Grand Touring Deliveries?

[ac.bill]

Mostly GTs

 

[hmp10]

View attachment 881

Does this look Zenith Red to anyone else?

Just a pep talk here for Zenith Red:

I would have wanted the Quantum Gray had it been available on the Dream Edition, but I fell back on Black. Then, when Zenith Red was belatedly introduced, friends lobbied me hard for that, and I buckled to their entreaties.

Now that I have been living with the Zenith Red for a few weeks, I find the color just gets more interesting and more beautiful the more I see it in different light. At night it looks almost black. In daytime shadows it is a deep, deep wine. In full sunlight it glows almost like a ruby. I've had a couple of cars in the blood red palette in the past, but neither had the chameleon-like character of Zenith Red.

I was taking one of our cars in for service yesterday and was following the person driving the Zenith Red who was to bring me home. I was fascinated by how the color undulated from one hue to another as my angle of view and the car's angle to the sun shifted.

The downside is that it doesn't take much dust or dried rain spots to dull and cloud the effect, just as with a black car.

 

[Dortreo]

Mostly GTs

If there are that many GTs wrapped in the lot and people with early reservations are still hearing “4 weeks to delivery” and “do not finalize,” I wonder if the GTs are still waiting for ”fit & finish” parts lIke the DEs. It would seem reasonable. I’m looking forward to Lucid getting this issue sorted.

 

[MidwestLucidDude]

If there are that many GTs wrapped in the lot and people with early reservations are still hearing “4 weeks to delivery” and “do not finalize,” I wonder if the GTs are still waiting for ”fit & finish” parts lIke the DEs. It would seem reasonable. I’m looking forward to Lucid getting this issue sorted.

Doubtful. You have the park the cars somewhere when they are done. Those GTs will move out in 2-3 days. What Lucid is doing is delivering the remaining Dreams on the lot first. Cars receiving final testing are in the small lot next to the assembly plant. There, Lucid has a tiny test track and the car wash. If those cars are having issues, they go back inside the plant to be fixed. I have seen a few video clips where it appears cars with minor missing parts are getting them added in after the fact, but that is not a fit and finish issue. It is highly doubtful that Lucid would fully body wrap a car and move it into the main lot if it is not ready to ship. Too inefficient to unwrap a car and move cars back and forth from there. If you've read W. Edwards Deming's book about the auto industry and quality control, a manufacture should fix fit and finish issues on the line while the car is being made. Any good manufacturer should not let a car get off the assembly line with fit and finish issues. Tesla may be an exception there.

 

[mnewber1]

Something not to discussed is the potential for some of the remaining Dreams in the lot being for new and existing studios that have pre-production models. Here is an example of a Dream edition in the Short Hills studio that opened just now.

 

[mnewber1]

If there are that many GTs wrapped in the lot and people with early reservations are still hearing “4 weeks to delivery” and “do not finalize,” I wonder if the GTs are still waiting for ”fit & finish” parts lIke the DEs. It would seem reasonable. I’m looking forward to Lucid getting this issue sorted.

I haven't seen anyone getting hard timeline of 4 weeks till delivery, it's more of an estimated guess by users on this forum. "Do not finalize" is Lucid's way of staying non-commital to a specific date and prevents anyone from paying for insurance on cars they don't have yet. Also, VINs have been taken from people before and given to others so the VIN seems to be not final either.

 

[ac.bill]

... It is highly doubtful that Lucid would fully body wrap a car and move it into the main lot if it is not ready to ship. ...

This past year Ford assembled and stored tens of thousands of pickups that were then moved to storage waiting for an electronic ADAS component. This was better, they judged, than shutting down production lines waiting for that one part to trickle in. Later that year Ford had issues with removable roof panels made by Webasto for the hotly anticipated new Bronco. Ford decided to ship the vehicles, telling customers that replacement parts would follow when ready. This second decision turned out to be a bit of a PR disaster as it generated a lot of negative press about leaky roofs.

It is quite likely that the reported fit & finish issue we face is some interior component. That could be any of a thousand things from the wood veneer on the disappearing center console lid to the finish on the dash-mounted mechanical switches. If I had to bet, I would wager that it is the outer mechanical door handle, since there was a known issue with that part on some early deliveries.

In any case it makes sense to wrap the cars to protect the finish if the repair won't involve respraying the body.

 

[mnewber1]

I have seen a lot cars with just the driver side door not wrapped, like the one in the picture. I highly suspect that this is the fit and finish issue related. There have been quite a few I've seen fully wrapped except the door.

 

[copper]

I have seen a lot cars with just the driver side door not wrapped, like the one in the picture. I highly suspect that this is the fit and finish issue related. There have been quite a few I've seen fully wrapped except the door.

That‘s really interesting. Stands to reason they wouldn’t wrap that part if it was unfinished.

Have any parts on the front doors been trouble for existing owners?

 

[Adnillien]

View attachment 885

I have seen a lot cars with just the driver side door not wrapped, like the one in the picture. I highly suspect that this is the fit and finish issue related. There have been quite a few I've seen fully wrapped except the door.

I am guessing that they need to be able to open that section to move the cars around. Keep Bear's guessing on what cars are new or more likely to load onto a carrier.

 

[MidwestLucidDude]

View attachment 885

I have seen a lot cars with just the driver side door not wrapped, like the one in the picture. I highly suspect that this is the fit and finish issue related. There have been quite a few I've seen fully wrapped except the door.

is a better shot to view post production issues. You can see a few works witih a work tray installing something in the rear of the car. It is anyone's guess what they're doing and if it is an issue that is hampering deliveries.

Below is the exact spot in the video where you can see work being done post-production. What they are doing and if it is even an issue is speculation. I've searched the great Interweb for credible claims of fit and finish issues and not found one. Most of what is out there is click bait.

 

[mnewber1]

Below is the exact spot in the video where you can see work being done post-production. What they are doing and if it is even an issue is speculation. I've searched the great Interweb for credible claims of fit and finish issues and not found one. Most of what is out there is click bait.

Fit and finish issues is the exact term Lucid has given as to what is causing delays in delivery and production. It is confirmed by Lucid.

 

[MidwestLucidDude]

Fit and finish issues is the exact term Lucid has given as to what is causing delays in delivery and production. It is confirmed by Lucid.

Confirmed by Lucid? There's been no press release from Lucid stating a production delay due to fit and finish. People reporting that their advisor stated there are issues is certain suspect. There have also been people reporting that advisors have told them Lucid is on target with all their production goals. I take all of these with a grain of salt.

 

[mnewber1]

Confirmed by Lucid? There's been no press release from Lucid stating a production delay due to fit and finish. People reporting that their advisor stated there are issues is certain suspect. There have also been people reporting that advisors have told them Lucid is on target with all their production goals. I take all of these with a grain of salt.

Certainly an optimistic way to view that, I guess. I generally believe there are fit and finish issues when about half the forums reported they got that message from their advisors.

 

[SaratogaLefty]

Certainly an optimistic way to view that, I guess. I generally believe there are fit and finish issues when about half the forums reported they got that message from their advisors.

Yes and the same advisor who originally told me in late December about the "fit and finish" issues told me yesterday that my car was now complete and would ship in the "coming days". So I do believe there were in fact "fit and finish" issues that are slowly being resolved. May be limited to the Dream Edition models so maybe the GT models will move more quickly??

 

[Dortreo]

Confirmed by Lucid? There's been no press release from Lucid stating a production delay due to fit and finish. People reporting that their advisor stated there are issues is certain suspect. There have also been people reporting that advisors have told them Lucid is on target with all their production goals. I take all of these with a grain of salt.

FWIW, back in December when I asked my advisor how things were going with deliveries, he explicitly declined to answer. Since the beginning of the year, has any advisor said that Lucid is on track with production goals? I seriously doubt it. From notes on this forum, advisors seem to only be commenting on an individual customer's car, and the guidance has been at best 2 to 4 months from date of confirmation.

I'm a glass half-empty kinda guy so frankly don't understand optimism about production going swimmingly for a product as complex as a luxury performance EV. Or why someone would choose to be optimistic, when the track record for production of these kinds of things suggests quite the opposite. Remember: The first 90% of a project takes 90% of the time. The last 10% takes the other 90%.

 

[mnewber1]

Currently out right now, will post comparison picture soon. Bear just posted updated pics, several Grand Tourings gone. May just be studio deliveries for test drives.

 

[copper]

Currently out right now, will post comparison picture soon. Bear just posted updated pics, several Grand Tourings gone. May just be studio deliveries for test drives.

I’m actually betting they are the first deliveries but heading to studios. They’ll do the initial AGT deliveries with some PR, possible at the HQ.

Edit: forgot they’re not done with the DE deliveries yet.

 

[mnewber1]

Here's a comparison. Definitely some cars missing that was there before. Two trailers being load in pics. Do not see any non-red, white, or black cars. No non-white or black Grand Tourings that are unwrapped.

 

[MidwestLucidDude]

FWIW, back in December when I asked my advisor how things were going with deliveries, he explicitly declined to answer. Since the beginning of the year, has any advisor said that Lucid is on track with production goals? I seriously doubt it. From notes on this forum, advisors seem to only be commenting on an individual customer's car, and the guidance has been at best 2 to 4 months from date of confirmation.

I'm a glass half-empty kinda guy so frankly don't understand optimism about production going swimmingly for a product as complex as a luxury performance EV. Or why someone would choose to be optimistic, when the track record for production of these kinds of things suggests quite the opposite. Remember: The first 90% of a project takes 90% of the time. The last 10% takes the other 90%.

Can't find the post now but on either this forum or a few Facebook forums I follow there were several posts back in December or January with people stating that when they asked the sales folks in the Lucid Studio the reply was that they have been told by Lucid HQ to tell customers they will meet all the production goals. My reply to those comments is I found that strange for HQ to tell them to give that reply. It would seem to me that the corporate line would be to state that we can't confirm or deny production numbers.

I’m actually betting they are the first deliveries but heading to studios. They’ll do the initial AGT deliveries with some PR, possible at the HQ.

Edit: forgot they’re not done with the DE deliveries yet.

Agreed, I see the earnings call making some form of grand announcement (pun intended) of the roll out of the GTs. We did not get a good side view of the parking lot today so don't know if the cars lined up in rows on the left side are Dreams or GT. So far that area has been nothing but Dreams.