few days later Audi germany showed E-tron

[DanFrederiksen]

@RobertGMuller if BMW actually believed in electric cars they would not have hired the very expensive ACPropulsion company to make a few conversions as a way to circumvent california eco laws. all you have to do is look at where the cars were placed to know why they did it. they are full blown super assholes. top of the line. cliche bad guys. and they don't actually know what they are doing. remember that Audi USA said electric cars are for idiots and a few days later Audi germany showed E-tron

[DanFrederiksen]

@RobertGMuller iirc it was officially stated that they had reduced the acceleration. down to something like 60%. remember it's basically the same power train as the tesla roadster has and the mini is not that much heavier. you would notice if it went to 100km/h in 4 seconds : )

and I think you have to understand that the decision making at the top of a car maker is surprisingly incompetent and incoherent. remember GM built the EV1 and then they killed it because the retards were afraid of it.