Take Mii home country roads
With heated seats and remote control lights, Seat’s fun-loving electric hatch belongs in your driveway
Maggie Barry
Well, it may not be a T-Bird but you can certainly have fun, fun, fun in Seat’s glorious little electric Mii.
If you have been thinking of investing in an electric model and just want a city runaround, you could do worse than take a good hard look at this lovely car.
I’ve had it for a week and fairly racked up the miles, spun it round the corners and zoomed it i nto parking spaces.
It is small and light but very well balanced, which makes it great fun to take out for a drive, especially with the foot down.
Of course it is no Ferrari – 81mph top speed – but since some of us do not necessarily have the need for speed, this is not always a drawback. And what this mischievous little car has is plenty of attitude and the performance to go with it.
First of all, the range – officially Seat says it is 160 miles and this may well be the case if you include the car’s
“limp” mode. This is an Eco+ button that you can press if you are nearing home and think you are not going to make it. It basically cuts everything out to try to give you enough energy and miles to get you home.
After plugging it in to my domestic socket overnight, however (apparently that’s how the majority of EV owners charge their cars), I had a full “tank” or charge and 136 miles on the clock.
Not that I am complaining because 136 miles was more than ample for two to three days’ normal driving around. If you want a rapid charge, plug it in at your local supermarket while you shop. There is a B gear which you use to enhance energy recuperation that is usually done by taking your foot off the gas or braking. The B gear just makes this all the fiercer, although you do lose a little power in the acceleration.
The car itself is quirky looking with quite a straight rear hatch, which makes it easy to reverse park – with sensors – and the boot is not bad, with room for shopping bags and a buggy probably if it is put in sideways, which is possible because of the high headroom.
The seats are comfortable and quite jazzy with black cloth and white stripy detailing on my model. They were also, surprisingly, heated, which I thought was quite an upmarket feature for a small electric car.
There is a handy little perch above the centre console on which to, well, perch your phone, which means it is not slithering around all over the place or falling under a seat. There is also a 5in colour screen with DAB radio as well as smartphone integration, sat nav and Bluetooth. There is a USB port and an AUX-in port too.
With the Seat connect app – and because this is an electric car – you can pair it to your phone and control certain things remotely, such as pre-heating it in winter, opening it and switching on lights. (It’s also useful if you lose your vehicle in a car park.)
The Seat Mii with its new electric powertrain under the bonnet – or floor, as the case may be – has really come into its own and is a revelation to anyone who thought EVs were boring.