Tag Archives: bmw i8

i8.

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There are very few automobiles which capture my attention, new or old, these days.  My interest in automobiles has faded aside from a few select cars which i’m always chasing.  i am, however, BLOWN AWAY by this car.  the fact that it is a production car that looks like a concept.  The fact that is totally a current car embedded with current technologies capturing the spirit of ‘new’ and ‘fresh’ without copying anything else before it.  The fact that it’s the first hybrid sports car that is somewhat attainable  (still expensive though…at $135k USA price).  But most of all I love this car because it pushes and opens an envelope into the current times.  No retro here.  No celebration of the past.  The BMW i8 is a celebration of the future.

If i had the money…i’d order this and drive it every day!!

Forget 0-60 times (4.4 seconds here), forget curb weight (3200+ pounds here), forget cost for a second, forget the badge, forget the insane aero design features— this car is a pioneer and a real innovation in this realm.  It’s rare in these generic modern times of automotive engineering that we see a true beginning, but i have a feeling the i8 is the first of many coming in this realm.

(I don’t count cars like the Porsche 918, because of price and uber-exclusivity)

Live photos from Frankfurt (courtesy of greenCarReports)

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promo photos from BMW in Black:

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Videos:

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Electric future: 2 cars that show it won’t be so bad.

No, the 2 reasons are NOT the Nissan Leaf or the Chevy Volt.  However, that thought has made me laugh just slightly!  Electric cars which actually work and have some enthusiasm are coming, it won’t be long—-but it’s not quite yet!  I can’t even take the Tesla serious enough to comment on it, considering it’s sketchy company and even sketchier reliability.  Fisker designs excite me, but the company is going under fast..so where does that leave us? With the germans of course!

I would like to think that the future will bring us totally NEW ideas within automobiles, and while we may miss the rumble of a V8 or the roar of an inline-5—-i think automobile enthusiasts should be excited about prospects of digital sounding electric cars burning around a track.  We may think these ideas are far away—-but they are not.  It will start in racing, and trickle down to reality.

We are currently sounded by a lot of street car junk….cars like the Nissan Leaf and Toyota Prius which have ZERO emphasis on driving characteristics and all emphasis on pseudo socio-political activism and trendiness.  They are not solutions, however they’ve been advertised as such.

At Petit Le Mans, I heard race cars quiet enough to only give off the sound of wind….the future is coming!

I think the BMW i8 really is the future.  So maybe it’s ahead of its time and nobody realises it yet.  The Audi R8 e-Tron, on the other hand is based off the current R8 and looks pretty great as we’d expect.  BMW are taking bigger risks here I reckon…and secretly i’m hoping they produce something fantastic (and i hope they change their Apple-hommage name of “i” to something more BMW-ish).  There will always be enthusiast sports cars, no matter what future technology brings.  Instead of resisting the inevitable, I think we are better off embracing the future while we appreciate the past.  I find myself VERY excited about these cars, but particularly about the i8 which really might be the beginning of something very special.  I will keep my eyes peeled.

I love the sounds they are working with…

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