Entry-level EV rolling drag race...including the Mini

Interesting to see the SE vs. the i3s. You'd expect them to be closely matched, and they were, but I've seen some i3s owners claim that it would be no contest.

EDIT: Here's the standing-start 1000 m drag race. No subtitles, but not really necessary to understand the outcome.

 

The video shows the Kona at 162 km/h (101 mph) when it pulls away near the end. The i3 and SE were quickest off the line, with the i3 pulling slightly ahead of the SE shortly after. Not sure if traction control was disabled, but the SE 0-100 km/h time (6.52s) seemed slower than what other drivers have gotten.

Very fun video.

 

0-100 km/h in 6.52 easily eclipses MINI's claim of 7.3 seconds.

Motor Trend "couldn't recommend" the MINI Cooper SE, but they did do 0-60 in a hurry:
> Take it to a dragstrip, and the Cooper Electric
> will accelerate from 0 to 60 mph in 6.0 seconds
> and through the quarter mile in 14.7 seconds
> at 91.7 mph.

FYI, here's MT author Duncan Brady's unreasonable concluding condemnation:
> But I can't recommend the Cooper SE. It's loud,
> stiff, it can't sustain full power for very long, and
> it offers fewer miles of range than fellow staffer
> Alex Leanse can cover on a bicycle. It is not the
> confidence-inspiring electric hot hatch I had
> anticipated. Instead, it's a style-over-substance,
> disappointing glimpse at how great an electric
> Mini could be.

I certainly wouldn't trade my SE for any other car in this drag race--I wonder what electric hot hatch Duncan Brady is using as his gold standard?

 

I only just saw this post. It is an excellent demonstration. Pretty much exactly as it should have gone. The mini and i3s have the same power, the i3s is slightly lighter, however slightly higher ultimate gearing (due to larger 20 inch wheels - 163kph vs 150 at 12000rpm). The Kona is heavy and powerful. The i3s and SE take off basically together quite a bit faster than the Kona and a lot faster than the rest, with the SE ever so slightly ahead (gearing advantage > weight disadvantage). RWD/FWD is a non issue as both aren't powerful enough to make much difference. The SE hits max power at just over 60kph, which is when the i3s catches up. They are pretty much neck and neck until the SE starts running out of revs and the i3s pulls away by about 10kph when the SE hits top speed. The SE is actually at top speed by 400m, so the i3 has 10kph advantage for about 500 of the remaining 600m. This should give around 34m advantage at the end of the race. The Kona eventually reels in the other two but it takes a long time considering the SE was not accelerating after 400m.

If anything, this actually shows how good the i3s still is, and that like the SE, weight matters. The Kona was always going to win as the other two could never pull far enough out to fight off a 20kph (or 30 for the SE) speed difference. If handling had been a factor too (ie track) there would have been a very different result

 

I forgot to add - when Motor Trend tested the SE at 6.0s 0-60mph, that includes a 0.3s 1ft rollout. What this means is that they don't trigger the timing till the front wheel goes through the timing beam. This makes times consistent, and is how drag strips measure 0-60 and 1/4 mile. It is used extensively in the US, however most other countries quote the time from standstill. This adds about 0.3s, so a 0-100 of 6.52 is actually quite quick (assuming the 1ft rollout wasn't used). Even if they did use the rollout type measurement, it is still close - as that extra 4kph from 60mph to 100kph takes about 0.4 seconds.

 

Thanks for explaining the reasoning behind the 1-foot rollout because it was really bugging me.

I'm from the old-school where 0 meant 0. There are certainly other ways to detect when acceleration begins without having to create a special procedure to accommodate an archaic pre-laser timing beam--a procedure that artificially produces quicker times. Who decided on one foot? Why not have a 20-foot rollout? That would make the results much more impressive. Why aren't these tests called the 1-foot-to-60 mph time so we can know they cannot be compared to the results some of us memorized decades ago? /geezer

 

I agree, it should be from 0. The 1 ft is a reference to the distance when the tyre first cuts the beam (front of the tyre) to when the beam stops being cut at the back of the tyre. The beam doesn't go through the middle but the bottom of the tyre - I suppose that is obvious as the middle of tyre has a car wrapped around it . For all but stupidly large tyres it is approximately 1 ft. It is for consistency at a drag strip. To get the best time, you just break the beam - if you go too far, you decrease your "free" time, so everyone tries to get is just right. This increases reproducibility. I personally prefer the time starting when the car first starts moving, however that is actually harder to monitor. The 1ft time depends on a beam of light, not an accelerometer/GPS. For the MINI, the rollout time is around 0.3s, so the 0-60 from real 0 is actually around 6.3s. Bjorn Nyland's timing (if you look closely) has 2 times. He quotes the real time, 6.6s from 0-100kph, but if you look carefully at his result screen you can see the 1ft rollout time of 6.3s. Still pretty quick

 

To me, any concession to the timing equipment that produces faster times is bogus. Traffic cops have more sophisticated equipment. A laser device at the end of the track (or down the road) could precisely record the time between 0 and 60 mph without requiring a roll-out.

While I'm complaining about numbers, why does MINI continue to claim the MINI Cooper SE has 184 hp when it really has 181 hp? How hard is it to go online and discover that the kW to hp conversion factor is 1.34102, not 1.35962 (the factor for converting kW to the German Pferdestrke, abbreviated "ps," not "hp")?

 

Um, they don't? States 181hp on the site.

 

There are actually 3 main conversion factors between kW and HP. There is mechanical, electrical and metric. These sort of translate to BHP, HP and PS. All are valid. 181 BHP = 184 PS. That is why it is easier to use kW - there is no ambiguity

 

I understand that we need to use HP for now, but I look forward to the day where we can talk about EV motors in terms of kW instead of converting to these old units. Then again, that day may never come - HP was created in order to ease the transition from horses to mechanical engines, and yet it still is in widespread use.

 

From page 19 of the 2022 MINI Press Kit:

I'm glad to hear that the MINI website got it right. However, this spec directly equates 135 kW to 184 hp, rather than the correct "135 kW/181 hp" or "135 kW/184 ps." Automotive writers who don't do the math repeat this incorrect information in their publications.

All are valid unless they use the wrong measure. HP /= PS. If they want to quote the PS number, identify the number as ps, not hp.

 

Lol shows I don't read those closely. I'm pedestrian and look to the site for quick info. They've constantly been correcting info all along so I don't put much weight on a press releases. Even the 0-60 has shaved a few tenths of a second since I first started reading. My initial thought is that was a wrong translation of sorts since km over mi was used.

I'll blame the person who stole my fog lights on this.... clueless sometimes.

 

I believe MINI has always conservatively quoted 6.9 seconds for the 0-60 mph time and 7.3 seconds for the 0-100 km/h time for the SE. One unassailable spec on the website has remained constant: 100% MINI Driving Excitement.

 

Then it was on the site wrong for a long time - someone really stinks at getting regions right