If BMW had kept the i3 with the backup engine I'd be ordering one next year. Friend is on his second one but will not be getting another since the backup version has been dropped. I think it was almost the perfect combo.
I keep an eye open for one though we don't see many up for sale here. They're still fetching too much for me to justify the outlay at present. Lots of problems listed with the IC engine, either due to not being used, or being ragged on long runs, according to reports.
Probably did around 40k miles split between my i3 ownership of 2 cars both were REx, never had any significant issues, the 'puter automatically runs the range extender engine for a warm up / test cycle every few weeks if you don't use it anyway
It was very useful to be able to fall back on the REx on long runs without worrying too much if the charge point was broken down on your planned mid route stop, (sadly happens a lot) the only real sphincter test I had was blasting back from London up the motorway, we'd just passed a services with 5 miles range left and the REx failed to ignite
