As early as 10 years ago, when electric vehicles were still a new concept, BMW had launched a new energy sub-brand BMW i, and BMW became one of the first traditional luxury brands involved in new energy. It's just that BMW i has only had the unexpensive i3 and the unattainable i8 for many years, making it even stranger to many people than the BMW M.
In the past two years, the heat of new energy has allowed BMW to regain the sub-brand of BMW i and release new cars one after another. Among them, there are iX3 and i4 developed simultaneously with the fuel version of the model, and there is also a new and subversive iX from the inside out. Why does BMW describe the iX as a landmark? As BMW's flagship pure electric vehicle, what kind of experience will the iX bring?
Conceptual design comes to life
The exterior of the BMW iX inherits the design language of the iNEXT concept car, the size of the double kidney mesh on the front face is further enlarged, the interior is covered with irregular diamond-shaped elements, and it is filled with various sensing components for automatic driving. The formation LED headlights on both sides are very slender and flat, and the overall shape is very recognizable.
Not exercising but very good to open
I test drive the iX xDrive50 this time, equipped with dual motors in front and rear, the maximum comprehensive power reached 385kW, the maximum torque reached 765Nm, and the overall power data is close to the X7 50i of the 4.4T V8. Such momentum is more than enough for all road conditions, and even feels that the official 4.6 seconds of acceleration of 0-100km/h is a bit conservative.
Although the power is very fierce, but BMW does not intend to make it into a high-performance SUV, on the daily road, as long as it does not cut to the sport mode, the power of the iX will give people a more relaxed feeling, power output is very linear and controllable. It is worth mentioning that the kinetic energy recovery of iX also has an adaptive mode, which can automatically adjust the kinetic energy recovery force according to the distance from the front car, and can realize the whole single pedal operation.
Interestingly, BMW's cruising range is calculated from the average energy consumption of the previous distance, so it will change greatly according to different road conditions and driving habits. For example, when I first got on the car, the electricity and mileage displayed by the meter were 76% and 401km, respectively; after driving 48km, the electricity and mileage displayed by the instrument were 68% and 388km, respectively, and the endurance was only dropped by 13km, which was far less than the actual driving 48km. However, from this power drop, the real endurance of the iX exceeds 600km is not a big problem.
The control of the iX also gives people a more relaxed feeling, the chassis adopts the structure of the front double wishbones, the rear multi-link, and is equipped with air suspension, the overall adjustment is more comfortable and flexible, and the tilt of the steering is not large, but it does not have a very tight feeling. While the size of the iX is not small, it doesn't feel bulky when turning continuously on mountain roads.
Because no laminated glass is used, the iX's sound insulation performance is not very good, and the sound of the large truck in the next lane can still be clearly heard. However, thanks to the low wind resistance of the body and the tires have been treated with low noise, so the wind noise and tire noise when driving are not annoying.
Write at the end
From the iX, we can indeed see BMW's subversion in design and intelligence, and it also inherits BMW's pursuit of mechanical quality, which is worthy of the name of BMW's flagship. Speaking of which, there may still be some people who are a little puzzled about the positioning of the iX flagship level, after all, in China, the price of iX is only slightly higher than the imported version of X5, but BMW also has a more expensive X7. In fact, the starting price of the iX overseas is higher than that of the X7, although the electric vehicle has the advantage of tax rate, it can still be seen that the BMW iX is very sincere in its pricing in China.