Lucid Technology

[hmp10]

Tom Moloughney wrote an article for "InsideEVs" giving more information on Lucid charging than he put in his video of the 0-100% charging session.

In this article he explains why the Lucid required 134 kWh to refill the battery pack. Even more interestingly, he said that Lucid told him the Dream Edition makes the entire pack capacity accessible to the user -- in other words, no buffers. This is the first I've heard of any EV manufacturer doing this.

This might support the suspicion I've expressed earlier that the difference in the GT 112-kWh pack and the Dream 118-kWh pack might be in the size of the buffers in addition to any differences between the Dream Samsung cells and the LG Chem Dream cells. It'll be interesting to find out how much of the GT pack gross capacity is accessible to the user.

I'm also curious whether there is something about the Samsung chemistry that makes it less damaging to tap into the battery's upper and lower charge limits?

Watch World's First Lucid Air 0-100% DC Fast Charge Test

The very first DC fast charge recording of the Lucid Air. We find out how fast does the Lucid Air charge in our Lucid Air EV charging review.

insideevs.com

 

[FFT]

Just to state the obvious, this really does not seem at all like the more polished product worthy of a > $100K car that I was expecting. Frankly, that surprises me given how long they have been touting this UI.

 

[manitou202]

Just to state the obvious, this really does not seem at all like the more polished product worthy of a > $100K car that I was expecting. Frankly, that surprises me given how long they have been touting this UI.

This was basically someone walking through the UI for their first time. Any new car is going to have a learning curve. For example he commented that it didn't show the arrival time when navigating to a destination, but it clearly showed an arrival time and time to destination on the upper screen.

I would tell you it looks better than my $200k Porsche Taycan. The menus in the Taycan are not easy to navigate and Porsche uses a crappy app like layout with isn't intuitive. The Taycan's lower screen only displays basic HVAC functions, so it's much more limited. Also way better than my E-tron. Both my Taycan and E-tron do not show many Electrify America stations in the navigation. I had to use a third party app on my drive from Colorado to Phoenix to find some of the actual charging sites. They both are partnered with EA as well.

It's maybe not as polished as Tesla (the best UI in the industry in my opinion) but it's arguably better than most if not all legacy automakers.

 

[hmp10]

Tesla has been at this for over 10 years. Our 2015 Model S went through several screen layouts and countless feature upgrades over the six years we had it. Our Model S Plaid that we got in August is still waiting for features such as active noise cancellation to be activated. My key fob that is programmed to the car will always unlock the doors and release the charge cable, but about a third of the time it will not allow the car to start, requiring me to dig the key card out of my wallet and rub it over the phone charger pad. Every week or two we get a message saying Autopilot and accident avoidance features are unavailabe -- a situation that persists until we park the car and restart it, which sometimes takes a couple of tries.

The VW ID.4 and the Mustang Mach-E, both of which some friends have, have had an array of initial software glitches, and Ford and VW have vastly larger resources for software engineering than Lucid.

I fully expect some software gremlins to bedevil the Lucid for a while . . . just as I fully expect Lucid to resolve them and do some minor layout adjustments as user experience grows.

Cars are driving machines first, and driving machines are incredibly difficult to design and manufacture to the standards of performance, handling, and comfort that Lucid appears to have attained at the outset of sales.

 

[hydbob]

I don't understand at all after reading and hearing so much, why everyone has the expectation that Lucid would produce a perfect product right out the gate?

It completely baffles me and on top of that, they say "at this price point..." How many cars just as expensive or even more so have glaring issues? It's completely asinine that they all get a pass because they are established automakers and Lucid gets dragged through the mud because they are a startup?

Not to mention, Branden is so biased in his comments in his review. Instead of answering questions about the UI, he just says it needs improvement. What a crock, that's bad journalism.

 

[Lucken]

I don't understand at all after reading and hearing so much, why everyone has the expectation that Lucid would produce a perfect product right out the gate?

It completely baffles me and on top of that, they say "at this price point..." How many cars just as expensive or even more so have glaring issues? It's completely asinine that they all get a pass because they are established automakers and Lucid gets dragged through the mud because they are a startup?

Not to mention, Branden is so biased in his comments in his review. Instead of answering questions about the UI, he just says it needs improvement. What a crock, that's bad journalism.

If you want the honest answer to that it's because Rawlinson pretty much told everyone that's the way it would be, perfect out of the gate. After all, it was one of the stated reasons for all the delays. We may not feel that's a reasonable expectation, but that's exactly what he did, raise expectations to a probably unachievable level.

 

[Alex]

If you want the honest answer to that it's because Rawlinson pretty much told everyone that's the way it would be, perfect out of the gate. After all, it was one of the stated reasons for all the delays. We may not feel that's a reasonable expectation, but that's exactly what he did, raise expectations to a probably unachievable level.

Right. Just look at the October 12th Dream Drive Reveal video - a major disconnect with the current shipping cars.

 

[hydbob]

That's true, but I think it is "okay" if they can get the UI update out before non-dream holders start deliveries. I had the expectation going into it, I would essentially be beta testing for Lucid.

 

[Alex]

That's true, but I think it is "okay" if they can get the UI update out before non-dream holders start deliveries. I had the expectation going into it, I would essentially be beta testing for Lucid.

Right. The privilege of paying $30K more to be able to beta test the UI.

 

[hydbob]

From what I remember you are a DE edition holder as well? What's your reason to pay for the DE over the GT?

 

[Alex]

From what I remember you are a DE edition holder as well? What's your reason to pay for the DE over the GT?

Originally, there was a supposed greater difference in range. I wanted the maximum range. There were to be exclusive features, of which currently only the exterior Gold paint is unique and possibly the 21" wheels, although I'm getting the R version with 19" wheels. Also, being able to get the car much sooner - like a year ago, at which point I would not mind being a beta tester and possibly having more of a say into UI features.

 

[dawktah LucidGT]

Originally, there was a supposed greater difference in range. I wanted the maximum range. There were to be exclusive features, of which currently only the exterior Gold paint is unique and possibly the 21" wheels, although I'm getting the R version with 19" wheels. Also, being able to get the car much sooner - like a year ago, at which point I would not mind being a beta tester and possibly having more of a say into UI features.

I was offered to get a Dream as well, we still live out in the country on gravel roads so June we will have moved.

 

[hydbob]

So something interesting...if you use a mobile key, and lock and unlock your car, the car will require a pin to drive. But you can still access all the other settings and profiles but can't change anything.

 

[hmp10]

What is a mobile key? The key fob?

 

[hydbob]

Your phone

 

[AIR.LUCID]

Lucid has said little about the technology of the Air motors but, due to their very high power density, my brother had begun to suspect that they might be an axial flux design. The less efficient radial flux design dominates in EV applications, but there have been some indications that EV manufacturers were starting to look at axial flux designs for EVs, particularly with the growing interest in hub motors. As far as we could find, though, none had not made it to market.

We had both pored over the exploded view of the drive unit on the Lucid website and concluded, based on visible geometry, that they were the more conventional radial flux design. But there were still some aspects of the motor's performance that seemed to comport more with an axial design.

"Car & Driver" just published a review of the Dream claiming that Lucid does, in fact, use axial flux motors:

2022 Lucid Air Dream Edition Turns It Up to 1111

For its first trick, Lucid pulls an impressive 1111-hp electric sedan out of thin air.

www.caranddriver.com

The relevant passage is:

"The axial-flux front and rear motors are identical, and each weighs a mere 163 pounds. They're a big part of how Lucid managed to get S-class space into a car with a 116.5-inch wheelbase . . . ."

(The article also answered a question that has been the subject of speculation on the Lucid forums: each of the 22 battery modules weighs 51.8 pounds, for a total of 1140 pounds of battery pack.)

this may be of interest. https://patents.justia.com/patent/20200127508

 

[hmp10]

Thank you. That is the most detail I've seen so far on the Lucid motors.

 

[FFT]

 

[hmp10]

This is an interesting review of the Lucid design (with some comparisons made to the EQS design) by a London-based design firm:

 

[AIR.LUCID]

Ben Collins Drives The Lucid Air GTP posted 8/19/22