Consumer Reports Got It So Wrong!

[Vike]

To anyone contemplating a purchase of the iMiEV all I can say is go drive it and investigate it thoroughly for the purpose you intend to use it for and do the math for all the cost elements as well as real-life driving distances and then be your own judge.

I think that's the real bottom line. I've had to face the fact that my EV enthusiasm is something of an anomaly, regardless of how much sense I think it makes. If you share this personal quirk, you just have to understand that general outlets like CR, newspapers, etc., aren't going to properly evaluate EVs. I think this is one reason that the Focus Electric gets so many favorable reviews - it's an impressive package for the "spend the afternoon with it" reviewer, who doesn't care that much about its compromised trunk or excessive price. It seems our poor little i-MiEV keeps getting dinged for exactly the same reason - its virtues are best perceived day-to-day by those who value what it does, while its shortcomings relative to more conventional cars are superficially obvious. Given that, you really need to trust your own judgment, and filter reviews to separate fact from opinion.
What comes across strongly in this CR review is that the reviewer's "gut" response to the car was so negative that it clouded the rest of his observations. What's surprising is that editors didn't insist on cleaning up the article to maintain a more evidence-based and professional tone.

 

[JoeS]

Finally got around to reading the more-detailed iMiEV report on ConsumerReports.org. That is a far better organized and cohesive presentation - I should have read this first before wasting my time on responding to the print version. All of my comments still apply, but this online version of the review does indeed address a number of items I thought they had missed. The condensing of this writeup into the print version was simply atrociously done.

I did note some redeeming differences between the print and online versions. For example, regarding noise, the online version says, reasonably -

With no engine, the i-MiEV is mostly quiet but you do hear some electric motor whine. Wind noise over the blunt front end and larger windshield prevails at highway speeds.

That is certainly far more civilized than the print version -

At low speeds the electric motor whines loudly. As speed builds, tire and wind noise become louder.

Like I said, atrocious condensing.

I'll now slowly re-read the online version to see if anything significant pops up that would be of interest.

I did find some interesting (and disturbing as it further makes me question CR credibility) quantitative information on ConsumerReports.org in their car comparison tables, which I plan on addressing next.

I've been a really long-time subscriber to Consumer Reports. I also subscribe to ConsumerReports.org so I can view their reviews online as well. I just found out that in order to see the iMiEV Test Track Report, I have to subscribe to something called "Consumer Reports Cars Best Deals Plus". Sorry, but I'm already so distressed at CR's review of the iMiEV that I'd rather not shell out the extra $$ to get that. If anyone on this forum has access to "Consumer Reports Cars Best Deals Plus", I'd appreciate your checking out the iMiEV Test Track Report and commenting for us. Thank you.

 

[NeilBlanchard]

The CR article is a hack job, clearly - if the author didn't have ulterior motives, then they are betraying their ignorance.

Write them paper letters, telling them how well the i MiEV meets your needs and how little you are paying.

 

[JoeS]

Going through Consumer Reports' summaries comparing vehicles, here's something that truly makes one wonder about their technical competence:

Under Fuel Economy for the iMiEV, they list:

CR overall mileage 111mpg
CR city mileage 104mpg
CR highway mileage 116mpg

The CR description shown for their overall mileage is CR's overall mileage is a composite of measured fuel usage on a prescribed city simulation and highway cruising
The CR description for their city/highway mpg is Measured fuel usage on a prescribed city simulation and highway cruising

Let's compare this to the EPA numbers:

EPA Overall 112mpge
EPA City 126mpge
EPA Highway 99mpge

What's wrong with this picture?
(ignoring for a moment that CR doesn't identify the mpg as being mpge)?

Both we and the EPA recognize that the iMiEV's city driving energy consumption is significantly LOWER than it's highway energy consumption.

That is not what Consumer Reports is saying.

We're in good company, as they did the same thing with the Leaf.

This just adds to the absence of their credibility in testing Electric Vehicles, as it appears no one even did a sanity check on the information they are presenting.

 

[JoeS]

I moved the comments regarding Consumer Reports and the Fiat 500e over to this thread:

http://myimiev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=1303

Hope you don't mind :?

 

[Vike]

I moved the comments regarding Consumer Reports and the Fiat 500e over to this thread:

http://myimiev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=1303

Hope you don't mind :?

I do a bit - that post was intended as part of this discussion of CR's i-MiEV review, not to start a new thread to chat about the electric Fiat, a car about which few readers here would care (and for good reason - like the Fit EV, it's a compliance-only custom job barely more credible than the RAV4-EV, and most Americans will never be able to buy one). Since just about every sentence of that post referenced CR's i-MiEV review, I figured it was pretty well on-topic, so banishing it seems a tad heavy-handed given the drift that I see (and accept) in many of these discussions.

The point, for those that are now not seeing it because they aren't clicking on a topic they don't care about, was that CR treated Fiat's cynical CA-compliance dodge with more respect than they gave Mitsubishi's effort to make a practical EV available to all comers nationwide. The point was that CR felt it was okay to publish some petulant, ignorant, childish whining about a mini-car being small, an EV not going very far after charging for a long time, and the least expensive EV in America coming up a bit short in the luxury amenities department. The point was NOT to dignify some semi-fake EV that Fiat's pretending to sell with its very own thread.

 

[JoeS]

Vike- apologies and my bad Sent you a PM to see if we can somehow undo the mess I've created.

Update: Vike and I agreed to simply leave the two threads alone as they stand. His choice of words (above) and in the Fiat 500e thread is excellent, and I encourage everyone to read it!

 

[JoeS]

After holding off for a month, the latest issue of Consumer Reports (which continues denigrating our iMiEV) spurred me to bite the bullet and spend a few bucks in order to satisfy my curiosity about what I thought were the technical details of their iMiEV testing. Specifically, if I wanted to obtain what they called the Full Track Report I would have to pay extra to join something to get it ... so I did.

Now, a Full Track Report I expected to be loaded with technical data specific to their performance testing of the iMiEV. Things like test conditions, number of runs for each test and recorded times and speeds, the different drivers participating, and details of how they conducted their mileage and charging tests ... that sort of thing. I wanted to know mundane things like exactly what tire pressures they were running, what load weights were being carried, whether ASC was disabled for their emergency maneuvers (I would hope they would run tests with and without ASC), and I wanted to know how many different drivers did the tests and what was the performance of each driver. I was also looking for quantitative data such as what were the measured heeling angles and lateral accelerations as they performed various maneuvers, not to mention simple measured noise levels to corroborate what they said. I also wanted to know EV-related things like exactly what the SOC of the battery pack was and which drive mode were they using for each test.

What a joke! This shows how naive I am. Their (expletive deleted) Full Track Report is nothing more than simply more of the same type of subjective nonsense that they already published, slightly expanded to telling us that the headliner "is like fuzz-sprayed cardboard" and the climate control knobs "feel like toys" and "there is a tall and tippy sensation in corners and the car requires a lot of steering input to round corners". No data. What utterly-shallow subjective tripe, totally unworthy of a "testing" organization!

What especially grates me is phrases such "tall and tippy sensation" - this is not a test "report". If nothing else, they should perform a measurable static stability test or at least calculate its SSF (Static Stability Factor) - I bet our little iMiEV outperforms many if not most of the cars out there, and especially SUVs! - for those who don't know, the iMiEV's battery pack is underneath the seats and contributes to a very low center of gravity for the vehicle.

To top it off, I had naively assumed that they fully charged the battery pack before each test run, but now I'm not sure -- if I wanted to make the iMiEV look bad in terms of acceleration or even an obstacle course speed test I'd deplete the battery first. This isn't mentioned anywhere.

Do NOT bother signing up for this Full Track Report - it adds no value in terms of telling us what their actual testing procedures were nor provides us with any data that wasn't already available.

 

[MLucas]

Do NOT bother signing up for this Full Track Report - it adds no value in terms of telling us what their actual testing procedures were nor provides us with any data that wasn't already available.

I guess you'll be asking for your money back, huh?

 

[JoeS]

Do NOT bother signing up for this Full Track Report - it adds no value in terms of telling us what their actual testing procedures were nor provides us with any data that wasn't already available.

I guess you'll be asking for your money back, huh?

Sure did, first thing this morning. :x The customer service person was quite courteous about it.

 

[NeilBlanchard]

From the quotes of the article, this is a hack job of the lowest order. The shear number of slam words makes this glaringly obvious. Somebody had to have paid them off and/or the author is hostile to EV's.

 

[aarond12]

Mitsubishi probably didn't pay them for a positive review. :lol:

You have to wonder when a "trusted" source like CR is using subjective, opinionated data rather than hard facts and numbers. The logical thought process is that they don't have the time/money to thoroughly test each vehicle and, instead, just make off-the-cuff judgments about the vehicle. If the car magazines tested cars the same way, they wouldn't have any subscribers left.

 

[JoeS]

:idea: :idea: :idea: Dang, I just realized something: if the heater was ON during CR's acceleration and performance tests, then of course the car is going to be slower, as the BMS limits the maximum total current draw out of the battery! Since their test conditions are nowhere to be found, we'll never know. :evil:

 

[JoeS]

Another commentary about Consumer Reports' continued attacks on the i-MiEV - I also added my perspective to the responses on the Inside EVs article.
http://insideevs.com/consumer-repor...iev-remains-an-overpriced-enclosed-golf-cart/

 

[mhdicke]

I immediately canceled my Consumer Reports subscription when I read their review. In fact, I wonder why I ever
subscribed since each of my purchases recommended by CR did not perform as indicated by their organization.

 

[JoeS]

I immediately canceled my Consumer Reports subscription when I read their review. In fact, I wonder why I ever subscribed since each of my purchases recommended by CR did not perform as indicated by their organization.

mhdicke, my hat's off to you!

Like it or not, MPGe is the fuel efficiency figure of merit assigned to electric vehicles by the EPA, ostensibly to maintain parity with infernal combustion engine vehicles. Using the conversion factor of 34.02kWh/gallon of gasoline and my measured 8000-mile average of 4.2miles/kWh wall-to-wheels, my i-MiEV's consumption rate is 142.88mpge.

For various obscure reasons, I'm still a subscriber to CR. Today I received a survey from Consumer Reports as a follow-up to their annual questionnaire. One of their questions dealt with the i-MiEV's fuel economy. Here's what I answered and here's how their survey responded:

Not only has Consumer Reports damned our great little car, but their survey is rigged to refuse a legitimate input.

Something about jousting with windmills seems appropriate here...

 

[BillThompsonMIEV]

Double plus 1 to you Joe. I received same survey. I put in 99MPG, as that was highest number. You are spot on.

 

[NeilBlanchard]

People are just stuck in the ICE age.

All the worry about meeting the 54MPG average in a decade - we can more than DOUBLE that NOW!

 

[jray3]

Now Forbes is regurgitating the pitiful CR review.
http://www2.forbes.com/business/15-new-cars-to-avoid/7/
I canceled my subscription years ago when it first came out but could be curious about the Buy It Again rating on every EV.

 

[siai47]

I just re-read the blogs about the Consumer Reports I-MiEV hatchet job. I am surprised how positive the majority of the posts were. This problem of perception will never go away along with the golf cart comments. I stopped in a gas station (no, not to get gas) and a guy came up to me who said his buddy's golf cart was nicer then my I-MiEV. I casually said that if his buddy really had a nice golf cart, he probably paid more for it then I did for the I-MiEV. That got the conversation going and in the end, he couldn't believe that you could get a car with all the features the I-MiEV has for anywhere near the price you pay for it. People don't understand that there are different vehicles for different purposes just like they don't understand that other people might be looking for something different in a vehicle then they look for. As some of you know, in addition to the I-MiEV I also have a Model S. The Model S is a truly great car as is should be for what it costs to buy. That being said each car has a definite purpose. I only drive the Model S if I have a trip that is beyond the range of the I-MiEV or it requires freeway travel. The bulk of my driving is in a urban environment, therefore the I-MiEV is the car of choice in those situations. It is much easier to thread through traffic, has better outside visablilty, and its easier to park then the Model S. You can also put bulkier items in the back of the I-MiEV (like a full sized washing machine)---not so with the Model S. I am not trying to brag, but I am very blessed to be able to afford to buy any car that I might want. What I want and what I need ended up with the I-MiEV being considered as my primary vehicle. If I only had one car, it wouldn't be the Model S which Consumer Reports gushes over. So as the thread title says "Consumer Reports Got It So Wrong!"