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Great writeups so far, bennelson, and that looks like a great find!
I'm considering an iMiEV, among other EV's. I wanted to ask you if you had a more complete range estimate shown/charge level shown list for your big trip from Chicago, how many miles between actual charging stops, how much heater used, how much charge put in, etc. My usage case is pretty close to ideal for an iMiEV, if it will do my once a week round trip of 48 miles without work charging/38 miles with work charging. I've a longer once/month trip that is ~68 miles with work charging, but there's a quick charger en route from which the remaining trip is 44 miles. My daily commute is 10.1 miles each way, so it would be trivial to do in an iMiEV.
Unfortunately, it looks like the "really good buy" one I was asking a dealer about (I think it was under $6K!) got sold - it is no longer listed. Was a one-owner with 44,500+ cold-climate (MN) miles on it. Now the cheapest ones are a hair under $8k - and there are 2012 Leaf SL's within $1k of that price. This is a bummer - I finally signed up for ecomodder to ask about your cheap high-mileage iMiEV because I was looking at a similar one, and now it is gone!
I'm in no hurry, so perhaps another cheap one will pop up - and I don't really want to buy another fuel-burner, so hybrids are pretty much out. At the current prices, though, the Leaf looks like a better deal than the iMiEV due to the slightly better range, cold climate making battery degradation less of a worry, much larger userbase, and (I think...) 3kw heater vs. the 5kw heater in the iMiEV. (Both are resistance heaters, until you pony up to a 2013 SL or SV Leaf, when they introduced the heat pump).
A note on your comment about adding a high-powered 120V heater for additional pre-heat capacity while charging - and the heating system in general. What does it look like under the "hood" in front? What's on what would be the "firewall" in a front-engine car? (The "i" in Japan is a rear-engine car). It would seem that if there is room on the "firewall" one could relocate the heater under the "hood" and get it out of the fast-moving cold air under the car. Might be easier to insulate it, too, and keep said insulation from trapping salt-slush. Adding a "tank type" coolant heater meant for an ICE would also help, though a pump-equipped one and a way to run the car's fan would also be nice. Apologies if that's all obvious already - I've not really done much of my own maintenance for too many years now, so I'm falling back on rather obsolete information plus googling.
Anyways, glad you like your car!
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