Is the Karma a glorified I8, or is it the other way around?
Is it known what kind of mileage the i8 will get in gasoline only mode if its battery gets depleted?
As I understand it the Karma is EPA rated at 20 mpg[SUB]US[/SUB] (12 L/100 km; 24 mpg[SUB]Imp[/SUB]) in gasoline only mode[SUP]1[/SUP]. Shall we say
not that great in other words…
On the other hand, it is possible to seat four adults in a Karma. That does not seem to be the case with the i8… And the Karma is EPA rated at 32 miles (51 km) all electric[SUP]1[/SUP], vs. 22 all electric miles for the i8.
If both cars are mostly to be used only by a driver, and as long as they’re both mostly driven in all electric mode, the i8 seems to be more efficient. But since the Karma can drive longer in all electric mode, and also gets more efficient the more people it hauls, there might be scenarios when the Karma gets more efficient once the i8 has to resort to gasoline. But again – if there’s mostly only the driver in the car, and s(he) regularly drives a lot longer than 32 miles (or whenever the battery tends to run out if s(he)’s driving a Karma), then I guess at some point the i8 will again start to make more sense from an efficiency point of view.
On top of that there’s of course also financial and reliability concerns...
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And for those who can accept post 5 sec. 0-60 acceleration figures, there’s of course (soon) also the i3 and the Caddy ELR. And perhaps even the Volt. In Europe there’s also the Volvo V60 Plug-in.
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And of course: IMO it goes without saying that the Model S beats all of the above. Tesla is also IMO by far the best corporate entity to give money to in exchange for products, since [1] they are arguably the one single entity[SUP]2[/SUP] behind not only their own products, but also everything else that is fully or in part electric[SUP]3[/SUP]. And [2]: They are the only entity that currently exists that can be fully trusted to never stop to relentlessly strive towards getting as much of the transportation sector as is physically possible over to electric propulsion.
But, if X absolutely have to keep the option to fall back on ICE tech in order to keep his/her job (or significant other), and isn’t willing to part with either…
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[SUP]1[/SUP]
Fisker Karma - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
[SUP]2[/SUP]Ok. Not entirely true. The US gov. and some other governments like the Norwegian and most likely also the Japanese (Panasonic), have also been helpful.
[SUP]3[/SUP]With the possible exception of the Fisker Karma. I don’t know enough to say though, so I could very well be completely wrong here. Regardless, though the Model S IMO is the better choice – Fisker is as of now in reality no longer around.
