BMW i3 nearly naked spy shots

BMW’s revolutionary i3 ‘Megacity’ vehicle is now less than a year away from launch and in the lead up to its eventual arrival engineers are hard at work finishing off the final prototype evaluation. The latest spy shots show the i3 doing a striptease that leaves little to the imagination.

If you're not familiar with the i3, it is essentially a rear-wheel-drive electric minicar due out from BMW at the end of the year, and arriving here in 2014.

It's aimed at providing a high degree of urban mobility while still allowing the occasional extra-urban long-distance jaunt when fitted with a range-extender, which BMW has said will be available at launch.

While the i3 retains the stubby proportions inherent to the minicar class, it wears them well, thanks in part to what appear to be large, if narrow, wheels, and a raked, extended windshield. Apparently, so many people have taken to the car's design that BMW has more than 100,000 eager to test drive one.

The basic i3 will come with a five-door body and electric motor rated at 125kW/250Nm, driving the rear wheels via a fixed-gear transmission. On a single charge of its lithium-ion battery, owners should expect a driving range of 150km.

A second version uses a 650cc two-cylinder petrol engine (from BMW's scooter line-up) acting as a range-extender to give 300km of travel when a full tank of petrol and batteries at 100 per cent capacity are employed.

The original concept version claims a 0-60 mph sprint of under 8 seconds, making it not exactly quick, but far from pokey. Key to its performance will be lightweight carbon fiber reinforced plastic used for its body. Charging is claimed to be quick, too, with a high-speed charger juicing the lithium-ion battery pack to 80 percent in one hour.

There is still a little bit of development before the i3 reaches production, but if the retail car reaches the goals of the concept, at a rate of 40,000 sold per year globally, the i3 could be a very attractive option for urban dwellers and suburbanites alike.

BMW’s upcoming i3 electric car will be priced similar to a reasonably-equipped 3-Series sedan in the US, which means a starting price there of around $40,000. However, Australian buyers are likely to pay more than $60,000 when it arrives here in 2014.

That estimation takes into account our higher prices for cars, and the levels already set by the less-prestigious Holden Volt at $60,000, and the Mitsubishi i-MiEV and Nissan Leaf -- both of which were just under $50,000, with the Leaf taking another price cut recently to $39,990 drive-away.

Though we’ve seen many i3 concepts since the reveal of the first one in 2011, we’ll finally get to see the production version at the 2013 Frankfurt Auto Show in September. The first showroom examples should start rolling out in overseas markets before the year is out.

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