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Recharge Wrap-up: BMW i app for Apple Watch, Tesla certified pre-owned web page

BMW has introduced ConnectedDrive and BMW i remote apps for the Apple Watch. The apps can show users battery and charging status, give service alerts, and control certain vehicle functions from the wearer's wrist. It can tell the owner if the doors are locked, or if the sunroof or trunk is open. Users can activate the climate control remotely from their watch, or honk the horn to help find the car in a crowded parking lot. It can even guide the owner back to the car using the navigation system. Read more in BMW's press release below. Higher octane gasoline could provide better fuel economy. According to a panel at the SAE World Congress that included folks from Ford, General Motors, Chevron and an ethanol group, a higher-octane fuel could boost fuel economy by three to six percent and reduce CO2 emissions by two percent. While higher octane fuel is more expensive, building cars calibrated to higher octane ratings could help automakers raise fuel economy and meet CAFE standards. Cars not calibrated to the higher octane levels would likely not see any significant benefit in fuel economy. Read more from Automotive News. Tesla Motors has added a Certified Pre-Owned section to its website. Tesla didn't make any announcement before it quietly added the CPO page. The used Model S electric cars sold by Tesla include a warranty good for four years or 50,000 miles. Plus, the cars have been inspected by technicians at Tesla to make sure everything is in working order and up to company standards. Explore the page yourself, and read more at Teslarati. BMW ConnectedDrive and BMW i Remote app. World premiere: Apple Watch controls functions of BMW i models. Munich. BMW is pressing its claim to automotive brand leadership in the world of mobile vehicle connectivity through its BMW ConnectedDrive technology. As the BMW i Remote app confirms, nowhere else is the link-up of driver, car and outside world raised to such an advanced level. The app can already be used to remotely check and control functions of BMW i models. It is an application that customers will also be able to use from day one on the new Apple Watch, due for imminent release. Apple Watch uses the BMW i Remote app – which can be downloaded free from the Apple iTunes Store – to keep users updated on the car's current battery status, for example, and alert them when the high-voltage unit is fully charged.

Ferrari, BMW lend expertise to Olympic bobsled, skeleton, luge

LONDON — There are plenty of reasons why the sport of bobsleigh is sometimes referred to as Formula One on ice, but few as obvious as Italy's World Cup sleds. Resplendent in Ferrari red, and with a set of team sponsor Pirelli's P-Zero tyres painted on the sides, they are even liveried to look like racing cars. Ferrari, Formula One's most glamorous and successful team, have worked with the Italian federation, whose sleds run without sponsor branding at the Olympics, since 2010 and in the run-up to next month's Pyeongchang Winter Games. Former rival BMW, title sponsor of the World Cup, has long partnered the U.S. bobsleigh team, while McLaren teamed up with Britain's bob and skeleton athletes for the 2014 Sochi Games in Russia. "There's always the link between the Formula One companies, or any motor company, and skeleton and bobsleigh," says Rachel Blackburn, the engineer who has been involved in Britain's skeleton program since 2006 and who used to work for McLaren. "There's the Ferrari sleds and the BMW sleds ... when we were at McLaren it kind of made a good story," she told Reuters by telephone from her home in Dubai. That somewhat manufactured rivalry has died down in the years since Sochi, with McLaren no longer involved and Ferrari's presence low key. But the worlds of grand prix motor racing and sliding sports still have plenty in common. Bobsled, luge and skeleton are among the fastest of Olympic sports, with bobsleds reaching speeds over 90 mph. Drivers are subjected to gut-wrenching G-forces, and crashes can be fatal. And then there is the ongoing debate about cost controls, the direction of future rules, preserving a level playing field and obsessive secrecy — all endlessly recurring themes in Formula One. 80 mph on a tea tray Blackburn said skeleton, where riders hit 80 mph on what has glibly been compared to an oversized tea-tray, sits somewhere between Americas Cup yachts and Formula One cars in terms of speed and aerodynamics. "Applied engineering is far more interesting than the pure stuff, so when its applied to something that's fun and exciting it does make it a lot easier to solve problems," she said. "There is the Americas Cup, sailing, Formula One and the high speed ice sports as well. It's the same concept.

Tesla exec calls rival EVs 'little more than appliances'

Tesla's Vice President of Business Development Diarmuid O'Connell called the company's competition "little more than appliances" at the Center for Automotive Research's Management Briefing Seminars in Traverse City, MI yesterday. "In essence, [mainstream automakers] delivered little more than appliances," O' Connell said. "Now, appliances are useful. But they tend to be white. They tend to be unemotional." According to Automotive News, O'Connell's main critique is that vehicles like the Nissan Leaf and BMW i3 don't deliver enough performance or range to draw the attention of consumers outside of a small group. The solution, in O'Connell's mind, is more power, more range, more excitement and a lower price – that last point is particularly rich coming from an automaker whose cheapest current offering, the Model S 60, costs $66,000 – although the cheaper Model 3 is on the horizon, way out there, somewhere. But some EVs are better than none, O'Connell added. "On balance, I'm happier that [traditional automakers are] doing these cars than not," O'Connell said. "I just wish they would do them better and faster." O'Connell also used his appearance at the Management Briefing Seminars to launch a volley at the Michigan legislature, blaming its opposition to Tesla's direct-sales model for the lack of available EVs in the Wolverine State. "I think if the Michigan Legislature would allow Tesla to sell cars in Michigan, we could probably address [the lack of available electric cars]," O'Connell said. Related Video: