Out of Spec 3 Row EV race - Lucid Gravity driven by Kyle

[johnse]

My wife and I watched them all. Thank you @outofspeckyle, @Cyp , and everyone else involved! I specifically stopped reading this thread as each episode was posted so as not to be spoiled.

*** SPOILERS BELOW ***

We were wondering why @outofspeckyle didn't try rebooting the Gravity earlier in the race to clear the stuck cameras? Also, did you find out more info from Lucid about the charge port errors?

Congratulations to both Gravity crews for winning the race. The result reinforced our decision to replace 2018 Model X 100D with the GDE. I've done many coast-to-coast (Seattle to Maryland) and Seattle to Phoenix trips in the X. I did not optimize for max charging curve like the X team did, choosing to drive from 80% to the mid-teens, except for the stretches that needed maximum range between chargers. But also, my charging curve is much lower than the current models. 120kw peak was normal in 2018 and although Tesla increased the charging rate over time, 150-170kw is typically the maximum I ever get.

With a couple of long trips in the Gravity, we have been very pleased by the increase in range between charges and the decrease in time needed. Again, we tend to charge to higher percentages and the car is typically ready to go before we are, and her range is greater than our bodies have.

Also, since we don't drive cannonball style, the BMS has time to get resting pack measurements, so BMS Sway probably won't impact us much.

Again, thank you for the long form content OOSpec posts. Your early reviews of the Gravity helped us learn about this wonderful car.

 

[9point81]

Not disputing Gravity's advantages. Just thought the actual 2,060 mile/32+hr road trip would show much bigger differences than what was realized.

I own an Air GT and a R1S and I drive these two cars alternately on 780 mile trips between Phoenix and Sausalito. The Air is more efficient than the Gravity, but does not charge as well.

For a 2,060 mile race, I'd expect at least 15+% advantage.

Maybe with normal people like us there'd be a delta that large for time, but these OoS teams are PROS at all aspects of getting the most out of the cars and charging, assuming it all works as it should. If a team of us normies raced against them, we'd have been back with the Buzz probably!

 

[petergottlieb]

I didn't watch all of OoS's videos on this race.

First, congratulations to Kyle's team and the two Gravities that won the 1 and 2 spots.

Of interest to me, is how all the other SUVs do with respect to the Gravities, which has the best efficiency and the fastest charging.

Per Kyle's summary,
> the Gravities completed the race in approximately 32 to 32.3 hours (started ~11:30AM, arrived ~8PM the next day). Kyle attributed the win(s) to high efficiencies (~2.7-2.8 mi/kWh) and ultra-fast charging.
> the Model X took another 26min.
> the Escalate, R1S, and Hyundai completed the race about 1hr 45min to 2hrs behind the lead Gravity.

These results were a bit of a surprise to me.

If I captured these numbers accurately, that means the R1S, which Kyle called a "Brick", low efficiency (~2.25 mi/kWh) and has slow charging (400V), completed the race and took ~6% longer travel time (driving + charging) than the much more efficient Gravities. While a win is a win, that seems like a rather small margin to me!

Q: Am I interpreting the data correctly?
Feel free to elucidate me.

I mean the takeaway is fairly obvious to me. Gravity is fastest, but if you are just driving without trying to maximize everything there are two-or-three vehicles that all do pretty well to (no, not you, iD Buzz!).

I mean, to me it feels like the difference between going the speed limit or five miles over the speed limit. Yes, it adds up over time, particularly on a long trip, but in most cases, and on most drives, it's less significant than it feels. The challenge for the Gravity is fixing/improving the quality of life stumbles. That stuff matters more when you take on board that the performance difference is real, but not life changing for the most part (a half-hour or so a 12 hour driving day in a determined multi-day road trip between it and the second tier (R1s/Escalade, Hyundai?).

 

[037]

Just to state the obvious, more powerful vehicles are generally less efficient.

As much fun as it is to compare 800hp Gravity to 600hp Rivian to 400hp Ioniq 9 to whatever the Cadillac makes depending on drive mode, these are absolutely different vehicles for different purposes.

We need an excel full of data so we can each play with it and extract what is important to us.

For me, I want to see average speeds between charging stops and efficiency, along with outside temperature so I can gauge consumption at speed and temperature.

Charging speeds at temperature would be great to know too.

 

[BS8899]

Just to state the obvious, more powerful vehicles are generally less efficient.

As much fun as it is to compare 800hp Gravity to 600hp Rivian to 400hp Ioniq 9 to whatever the Cadillac makes depending on drive mode, these are absolutely different vehicles for different purposes.

We need an excel full of data so we can each play with it and extract what is important to us.

For me, I want to see average speeds between charging stops and efficiency, along with outside temperature so I can gauge consumption at speed and temperature.

Charging speeds at temperature would be great to know too.

Temperature, speed, road conditions, etc. are all relevant points when it comes to EV efficiency. That said, in OoS races, all the EVs are travelling the same route, around the same time. Hence, most of these factors affect all the EVs similarly.

The Gravity (ies) won, as expected. However, the margin vs the other EVs are surprisingly narrow.

On paper, Gravity's efficiency and charging speed is almost 1.5-2X that of some of the other EV-SUVs. Yet, in a real-life contest, the margin of win is much smaller.

 

[Ron_Burgundy]

I don’t quite understand why the Buzz was included. Given its range, there was a 0% chance it was going to win.

I do have a friend who loves their Buzz, but it’s because they like the space for kids and stuff and tbh y never, ever road trip.

 

[037]

Temperature, speed, road conditions, etc. are all relevant points when it comes to EV efficiency. That said, in OoS races, all the EVs are travelling the same route, around the same time. Hence, most of these factors affect all the EVs similarly.

The Gravity (ies) won, as expected. However, the margin vs the other EVs are surprisingly narrow.

On paper, Gravity's efficiency and charging speed is almost 1.5-2X that of some of the other EV-SUVs. Yet, in a real-life contest, the margin of win is much smaller.

The margin is smaller because vehicles were optimized, who knew that Model X likes to charge at 11% but not 8%?

It’s not like everyone would travel same distance, charge to 80% and go again.

Skill of people in the car made a huge difference.

Fixing an issue vs going with the flow, for example.

Most people don’t even know what speed to expect, my Gravity hasn’t hit 300kw charging ever!

 

[Ron_Burgundy]

So, I think the difference WOULD be bigger with normal folks who just charge when they want, etc because, by “default” Gravity has more range and charges faster.

As others said, with “pros” optimizing everything in the race, the result doesn’t surprise me. It’s less about Gravity should have performed better and more about the X and R1S performing much better than they probably would with a typical owner/driver.

 

[BS8899]

The margin is smaller because vehicles were optimized, who knew that Model X likes to charge at 11% but not 8%?

It’s not like everyone would travel same distance, charge to 80% and go again.

Skill of people in the car made a huge difference.

Fixing an issue vs going with the flow, for example.

Most people don’t even know what speed to expect, my Gravity hasn’t hit 300kw charging ever!

All fair points. But folks like Kyle (OoS) and Tom (SoC) know their stuff, correct? They know how far down they should run the battery and what chargers to go to.

 

[yectonix]

The margin is smaller because vehicles were optimized, who knew that Model X likes to charge at 11% but not 8%?

It’s not like everyone would travel same distance, charge to 80% and go again.

Skill of people in the car made a huge difference.

Fixing an issue vs going with the flow, for example.

Most people don’t even know what speed to expect, my Gravity hasn’t hit 300kw charging ever!

It also comes down to the ratio of time spent driving vs charging. Modern EVs are pretty good, so the vast majority of the time is spent on the actual driving.

Google Maps says it takes 31 hours to drive from Fort Kent, ME to Key West, FL without traffic. (They were going 10 miles over the speed limit, but also hit some traffic, so I'll use 31 hours as an illustrative example)

So if the Gravity took 32.5 hours total, that's only 1.5 hours spent charging plus getting to/from the chargers. If the Rivian/Escalade were 2 hours later, that means they spent 3.5 hours stopping and charging. More than double the time!

 

[BS8899]

I don’t quite understand why the Buzz was included. Given its range, there was a 0% chance it was going to win.

I do have a friend who loves their Buzz, but it’s because they like the space for kids and stuff and tbh y never, ever road trip.

I bet the Buzz was the most comfortable transport!

I had a VW Eurovan with a built-in table for 26 years. My kids and our dogs love that van!

 

[Smorgasbord]

State of Charge has released his version of the race, with more stats as you'd expect from Tom Moloughney:

For instance:

 

[Smorgasbord]

However, the margin vs the other EVs are surprisingly narrow.

Well, the Model X team was riding their limited charge curve to the extreme. The SC Gravity team only stopped 11 time, and I suspect the any-charger Gravity teams stopped about the same. IIRC, the Model X team charged 40 times!!

So not only did they lose by ~25-50 minutes, they had a lot more hassle in my view. And this is with the Model X being the most efficient of the vehicles by more than 10%. Shows how charging speed does matter.

We took a 850+ mile road trip right after getting our car, same trip we do every year, previously in our Model X LR. The Gravity not only went further on the initial charge, the stop we did make was determined by our bathroom break, not the charge needed - and we used Tesla SCs so didn't get above 250kW. While I didn't measure the time, we figured we saved a half hour just on each 425 mile leg of the round trip.

 

[Smorgasbord]

actually... Cyp's Gravity is a 5 seater while Kyle's was a 7 seater, so I would've liked to see how much of a difference the range would have made

As weight is the only difference there, to get a truly fair comparison the vehicles would have to be loaded with the same amount of weight. As the owner of a 5-seat Gravity, I think we should all be using the 7-seat range estimates for our comparisons and calculations.

 

[Shane_SLC]

State of Charge has released his version of the race, with more stats as you'd expect from Tom Moloughney:

For instance:
View attachment 35742

From Tom's video, in case anyone just wants to see the rankings.

 

[msaunders9430]

State of Charge has released his version of the race, with more stats as you'd expect from Tom Moloughney:

For instance:
View attachment 35742

For the sake of clarity: the chart shown in the post above about Tom's video is the charging data from one his charging tests with the Gravity before the Eastern Edge race. It is not from the actual race. Remember, his team was limited to Tesla superchargers, so they would not be charging at 400 kW.

 

[9point81]

View attachment 35745
From Tom's video, in case anyone just wants to see the rankings.

This right here is one of the hugest takeaways. Google estimates that the entire drive of 2000+ miles should take about 32 hours in a gas car. The winning Gravity did it in 33 hrs and 20 mins! If it hadn't had the charging issues later on, possibly could have shaved 30-60 minutes off that arrival time. People always complain how EV road trip is going to take HOURS longer. That's just Not true anymore with a vehicle like Gravity!

 

[Smorgasbord]

For the sake of clarity: the chart shown in the post above about Tom's video is the charging data from one his charging tests with the Gravity before the Eastern Edge race. It is not from the actual race. Remember, his team was limited to Tesla superchargers, so they would not be charging at 400 kW.

Yes, thanks. I just did a post in the Gravity->Charging sub-forum doing some math of his optimizing of when to stop charging. I again used the EA 400 kW data since that's all I had, but even there the numbers came out that they definitely should not have stayed longer. I wonder with the 224kW Tesla SC charger restrictions if maybe they should have taken a page from the Model X team and stopped even sooner?

 

[msaunders9430]

Yes, thanks. I just did a post in the Gravity->Charging sub-forum doing some math of his optimizing of when to stop charging. I again used the EA 400 kW data since that's all I had, but even there the numbers came out that they definitely should not have stayed longer. I wonder with the 224kW Tesla SC charger restrictions if maybe they should have taken a page from the Model X team and stopped even sooner?

Kinda hard to say without knowing their next charging locations. I look at the stops where they ended with 18 and 19 percent soc and wonder why they stopped. That soc is allowing for a lot of BMS sway. Their plan was to charge with an soc of 5 to 8 percent. Again, hard to say without knowing the next charging locations. They're the pros. What do I know.

 

[Bdr100]

I don’t quite understand why the Buzz was included. Given its range, there was a 0% chance it was going to win.

I do have a friend who loves their Buzz, but it’s because they like the space for kids and stuff and tbh y never, ever road trip.

Don’t think that the object was a race but rather to stress test all of the available 3 row SUVs out to see how they perform. The info on the Buzz was helpful for those that might be considering it as a primary around town people hauler and let potential owner know what “moderate” and “limited” road tripping would be like.