As an EV enthusiast, every now and then I would jump onto classified listings websites to have a look at the variety of electric vehicles on offer around the country.
This week I came across a much-forgotten EV by Mitsubishi that happens to be Australia’s cheapest, and probably one of the oldest.
A 2011 Mitsubishi i-MiEV is listed and priced – as at late November – at $17,990 drive-away with just a tad over 32,000km on the clock. It also happens to be the only Mitsubishi i-MiEV for sale in Australia.
The story of the Australian-delivered Mitsubishi i-MiEV began even before the first Nissan Leaf arrived.
I remember when these were launched back in 2010, you could only lease them and this was my first experience behind the wheel of an EV. The lease in 2010 was $1740 a month over a three-year term.
I was fortunate enough to be an engineering intern at Bosch back then in Melbourne. Being an automotive innovation-driven company, Bosch had one of these Mitsubishi innovative Electric Vehicle (MiEV) on a trial that employees could get behind the wheel of.
It was so quiet and easy to drive around the streets of southeast Melbourne. The 3,500 mm long mini hatchback was powered by 47 kW motor that produces 180 Nm of torque.
With claimed 155 km of range, it was plenty to get around town. More realistically, it would get around 120 km which was still plenty from its original 16 kWh battery pack.
As recently as last year, a local electric car repairer launched i-MiEV battery upgrade to get it up 200 km of a real-world range which is great for the few that are still running around.
In my humble opinion, the Mitsubishi i-MiEV is the car that started Australia’s transition towards EVs. The first batch arrived in Australia in late 2010, that’s over 12 years ago but feels like yesterday.
