tonymil
Well-known member
I MiEV owners, any regrets? Anyone feel this car hasn't met expectations? Anyone wish they had spent the extra $6k for a Leaf?
Any Regrets?
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jjlink
Well-known member
No regrets here. Its a great commuter car, when I need more room or longer range I drive the Prius (it keeps the hybrid's battery alive).
tonymil said:
tonymil, good question, and one I would expect everyone shopping for an EV to explore. Funny you should ask, as my wife and I are just now approaching three months of ownership and 3000 miles and just yesterday my wife and I were talking about the car and how absolutely delighted we are with how it has turned out in actual practice. Before buying the iMiEV (cost differential between the iMiEV and the Leaf was not a significant factor) I pretty well knew what I was getting into, and not having any unexpected surprises after purchase is reassuring.
Mind you, last year I had talked two friends into buying Leafs, and I consider the Leaf to be a very good electric car, with kudos to Nissan and Mitsubishi for being first to market with mainstream electric vehicles in this decade. The Leaf is physically significantly larger than the iMiEV and IMO a more cumbersome vehicle. The Leaf is more opulent, even luxurious, and more refined compared to the iMiEV, and if carrying five bodies on a daily basis is a necessity for you, then the 4-passenger iMiEv won't cut it. The iMiEV with its back seats down actually has more available volume than the Leaf with its seats down (according to Mitsubishi). The back of the iMiEV can carry a bicycle or do Costco or Home Depot trips, no problem. The iMiEV is basic transportation that is comfortable, has easy entry/egress with high sitting position with good visibility and lots of headroom, decent handling, and a top speed well over any posted limits. For safety it has six airbags, incredibly good brakes, and active stability control (superfluous IMO). It's tight turning radius is wonderful, and the control over regeneration is far superior to the Leaf's (that was important to me). It is suiting our primary daily-driver needs admirably!
This is my wife's car and, although bemoaning the non-use of her beloved 1983 Toyota Corolla wagon (she actually drove it this morning for the first time this year to pick up a bunch of plants at the nursery because she didn't want to get the iMiEV dirty), no way would I now be able to get her to part with her Mitsi for her everyday driving.
I didn't go with the expensive display option, but I installed a $60 GPS simply because on longer trips I like to see the Distance-To-Destination and bounce it off the iMiEV's Range Remaining for feedback in addition to the iMiEV's Fuel Gauge. The slightly better range of the Leaf is irrelevant for our daily usage, as I opportunity charge whenever needed and recognize that for longer trips we simply take our Gen1 Honda Insight hybrid.
The reason I'm dwelling on this is because the most-frequently-asked question deals with the iMiEV's range. I think if more people simply recorded their own daily driving mileage (with breaks) they'd soon realize how irrelevant the question becomes. If you're a commuter, you know exactly what you need and the vehicle range needed often becomes a question of whether you can arrange for charging at work. For a housewife … uh, houseperson … or a retiree or student doing multiple daily errands, range is simply not an issue as you plug the car in when you get home if you know you're going somewhere later on in the day. There is no 'range anxiety' because you usually know exactly where and how far you are going (don't you?) and how far you can go in the iMiEV. You get up in the morning with a full "tank" without having to drive to the infernal ga$ station - how good is that?!
tonymil, if you have any specific questions, I'm sure the iMiEV owners on this Forum will be happy to answer them. Good luck in your quest and sorry for my long-winded response and no, I have no affiliation with Mitsubishi!
Mind you, last year I had talked two friends into buying Leafs, and I consider the Leaf to be a very good electric car, with kudos to Nissan and Mitsubishi for being first to market with mainstream electric vehicles in this decade. The Leaf is physically significantly larger than the iMiEV and IMO a more cumbersome vehicle. The Leaf is more opulent, even luxurious, and more refined compared to the iMiEV, and if carrying five bodies on a daily basis is a necessity for you, then the 4-passenger iMiEv won't cut it. The iMiEV with its back seats down actually has more available volume than the Leaf with its seats down (according to Mitsubishi). The back of the iMiEV can carry a bicycle or do Costco or Home Depot trips, no problem. The iMiEV is basic transportation that is comfortable, has easy entry/egress with high sitting position with good visibility and lots of headroom, decent handling, and a top speed well over any posted limits. For safety it has six airbags, incredibly good brakes, and active stability control (superfluous IMO). It's tight turning radius is wonderful, and the control over regeneration is far superior to the Leaf's (that was important to me). It is suiting our primary daily-driver needs admirably!
This is my wife's car and, although bemoaning the non-use of her beloved 1983 Toyota Corolla wagon (she actually drove it this morning for the first time this year to pick up a bunch of plants at the nursery because she didn't want to get the iMiEV dirty), no way would I now be able to get her to part with her Mitsi for her everyday driving.
I didn't go with the expensive display option, but I installed a $60 GPS simply because on longer trips I like to see the Distance-To-Destination and bounce it off the iMiEV's Range Remaining for feedback in addition to the iMiEV's Fuel Gauge. The slightly better range of the Leaf is irrelevant for our daily usage, as I opportunity charge whenever needed and recognize that for longer trips we simply take our Gen1 Honda Insight hybrid.
The reason I'm dwelling on this is because the most-frequently-asked question deals with the iMiEV's range. I think if more people simply recorded their own daily driving mileage (with breaks) they'd soon realize how irrelevant the question becomes. If you're a commuter, you know exactly what you need and the vehicle range needed often becomes a question of whether you can arrange for charging at work. For a housewife … uh, houseperson … or a retiree or student doing multiple daily errands, range is simply not an issue as you plug the car in when you get home if you know you're going somewhere later on in the day. There is no 'range anxiety' because you usually know exactly where and how far you are going (don't you?) and how far you can go in the iMiEV. You get up in the morning with a full "tank" without having to drive to the infernal ga$ station - how good is that?!
tonymil, if you have any specific questions, I'm sure the iMiEV owners on this Forum will be happy to answer them. Good luck in your quest and sorry for my long-winded response and no, I have no affiliation with Mitsubishi!
tonymil
Well-known member
jjlink, Joes, I really appreciated the responses. My own view after taking the MiEV for three test drives is that it's the car for me. But I live in upstate NY and my biggest concern is how much running the heater will reduce the car's range. That's the only reason I would consider the Leaf. The extra luxuries the Leaf has aren't important to me either. The MiEV has everything I need, including room for my golf clubs! This forum and some other sites have been very helpful. On the other hand, the MiEV is generally getting trashed on Edmunds' website for long term road tests. See here:
http://blogs.insideline.com/roadtests/Vehicles/2012-mitsubishi-i-miev/
However, I think the testers are unreasonably expecting a luxury vehicle from the least expensive all-electric car on the market. And I think some of the commenters are just trolls ready to trash any positive comment.
My most recent test drive was yesterday - the ES model with cold zone package. After the test drive the salesman offered the car at $1,600 off sticker. I was very surprised, I didn't think dealers were offering anything less than sticker. I think I would have jumped on it if it wasn't Labrador Black. I still may - maybe some decals will spruce up that bland exterior.
http://blogs.insideline.com/roadtests/Vehicles/2012-mitsubishi-i-miev/
However, I think the testers are unreasonably expecting a luxury vehicle from the least expensive all-electric car on the market. And I think some of the commenters are just trolls ready to trash any positive comment.
My most recent test drive was yesterday - the ES model with cold zone package. After the test drive the salesman offered the car at $1,600 off sticker. I was very surprised, I didn't think dealers were offering anything less than sticker. I think I would have jumped on it if it wasn't Labrador Black. I still may - maybe some decals will spruce up that bland exterior.
tonymil, thanks for the links. Reading people's and motorsport "journalist's" opinions (often uninformed) without focusing on the intended application of this vehicle simply makes my blood pressure go up - life is too short…
A few additional comments -
Looks: The iMiEV is functional but does make an attempt at aerodynamics with its front end. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, with 'cute' being a common compliment from passers-by. I have a personal aversion to commonplace conventional 'ordinary' vehicles, anyway. Function trumps 'beauty' in my book.
Price: The iMiEV, if it were a conventional econobox, I would expect it to sell in the $15K pricerange. The after-rebates price of around $22K is the penalty for being an early adopter - I'm ok with that, just as I was buying my first outlandishly-priced Apple Macintosh in December 1984 because I considered it a superior product.
Emissions: let's not lose sight of the fact that we're talking about a vehicle which outputs zero compared to an ICE. I'll let others debate the cleanliness of the energy sources. I feel that we as individuals need to help, even if it's a tiny bit.
Operating cost: I have an oversized PV array, so my own recurring energy cost is zero. Somewhere else on this Forum there's a thread that i'll be revisiting and plan on updating based on my actual measured wall-to-wheels energy consumption which I've been meticulously tracking.
Color: my first car was a black Austin-Healy 3000. Never again would I have a black car: doesn't reflect the sun (that matters here in California), is invisible at night, and is impossible to keep clean. My two-cents
My iMiEV is white.
Heating: simply turning on the heater takes a ten-mile hit on the Range Remaining display. We found that preheating the car in the morning, coupled with then only running the seat heater (it's consumption is negligible) worked for us if we were going further - but then, we're not in upstate New York. The Leaf also takes a big hit in this arena. Sorry, but converting battery energy into heat is such a waste… with my other EVs, I simply resort to a fleece blanket. Because of our battery-powered vehicle efficiency we simply don't have the waste heat of an ICE to utilize for cabin heating. Running the iMiEV's heater is no big deal if you're within your range limits.
Range: the more we drive it, the more we realize that speed is THE major culprit. I hope to be quantifying this in the next few weeks. Don't get your hopes up if you use the Interstate a lot at 70mph; on the other hand, on city streets and up to about 45mph it's the Energizer Bunny - and a lot depends on whether you're a leadfoot. Since I've been driving EVs with far worse range for years, opportunity charging is second nature. Although the iMiEV's efficiency I am finding to be far better than the EPA ratings, their highway/city mix range figure of 62 miles is actually pretty good. Since I never want to go below two bars (out of 16) on the fuel gauge, we rarely travel more than about 40-50 miles without planning for opportunity-charging. Hopping onto the freeway (Interstate) to get anywhere is the norm around here.
Technology: the heart of a lithium-xx battery electric vehicle is the Battery Management System. So far, I'm impressed with our iMiEV's controls over its power source. Elsewhere on this Forum is a discussion of the very advanced battery pack in our iMiEV. Let's face it, it takes guts for a major manufacturer to sell an advanced-technology product and they certainly wouldn't do it without a massive development and life/stress test effort. Toyota (Scion IQEV) and Honda (FitEV) are wimping out and leasing, and plug-in-hybrids are IMO a less-stressful and more-manageable battery environment than pure EVs. Hopefully these batteries prove to be even more successful than the NiMh of a decade-ago. Besides, the warranty is pretty good.
Sheesh, sorry for the verbosity...
A few additional comments -
Looks: The iMiEV is functional but does make an attempt at aerodynamics with its front end. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, with 'cute' being a common compliment from passers-by. I have a personal aversion to commonplace conventional 'ordinary' vehicles, anyway. Function trumps 'beauty' in my book.
Price: The iMiEV, if it were a conventional econobox, I would expect it to sell in the $15K pricerange. The after-rebates price of around $22K is the penalty for being an early adopter - I'm ok with that, just as I was buying my first outlandishly-priced Apple Macintosh in December 1984 because I considered it a superior product.
Emissions: let's not lose sight of the fact that we're talking about a vehicle which outputs zero compared to an ICE. I'll let others debate the cleanliness of the energy sources. I feel that we as individuals need to help, even if it's a tiny bit.
Operating cost: I have an oversized PV array, so my own recurring energy cost is zero. Somewhere else on this Forum there's a thread that i'll be revisiting and plan on updating based on my actual measured wall-to-wheels energy consumption which I've been meticulously tracking.
Color: my first car was a black Austin-Healy 3000. Never again would I have a black car: doesn't reflect the sun (that matters here in California), is invisible at night, and is impossible to keep clean. My two-cents
My iMiEV is white.Heating: simply turning on the heater takes a ten-mile hit on the Range Remaining display. We found that preheating the car in the morning, coupled with then only running the seat heater (it's consumption is negligible) worked for us if we were going further - but then, we're not in upstate New York. The Leaf also takes a big hit in this arena. Sorry, but converting battery energy into heat is such a waste… with my other EVs, I simply resort to a fleece blanket. Because of our battery-powered vehicle efficiency we simply don't have the waste heat of an ICE to utilize for cabin heating. Running the iMiEV's heater is no big deal if you're within your range limits.
Range: the more we drive it, the more we realize that speed is THE major culprit. I hope to be quantifying this in the next few weeks. Don't get your hopes up if you use the Interstate a lot at 70mph; on the other hand, on city streets and up to about 45mph it's the Energizer Bunny - and a lot depends on whether you're a leadfoot. Since I've been driving EVs with far worse range for years, opportunity charging is second nature. Although the iMiEV's efficiency I am finding to be far better than the EPA ratings, their highway/city mix range figure of 62 miles is actually pretty good. Since I never want to go below two bars (out of 16) on the fuel gauge, we rarely travel more than about 40-50 miles without planning for opportunity-charging. Hopping onto the freeway (Interstate) to get anywhere is the norm around here.
Technology: the heart of a lithium-xx battery electric vehicle is the Battery Management System. So far, I'm impressed with our iMiEV's controls over its power source. Elsewhere on this Forum is a discussion of the very advanced battery pack in our iMiEV. Let's face it, it takes guts for a major manufacturer to sell an advanced-technology product and they certainly wouldn't do it without a massive development and life/stress test effort. Toyota (Scion IQEV) and Honda (FitEV) are wimping out and leasing, and plug-in-hybrids are IMO a less-stressful and more-manageable battery environment than pure EVs. Hopefully these batteries prove to be even more successful than the NiMh of a decade-ago. Besides, the warranty is pretty good.
Sheesh, sorry for the verbosity...
jennrod12
Well-known member
I'll counter-balance Joe's lengthy (and helpful) response -
No Regrets! :lol:
Jenn
No Regrets! :lol:
Jenn
5000 miles so far, and my only regret is not getting the ChaDEmo quick charge option (grabbed my i out of dealer stock before the end of 2011).
Another item I've added to my list of likes over the LEAF is the speedy startup. Though I sometimes get an error by shifting too soon after turning the key, before the READY light comes on, it's a much faster startup than the LEAF.
Another item I've added to my list of likes over the LEAF is the speedy startup. Though I sometimes get an error by shifting too soon after turning the key, before the READY light comes on, it's a much faster startup than the LEAF.
tonymil
Well-known member
jray3, did you drive it in the winter? How did perform with the heater running?
Well coming from 3 turbo cars and 1 turbo diesel truck family i would say i bought the MIEV for the cheap miles we get .06kw in michigan from 11pm to 7am.
So its what i thought it would be kinda slow kinda cheap but really really good at what it is made to do which is cheap driving.
I wish they would not have limited the drive so much for power because sometimes i wish it had a little more even if it used more of the battery pack i use the car to go 27 miles each way to work and i charge at work off the 110 and it works fine. Heat is something i can deal with it would have been nice if they would have done more then one seat heater.
I would buy another one.
So its what i thought it would be kinda slow kinda cheap but really really good at what it is made to do which is cheap driving.
I wish they would not have limited the drive so much for power because sometimes i wish it had a little more even if it used more of the battery pack i use the car to go 27 miles each way to work and i charge at work off the 110 and it works fine. Heat is something i can deal with it would have been nice if they would have done more then one seat heater.
I would buy another one.
1500 miles and I (we, the wife drives my car more than me) have no regrets at all. This amazing car has exceeded all of my expectations. at fist I didn't want to buy the Mitsubishi because of all the negative reviews. I was waiting for the Chevy Spark EV because I thought a 49KW motor was too small, but my little commuter car died so, rather than buy another ICE car, I bit the bullet and bought the Mitsubishi, knowing that I would have to accept it's shortcoming. The shortcomings were actually misconceptions created by car reviewers. Sure, it's not the fastest or coolest, but its is a very comfortable well built commuter car.
One more thing: 1500m/30mpg x $400/gal = $200
1500m/(62m/16kwh) x .012/kwh = $46
One more thing: 1500m/30mpg x $400/gal = $200
1500m/(62m/16kwh) x .012/kwh = $46
dumemama
Active member
jray3 said:
So how many chademo chargers have you seen and had to pass up??? Last I checked there were only TWO chademo stations in the entire country. I got the quick charger only because when I try to sell the vehicle in 10 years it may help.
psyflyjohn
Well-known member
Had the Miev for about 3 months. Absolutely no regrets. It has performed up to expectations.
We are retired and use it for an about-the-town car, with a second "gasser" for long trips.
Combined with an oversized solar system, we have been saving a ton of money when gas has been running up to $4.50 a gallon.
We quickly learned the range limitations. That erases the range anxiety completely.
We are retired and use it for an about-the-town car, with a second "gasser" for long trips.
Combined with an oversized solar system, we have been saving a ton of money when gas has been running up to $4.50 a gallon.
We quickly learned the range limitations. That erases the range anxiety completely.
Dumemama:
As of June 14th there were 26 Level 3 DC fast chargers installed and in operation in the Chicago area. A total of 73 Level 3 chargers will be installed along with 207 (142 already installed) Level 2 chargers in the Chicago metro area. Several of these chargers are installed at rest areas (oasis) on the Illinois Tollway.
As of June 14th there were 26 Level 3 DC fast chargers installed and in operation in the Chicago area. A total of 73 Level 3 chargers will be installed along with 207 (142 already installed) Level 2 chargers in the Chicago metro area. Several of these chargers are installed at rest areas (oasis) on the Illinois Tollway.
Yep, we had a weeklong ice/snow storm in Seattle that I took the i out for a test drive in (but stayed with my beater Civic for that week's commute). Even with the stock tires, the ABS, ASC, and Traction Control made the i practically idiot proof. Considering the car's high ground clearance and watertight flat floor, I wouldn't hesitate to take it into 6" snow with winter tires on.
Regarding my CHAdeMO regrets, I consider DCQC a regional consideration. There are now 23 quick charge stations covering the entire I-5 corridor between California and Canada, plus a prime route from Seattle east across the Cacade range. CHAdeMO would enable more practical use of my i for pretty much any 'day trip' we take. So, I'm getting to know my dealer's parts counter guy, and he says that the entire CHAdeMO cable is available, but it lists for over $1400, or twice the price of the original option-installed! For an uninstalled, potentially warranty-wounding upgrade, I'll cultivate the relationship with some smaller parts purchases and work on jobber pricing..
Regarding my CHAdeMO regrets, I consider DCQC a regional consideration. There are now 23 quick charge stations covering the entire I-5 corridor between California and Canada, plus a prime route from Seattle east across the Cacade range. CHAdeMO would enable more practical use of my i for pretty much any 'day trip' we take. So, I'm getting to know my dealer's parts counter guy, and he says that the entire CHAdeMO cable is available, but it lists for over $1400, or twice the price of the original option-installed! For an uninstalled, potentially warranty-wounding upgrade, I'll cultivate the relationship with some smaller parts purchases and work on jobber pricing..
More regarding the i in snow, a must see if you haven't viewed this maniac...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m2Tt3bmy9mE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m2Tt3bmy9mE
