[garysmith21]

Hi all - lurking for a while and now taken the plunge and ordered a 45e. It’s going to be a company car so just waiting to hear back from our company car service which UK BMW Dealer is processing the order.

Gone for the following UK spec:

X5 xDrive45e (M Sport)
Metallic - Carbon Black
Vernasca leather - Brown/Black with contrast stitching
M Sport

• 20” Bicolour Star-spoke style 740 alloy wheels
• M Sport brakes
• M aerodynamic body styling

Technology pack

• Loudspeaker system - Harman/kardon surround sound
• BMW Gesture Control
• Head-up Display
• BMW Drive Recorder
• Parking-Assistant Plus

Visibility pack

• BMW Icon Adaptive LED Headlights
• High-beam Assistant

Electric Folding Towbar
Sun Protection Glazing

Will obviously get a better idea from the dealer on timescales for delivery but the company car service reckons January 2021 (6 months). Looking at some of the posts on here that’s probably a good guess.

[BryanC84]

Nice spec!

I've had my 45e for 2 days and I'm loving it. The difference in the drive from my F15.
Spent literally months (ordered January) reading through these forums and absorbing all kinds of information!

[garysmith21]

Originally Posted by BryanC84

Nice spec!

I've had my 45e for 2 days and I'm loving it. The difference in the drive from my F15.
Spent literally months (ordered January) reading through these forums and absorbing all kinds of information!

I guess it’s too early to ask you what electric range you’re getting as you’ll still be enjoying it!

[BryanC84]

Originally Posted by garysmith21

I guess it’s too early to ask you what electric range you’re getting as you’ll still be enjoying it!

Funnily enough I pulled up a thread yesterday regarding summer range. Edit: https://g05.bimmerpost.com/forums/sh....php?t=1733807
There is this one too https://g05.bimmerpost.com/forums/sh....php?t=1720553

Charging it for the first time yesterday, it showed 35 miles when finished.
This morning, it was showing 41 and wasn't even plugged in!

My driving style has immediately changed. I'm braking less, I'm accelerating but with less force and I'm keeping an eye on the kwh being used live when driving.

I think my use case isn't particular useful to many. I work from home so my use of the Electric drive is literally pottering about taking the kids to school, popping to the shops etc.

Over the 2 days, I've done about 35 miles, purely electric driving. Most, if not all my driving will be electric and I'm currently paying 13p/kwh, so charging anytime isn't an issue either.

Will be looking at other tariffs to see if I can optimise it and get a cheaper rate at night.
All things considered, even in just 2 days, its nice driving past petrol stations knowing I won't nearly ever need to visit again!

[garysmith21]

My commute is normally 100 mile round trip andI was doing that 3 times a week. I’d originally ordered an i3s as a company car but then lockdown happened and it looks like I’ll only be going back to work 1-2 times a week from January onwards. Cancelled the i3s and have ordered the 45e instead. I can charge when I get to work so I’m hoping about 80 miles a day will be electric.

Because of the i3s order I’ve already got a home charging point and we’re on the EDF Energy tariff. It’s 17p/kWh during the day but only 8p at night and weekends. I think you can get cheaper but the EDF tariff is 9pm to 7am and all weekend so there’s more ‘cheap’ hours.

[BrummyGit]

Congratulations - I've also placed an order for a 45e through my company car scheme recently and the spec was confirmed by the dealer this week.

My spec is similar:

X5 xDrive45e M-Sport

Phytonic Blue
Vernasca perforated leather - Black/Black

Comfort pack
Technology pack
Visibility pack with Laser Lights
Driver Assistant Professional
Electric Folding Towbar
Sun Protection Glazing


So far I have a provisional delivery date in December but I'm told it could also be January 2021. Have you been given any dates yet?

I'm not 100% confident as they keep telling me it will be a MY2020 which I thought was replaced by MY2021 from July production.

[garysmith21]

I’ve not had anything from BMW - just an estimate from Hitachi (company car provider) that it would be January.

As soon as I hear from BMW I’ll update which dealer it is and what they tell me.

[jwtw20]

Best company car in the UK ever! Great choice!

Real world electric for me since having it from March is about 45/46 miles fully charged, but you'll get further as the car generates more as it's driving.

[garysmith21]

Originally Posted by jwtw20

Real world electric for me since having it from March is about 45/46 miles fully charged, but you'll get further as the car generates more as it's driving.

Sounds good to me! Just a quick question - I’ve read that using the sat nav in the adaptive hybrid mode optimises the use of the battery. Can you put roundtrips in the sat nav? Say I’m going somewhere 30 miles away can you tell the sat nav you’re also coming back so it’ll use half the battery on the way out and half on the way back?

[X5 45e]

Originally Posted by garysmith21

Sounds good to me! Just a quick question - I've read that using the sat nav in the adaptive hybrid mode optimises the use of the battery. Can you put roundtrips in the sat nav? Say I'm going somewhere 30 miles away can you tell the sat nav you're also coming back so it'll use half the battery on the way out and half on the way back?

That is what I do. I program the entire trip so that the sat nav determines where to drive electric en to arrive home with an empty battery.

If on the way back I see that I have more battery left than the raining trip needs I switch to electric individual my self.

With the function "e zones" it also automatically switches to electric in selected city areas by geofencing. You can see this in the app section. I think London is in the list. The list is updated regularly.

[garysmith21]

That’s great thanks.

[BrummyGit]

Originally Posted by jwtw20

Best company car in the UK ever! Great choice!

Real world electric for me since having it from March is about 45/46 miles fully charged, but you'll get further as the car generates more as it's driving.

Can you give any more info on the self-charging functionality? How quickly/much does it charge itself, is this something that you need to switch on manually, do you see a huge reduction in mpg when it's charging?.......or any such info that you can share.

Thanks

[jwtw20]

Originally Posted by BrummyGit

Can you give any more info on the self-charging functionality? How quickly/much does it charge itself, is this something that you need to switch on manually, do you see a huge reduction in mpg when it's charging?.......or any such info that you can share.

Thanks

You see a massive dip in mpg if you drive in battery charging more. You'll average around 16/17mpg when charging and add 1 mile of electric for every 2/3 miles you drive. You can charge the car to full in this mode as well. If you are any of the other modes the car will charge the battery through harvesting energy from breaking and free wheeling, however that will never charge the battery alone and just extends the electric range by a few miles as you drive.

If you aren't going to charge the car from a wall charger then it's not an economical car. I charge mine rarely and one of the main reasons I got it was for the BIK. Best company car I've had on all fronts!

[BrummyGit]

Originally Posted by jwtw20

You see a massive dip in mpg if you drive in battery charging more. You'll average around 16/17mpg when charging and add 1 mile of electric for every 2/3 miles you drive. You can charge the car to full in this mode as well. If you are any of the other modes the car will charge the battery through harvesting energy from breaking and free wheeling, however that will never charge the battery alone and just extends the electric range by a few miles as you drive.

If you aren't going to charge the car from a wall charger then it's not an economical car. I charge mine rarely and one of the main reasons I got it was for the BIK. Best company car I've had on all fronts!

Thanks, I plan to charge mine overnight at home on a regular basis which will mean 90% of my journeys will be on electric or a mix up to around 100miles. BIK savings are great and so as long as I can average about 40mpg for my mix of driving I will be no worse off than my current car, and when the BIK is taken into account I can live with less.

You sparked my imagination as this weekend I did a 300 mile round trip in a day where in each direction I did around 20 miles of slow driving, then 110 miles of motorway before around 20 miles of slow at the end. I was wondering how much range would be added in normal motorway driving to finish off my journey - sounds like minimal.

Charging mode at 16/17mpg while driving isn't going to be cost effective unless its to facilitate use in pure electric mode in restricted cities when I haven't been able to charge up overnight.

All very useful learning.

[garysmith21]

So got an update from the dealer this morning (Sytner) that my car is due into production week 47 (w/c 16th November) with arrival (I assume at the dealer) week 2 (11th January).

[BrummyGit]

You've had more info than me, I'll ask tomorrow.

Is it Sytner corporate sales in High Wycombe that you're dealing with?

[garysmith21]

It is Corporate Sales but the emails have been coming from a senior sales administrator based at their Tamworth dealership.

[BrummyGit]

Originally Posted by garysmith21

It is Corporate Sales but the emails have been coming from a senior sales administrator based at their Tamworth dealership.

You did better than me at getting information. The reply I got was "There's no update, and don't expect to hear from me until the car arrives". I'm quite disappointed that there's such poor communication from BMW UK.

It's a bit of a pain as I want to get a charging point installed using the OLEV grant which needs proof of order and cannot be installed more than 4 months ahead of delivery.

[garysmith21]

Originally Posted by BrummyGit

You did better than me at getting information. The reply I got was "There's no update, and don't expect to hear from me until the car arrives". I'm quite disappointed that there's such poor communication from BMW UK.

It's a bit of a pain as I want to get a charging point installed using the OLEV grant which needs proof of order and cannot be installed more than 4 months ahead of delivery.

That’s really poor - I’ve had the spec confirmed (with the prices blocked). Got the Sytner reference as well as the BMW 7-digit reference which means I can now use the live chat and get an update everyday if I want.

Does your company have a company car intermediary/provider or do you just do it directly yourselves?

[BrummyGit]

Thanks, you've been really helpful - I got 2 badly scanned pages (of 6) to confirm my chargeable options on the car - they missed off the full spec print out but it does list some information (including prices in my case). I have a 7-digit Order Number which I hope is the BMW reference. If you have the same paperwork can you confirm if the number I want is on the right hand side just above Chassis/VIN and Stock Number headings which are blank?

Our company use Arval for all of our lease vehicles.

[garysmith21]

Sorry I’m on holiday this week so don’t have the email with me. It was the only 7 digit reference so just try the online chat.
You have to actually go into the configurator for it to appear and then just ask for the status on order xxxxxxx. They don’t ask for any other details and can tell you the week scheduled for build and delivery.
They’ll soon tell you if it’s the wrong reference.

[BrummyGit]

Thanks you gave me enough information and I was able to get an update nice and easily.

My build is week commencing 9th November with delivery to the BMW Centre w/c 28th December, so looks like I'm 1 week ahead of you in build but 2 weeks ahead on arrival due to Christmas & New Year.