Mobile key not working

[Bobby]

Did you man to reply to me or OP?

Anyone for whom this might help, I guess.

 

[sansonoma]

I was in the similar boat as all of you. My car was awful at waking up and there was no rhyme or reason. Key fob? Sucked. Phone key? Somehow worse. My success rate was probably close to 25% that the car would wake up within 10 seconds. I took it to service and was told they couldn’t reproduce it. I was pretty disappointed and thought this was just the experience. Until it got worse. At that point I demanded an antenna replacement on the car. Service gave in and man it’s been a night and day difference.

I’ve suggested this in another thread already but I personally believe that the cars antenna and logic board have had a lot of revisions over the years as lucid knows this was a pain point for the 2022 model years (and maybe 2023). This would explain the huge division in the forum around the handles unlocking. If I was OP, I would try to get your antennas replaced ASAP. My fob now wakes the car from about 5 ft away every single time. Since antenna replacement, I’ve maybe had 2-3 instances in which I’ve even had to touch my door handles to get the car to unlock, usually they are already unlocked when I get to the car (no matter which side I walk up from). Hell even the trunk opens without having to approach from the side now. Night and day.

I still wish that lucid was proactive about this though to save face. There is no way that this isn’t a known and wide spread issue at this point. I think a recall or customer PSA would be ideal to update all the cars to the later revisions. This would fix current owners outlook on the car along with some of the long term reviews as the key is usually mentioned in some capacity

Gonna give this a shot. Thanks much for theadvice. It can explain why @Bobby has a different experience than us.

 

[terrycs]

I have a Bluetooth speaker at home that can pick up my iPhone from super long distances, but is that really ideal for car security? I'm not sure I'd want my car unintentionally opening while I'm inside the grocery store for example.

The ideal situation is for the car to lock or unlock only if the mobile device is say within 5' to 10' (for example) from any direction. I have a feeling it might be too much to ask of Bluetooth technology? There are just too many environmental factors to consider.

Question for those familiar with other manufacturers that use one's mobile phone as a car key: Are they capable of more reliably using a mobile device to lock and unlock the car from a distance? Or does the device have to be held near a reader of some sort on the car?

 

[joec]

I have a Bluetooth speaker at home that can pick up my iPhone from super long distances, but is that really ideal for car security? I'm not sure I'd want my car unintentionally opening while I'm inside the grocery store for example.

The ideal situation is for the car to lock or unlock only if the mobile device is say within 5' to 10' (for example) from any direction. I have a feeling it might be too much to ask of Bluetooth technology? There are just too many environmental factors to consider.

Question for those familiar with other manufacturers that use one's mobile phone as a car key: Are they capable of more reliably using a mobile device to lock and unlock the car from a distance? Or does the device have to be held near a reader of some sort inside the car?

My Model 3, when I first got it, also had issues with unlocking. But Tesla figured it out and managed to make it much more reliable.

That's the only other manufacturer I know that relies completely on Bluetooth for this. Most other cars use other wireless technologies.

Lucid, too, has made it much more reliable than it was at first. But not for some, apparently. Personally, I think @koflo is right and many of those folks have a bad antenna somewhere. No amount of software tweaking is going to fix a bad antenna.

I'm sure if Lucid had it all to do again, they'd go with something other than pure Bluetooth LE for mobile phone unlocking. I'm so sure, in fact, because I was told they have changed this for Gravity. I'm guessing eventually, when Air gets a proper hardware refresh in a few years, Air will also abandon the BLE-only unlocking.

In the meantime, the best they can do is keep tweaking the software to make it more reliable. I wouldn't worry about it randomly unlocking in grocery stores, etc, though. That seems pretty unlikely.

 

[segbrk]

Are they capable of more reliably using a mobile device to lock and unlock the car from a distance?

Yes. Part of Lucid's problem is they're not just using the built-in car key functionality of iOS or Android, they rolled their own in their app. Mobile operating systems really like to put apps to sleep, while core functionality like their built-in car key features have much more freedom to e.g. wake up your phone and start working as soon as the car is detected nearby. That's why wiggling your phone around or just tapping its screen can make the Lucid mobile key start working.

The ideal situation is for the car to lock or unlock only if the mobile device is say within 5' to 10' (for example) from any direction. I have a feeling it might be too much to ask of Bluetooth technology?

Bluetooth is not a good idea for this, you are not wrong. The way manufacturers have done this with bluetooth is using the signal strength between the car and key to estimate how far away you are. As you said, all kinds of environmental factors are at play there. Also, a not very advanced "hacker" can easily use a signal repeater to unlock your car. If they have one device next to your pocket listening to the key, replaying to another device next to the car, both the car and the key will think they're right next to each other and unlock.

Gravity is (I believe) going to use UWB ("ultra-wideband", a silly generic name) for mobile key and fob, with timing-based proximity detection. That eliminates the repeater attack using authenticated timestamps baked into messages between the key and car. If you tried to relay that signal, your transmission between the next-to-key device and next-to-car device would take too long, and both sides would know you're up to no good (or far away). It's also somewhat less susceptible to environmental factors. Signal strength varies through different materials, depending on the direction you hold your hands and where you point your tongue, etc. - speed of electrons from point A to point B doesn't vary quite so much.

 

[GoFast]

I almost kicked the car today when I’m literally standing around the car for over 7 mins, after two phone resets, and no unlock. This has been a consistent thing for me, but never this long. They need to fix this issue fast!!!

You need to visit service...

 

[dingo]

I literally never do that.

That's great Bobby -- what is the point of informing me of that

It seems many people experience issues with the mobile key, if even for a few seconds more than expected... I'm glad you aren't.

 

[fredp]

So my mobile key is not unlocking the car automatically as I approach the car using my iPhone. I am on latest version with mobile key status “linked”. I have Bluetooth on. Yesterday I did not have my keyfob and walked up to the car and the car did not unlock. I had to open the Lucid app and waited about 10 seconds for the car to “wake up” and then had to manually unlock the doors using the app.
I thought the mobile key would unlock car doors automatically? How do I get it to work properly? I am on latest software edition.

Something to be aware of, as it was explained to me, is the the key fob uses bluetooth, not RF, which uses up battery life quickly and can cause the fob not to function as expected. When we first got our car and were having this issue, which still persists, is to replace the key fob battery frequently, i.e. - monthly, which in my mind is impractical. I suggested that Lucid look to develop a cradle that the key fob can sit in to recharge with a rechargeable battery.

 

[segbrk]

I suggested that Lucid look to develop a cradle that the key fob can sit in to recharge with a rechargeable battery.

I have looked to see if there's an easy way to retrofit that, for what it's worth. There are CR2032 compatible rechargeable batteries - LIR2032 and ML2032. The problem is their capacity is about a quarter of the non-rechargeable CR2032 at best, so you'd be recharging them every day. With that much cycling, they'd wear out and be useless in no time anyway.

 

[terrycs]

Something to be aware of, as it was explained to me, is the the key fob uses bluetooth, not RF, which uses up battery life quickly and can cause the fob not to function as expected. When we first got our car and were having this issue, which still persists, is to replace the key fob battery frequently, i.e. - monthly, which in my mind is impractical. I suggested that Lucid look to develop a cradle that the key fob can sit in to recharge with a rechargeable battery.

I'm not sure what technology is being used in the fob, but I haven't had to replace my fob battery yet. This is with normal use which includes manually opening/closing frunk almost daily and occasionally manually locking/unlocking doors if they do not automatically respond promptly when I am near the car. I also keep the fob (and iphone) away from my car when the car is in the garage so the car is not continuously locking/unlocking.