Someone stop me from going all-electric

I bought the car last week. $10,800 below MSRP was the final price, or $36k. After government rebates, that will bring the price to $26.

I'm not sure where you're getting that this car comes with a spare. No EV on the market comes with a spare. The B-class is no exception.

My driving falls into two categories: all driving in a given day can be done on a single charge, or I would need to charge somewhere during the day. I have free 240v charging at work and a 120v outlet at home. For the latter scenario, I would end up charging after ~50 miles. Depending on what sort of actual range I get on these routes, I might end up charging only once as well. I do know that people have gotten 100 miles on a single charge when charging in range mode.

Since all my charging is free or at public stations, I have never had a need for timers. But my understanding is that all the cars come with Internet-based control, including lock/unlock, charging, and climate control, and access to this service is included for free for the first 3 years of ownership.

Much quieter, both due to better cabin insulation and due to the fact that the motor is silent.

The wheelbase is shorter than the Prius by 0.1 inches. Overall width is shorter by 5 inches. The car is wider by 2 inches in the front and 11 in the back (??). However, the car is also taller by 2.5 inches. It's hard to evaluate something like this in a short test drive, but I did come off the freeway at speed and took a left turn pretty fast and the car definitely did not hug the ground. We'll see once I start driving on my own – my metric is how many MPH you can go above the recommended "yellow square" speeds shown on turns and ramps. On the Prius, 20 is reasonable and 25 is at the limit of maintaining traction on most roads. We will see how the B-class handles.

I've driven the RAV4 EV and the i3. I also drove a Leaf for 6 weeks as a commuter car two years ago. The i3 is a nimbler car for sure, but has lower range, a less powerful built-in charger, and costs much, much more (at least $7k more).

There's no moonroof. Generally, the B-class is comparable to a fully-loaded PiP Advance, which would actually cost more than what I paid. In addition to that, there's seat memory for 3 drivers and 3 passengers, the climate control is dual-zone, the wipers are automatic, the windshield is heated (would be really great for PiP given that it needs the engine to run the windshield defroster), TPMS shows you individual tire pressure readouts. As I mentioned above, the ride is much quieter. Sadly, cruise control is not adaptive, though I guess the pre-collision system would make sure you don't crash.

If you're interested in a 100+ mile car, check out the Kia Soul EV. I didn't go for it because it ends up costing the same for a less luxurious car and its charger is just 6.6 kW, compared to 10 kW on the B-class.

 

No, because those fees vary from city to city and you have zero control over them.

New. The dealer had an advertised price of $6k below MSRP through Edmunds, I got that down to $10k with a corporate fleet discount, and then managed to eek out another $800 just because.

I picked up the car on Wednesday morning and except for a few weird "bugs" absolutely love it. "Bugs": radio sometimes starts out silent when you turn on the car, front interior light doesn't work at all, some settings can't be changed even though they appear to be modifiable, and, the icing so far, they managed to deliver the car to me with no fluid in the washer reservoir (or the nozzles don't work either, haven't checked the fluid level yet).

Range seems good so far. I love being able to press on the "gas" however I want without having to worry about the gas engine coming on, lol. Today I went 37 miles with 59% range remaining after a regular charge (which would mean a total range of 90 miles); this included fast acceleration and highway driving at 75 mph for about 20 miles. Will try going to San Francisco on Sunday I think – 80 miles roundtrip the short, slow, and crappy way, 100 the long, fast, and peaceful way.

 

haha scheduled an appointment for two weeks from now to get the car looked at. basically none of the interior lighting works.
also radio randomly decides to turn volume to zero at startup.
but the drive experience is absolutely great.

Also, can now answer some of drash's questions from earlier.

So, I personally do not have any problems with them, but I also prefer a "sportier" ride than most. The car has neither a donut nor a tire repair kit.

This appears to have been resolved in the 2015 model. There are 3 (!) separate charge timers that you can set entirely in the car. You can also set separate departure time charge timers (so 6 total?). Like I said I have no use for these so there's that.

So today I got to do the cornering test, managed to go 30 mph above the recommended speed (70 on a 40 curve), and triggered traction control for a split second. I suspect with more precise steering, I could probably go 32 above. So, in that sense, definitely better handling.

Also, when I parked the cars next to each other, my god how tall the MB is. The bottom of the Prius windows are below the door handles on the MB.

I have to say that so far the entertainment system is better in many respects: higher quality Bluetooth phone connection, ability to disable analog FM radio, higher-resolution screen. But again bugs abound, for example the sound level between Bluetooth music and Radio is insane, when radio is set to a comfortable level Bluetooth is essentially silent, if you make Bluetooth loud enough to hear, switching back to Radio will blow out your eardrums. Hopefully when the car is in for service, they can install a software update that addresses the volume issues together with the lighting.

A final funny note: I registered for the MB Owners portal. When I try to log in, I get a server error because it can't load some page because the "B ED" model has a space in the name. Sent an email to MB support, we'll see how many years it takes them to address it.

 

36k, that's what the tax was charged on. So that was the actual purchase price put on the registration with the DMV.
Generally speaking, factory rebates *on financing* do not lower the purchase price. So when I bought my pip, I got a 2k discount from Toyota financial services. I did pay the sales tax on that. But this discount was an actual purchase price discount, so this didn't come into play. The financing was actually 3% on this car.