Of all of BMW's recent concepts, none are as daring as their pair of low emission "i" vehicles, the i8 and i3. Both those cars remain in the prototype stages, but Britain's Evo Magazine recently got to take a trip in the i8 on frozen lake in Sweden.
The i8, in case you forgot, is BMW's plug-in hybrid sports car where an electric motor drives the front wheels and a 1.5-liter three cylinder drives the rear wheels. Combined power should be somewhere around 350 horsepower and 406 lb-ft of torque.
Evo's Harry Metcalf says it will be a 911 competitor that could cost as much as 100,000 euros, or $130,000. That's a lot of euros or dollars for a hybrid.
The heavily-camouflaged prototype they drive still has a very throaty, raw-sounding three banger engine, but BMW engineers say that will be "fine-tuned." (No doubt that means an engine sound will be piped into the cabin, much like other modern BMWs.) Evo agreed not to show the interior at all, but the video does give a good run down of how the car's development is going.
If it works out the way BMW wants, the car will do 0 to 60 in 4.6 seconds and get as much as 80 miles per gallon. There's no denying it looks awesome, either. But will people actually buy it? That's what I want to know.