Problems, glitches, issues and observations etc

[hydbob]

Awesome thanks for the update! Please let us know what happens with the techs!

 

[Lucken]

Two mobile service techs just arrived. Before I got into the weeds about our car's problems, I asked them about the dark spots in the headlight beam. They said that, due to the brightness of the LED lights, they are there to reduce the light intensity in the area where oncoming drivers might have a problem. They said most systems lower the entire beam, but Lucid took a more focused approach.

As for the freezing and blanking out of our screens, their service center has seen it in one more car (in Pensacola), which was running software version 1.0.4.

Although likely software, they probably can't rule out a hardware issue.

 

[Paladin732]

Although likely software, they probably can't rule out a hardware issue.

Even seeing 200 cars delivered (let’s call that a high guess, it’s likely closer to 150) 2 of these failures across the fleet is quite high. Let’s hope it’s something simple with an odd configuration due to your software and not the same as the other user.
The odds of a mismatch in versions of software amongst components causing this seems quite high on first glance.

 

[hmp10]

Two mobile techs arrived right on time in a service vehicle bigger and better equipped than any mobile service vehicle I've seen from Tesla. (This summer a Tesla tech arrived in a 2015 Model S with the rear hatch loaded with tools and paraphernalia. I had just found that the rear sun mesh from our 2015 Model S would not fit the Plaid, so I donated it to him, as he said that things got hot to the touch back there.)

I had sent a detailed description of the latest problems I was having to Lucid Customer Care before 6:00 a.m. this morning, and it had already been forwarded to and read by the techs by the time they arrived.

Lucid seems to have delivered on its promise to have service capability in place from the start of deliveries. As aggravating as the car has been thus far, every single contact with Service so far has been all anyone could expect. Now, we'll see if they can actually fix the problems I'm having . . . .

 

[CraZ8]

So how long were the techs there and did they resolve any/ all the problems?

 

[Kzooguy]

I too had a tech visit here in Orlando today. This was for the following issues that I had reported to Lucid:
-Frunk would not open at all from any device.
-Facial recognition would not work for Driver profile.
-Car had 1.0.6 version software while most others are on 1.0.7 (except for 2 members that we know who have 1.1)

Communication over the phone yesterday to set this appointment up was excellent. Lucid confirmed the appointment in the afternoon. Then, late evening I recd a phone call from Riviera beach with more specific details (who the tech would be, when exactly they would arrive etc).

This morning I got an update when tech was en route and also an ETA.

Tech called around 20 min prior to showing up as a heads up.

Extremely helpful tech, very knowledgeable, had been with Lucid since June 2021.

I gleaned the following information/ comments from his visit:

-"very exciting" update is coming before the end of January. I did not want to pry any more and so I left it at that but he made it clear that it will be a big one.

-Acknowledged that there is no workaround to the homelink button disappearing while backing the car into garage and therefore having to exit the camera mode in order to press the homelink button. He claimed that he would present this issue to the team and put it in the 'suggestion bin' to request a hot button for homelink that is always on.

-Confirmed that if you are in Navigation mode and have maps displayed on the upper screen, the larger pilot panel can NOT be used to browse music or vice versa. He knows that many owners have expressed displeasure at the lack of this must have/obvious feature but stopped short of indicating whether a fix is coming to address this issue. This is probably one of my biggest gripes with the car software. Hopefully there is some fix to this coming up.

-He indicated that Lucid has a few cars that are running the 'fully loaded', quirk free software versions. He said that those cars worked like a dream (pun intended lol). The screens were as responsive as our phones, the software had no lag, etc. I asked why us early owners did not have that version and his response was it was due to rules/legislation/red tape that the software had to be approved to be used in a mass produced vehicle and therefore took longer to come to us.

As for addressing my issues,
-it turned out that the Frunk decided to start operating normally yesterday afternoon on its own. I had tried everything from pushing the frunk down from the outside, to soft resets, to using the phone app to open, both key fobs etc to no luck on Saturday. I parked the car on Saturday late afternoon and did not unlock or touch it till Sunday around 5pm. When I took it out for a spin then, all of a sudden the "door ajar" indicator went away and the frunk became operational. I wonder if the long rest acted as some type of major reboot. The tech was unsure of this also. He was able to confirm by connecting to the car with his laptop that it had indeed thrown a malfunction error but he had no way of knowing exactly why. He suspects that the left latch (while you are facing the car frunk) might be the culprit. He indicated that there is some frunk rework in the process and even though my car has the 'correct' latch, there might be some other parts that will possibly need to be swapped out at some point.

The software update: he was able to call the customer care folks and somehow arrange a car specific push. My car is now on 1.0.7.

The facial profile issue: I blame it on lack of enough info. My delivery coach was unable to get this set up for me. We even spent 30 min on the phone with lucid care to no avail. Turns out the camera is located at the very bottom right side of the driver info panel and the position of the steering wheel is such that to set up the profile, you should make sure the steering wheel is all the way down and therefore allow uninterrupted view for the camera. So all it took was lowering the wheel and then the car registered my profile in 1 second!

In all, he spent around 3 hours here and provided exceptional service and info that left a very pleasant and satisfying aftertaste. I am happy to report that as of this moment, the car is operating 100% and has no warnings or any other issues. (now I hope I didn't just jinx myself). I took the car out one more time today after the update and REALLY enjoyed it. It is an exceptional car and I am thrilled to have it while recognizing that there will be more of these tech visits in the (near) future most likely.
PS: If you don't like attention while driving/parking this is NOT the car for you lol.

 

[dawktah LucidGT]

I too had a tech visit here in Orlando today. This was for the following issues that I had reported to Lucid:
-Frunk would not open at all from any device.
-Facial recognition would not work for Driver profile.
-Car had 1.0.6 version software while most others are on 1.0.7 (except for 2 members that we know who have 1.1)

Communication over the phone yesterday to set this appointment up was excellent. Lucid confirmed the appointment in the afternoon. Then, late evening I recd a phone call from Riviera beach with more specific details (who the tech would be, when exactly they would arrive etc).

This morning I got an update when tech was en route and also an ETA.

Tech called around 20 min prior to showing up as a heads up.

Extremely helpful tech, very knowledgeable, had been with Lucid since June 2021.

I gleaned the following information/ comments from his visit:

-"very exciting" update is coming before the end of January. I did not want to pry any more and so I left it at that but he made it clear that it will be a big one.

-Acknowledged that there is no workaround to the homelink button disappearing while backing the car into garage and therefore having to exit the camera mode in order to press the homelink button. He claimed that he would present this issue to the team and put it in the 'suggestion bin' to request a hot button for homelink that is always on.

-Confirmed that if you are in Navigation mode and have maps displayed on the upper screen, the larger pilot panel can NOT be used to browse music or vice versa. He knows that many owners have expressed displeasure at the lack of this must have/obvious feature but stopped short of indicating whether a fix is coming to address this issue. This is probably one of my biggest gripes with the car software. Hopefully there is some fix to this coming up.

-He indicated that Lucid has a few cars that are running the 'fully loaded', quirk free software versions. He said that those cars worked like a dream (pun intended lol). The screens were as responsive as our phones, the software had no lag, etc. I asked why us early owners did not have that version and his response was it was due to rules/legislation/red tape that the software had to be approved to be used in a mass produced vehicle and therefore took longer to come to us.

As for addressing my issues,
-it turned out that the Frunk decided to start operating normally yesterday afternoon on its own. I had tried everything from pushing the frunk down from the outside, to soft resets, to using the phone app to open, both key fobs etc to no luck on Saturday. I parked the car on Saturday late afternoon and did not unlock or touch it till Sunday around 5pm. When I took it out for a spin then, all of a sudden the "door ajar" indicator went away and the frunk became operational. I wonder if the long rest acted as some type of major reboot. The tech was unsure of this also. He was able to confirm by connecting to the car with his laptop that it had indeed thrown a malfunction error but he had no way of knowing exactly why. He suspects that the left latch (while you are facing the car frunk) might be the culprit. He indicated that there is some frunk rework in the process and even though my car has the 'correct' latch, there might be some other parts that will possibly need to be swapped out at some point.

The software update: he was able to call the customer care folks and somehow arrange a car specific push. My car is now on 1.0.7.

The facial profile issue: I blame it on lack of enough info. My delivery coach was unable to get this set up for me. We even spent 30 min on the phone with lucid care to no avail. Turns out the camera is located at the very bottom right side of the driver info panel and the position of the steering wheel is such that to set up the profile, you should make sure the steering wheel is all the way down and therefore allow uninterrupted view for the camera. So all it took was lowering the wheel and then the car registered my profile in 1 second!

In all, he spent around 3 hours here and provided exceptional service and info that left a very pleasant and satisfying aftertaste. I am happy to report that as of this moment, the car is operating 100% and has no warnings or any other issues. (now I hope I didn't just jinx myself). I took the car out one more time today after the update and REALLY enjoyed it. It is an exceptional car and I am thrilled to have it while recognizing that there will be more of these tech visits in the (near) future most likely.
PS: If you don't like attention while driving/parking this is NOT the car for you lol.

How did he connect to the car, USB or the OBDII?

 

[FFT]

-He indicated that Lucid has a few cars that are running the 'fully loaded', quirk free software versions. He said that those cars worked like a dream (pun intended lol). The screens were as responsive as our phones, the software had no lag, etc. I asked why us early owners did not have that version and his response was it was due to rules/legislation/red tape that the software had to be approved to be used in a mass produced vehicle and therefore took longer to come to us.

Thanks for the great write-up. I found this tidbit interesting but confusing. What rules or legislation exist that would prevent them from placing the "fully loaded" software onto a new Dream being delivered to an actual paying customer? That sounds a little wonky to me frankly.

 

[hmp10]

Car had 1.0.6 version software while most others are on 1.0.7 (except for 2 members that we know who have 1.1)

It turned out my car never had version 1.1.0 but rather 1.0.7. According to Lucid, there was a "backend" error that caused 1.1.0 to display erroneously. What was characterized as a push of 1.0.7 to my car was actually a correction sent to change the display to reflect the actual version in the car.

So how long were the techs there and did they resolve any/ all the problems?

Two techs were at the house for over four hours. They seem to have resolved the Homelink issues by reprogramming it. They thought they had resolved the issues with the screens either freezing or blanking out, and several test drives while they were here and a test drive after they left seemed to confirm it.

They were unable to resolve the issues with Alexa. In one test drive, Alexa placed a phone call as I asked. A couple of minutes later, from the same location, I requested the same number again. For the next four tries, we got four different responses: (1) Alexa is not supported by the device (i. e., the car); (2) Alexa cannot provide the function requested; (3) no phone is connected to the car; and (4) Alexa does not have access to the contact list. All four responses were incorrect, as verified by the techs. Alexa was equally random in playing or not playing music I requested (although when it did, the bass was mysteriously back in full force). The techs also could not get Alexa to respond to commands to change A/C settings or similar commands.

They also found the car sometimes does not automatically switch to LTE once it goes out of range of my home WiFi. Even several miles from the house, one on test drive the car was still trying to pull a signal from WiFi. We had to manually turn off WiFi in the settings for the car to pull in an LTE signal.

These issues have been "escalated" to the IT team.

When we got in the car to drive to dinner, once again the Pilot Screen and the right section of the Glass Cockpit were blacked out and all the functions they controlled rendered inaccessible. Also, the "Autopark Not Available" warning came up unsummoned and remained displayed on the speedometer screen throughout the drive.

In short, by the end of the day we were right back where we started, except for Homelink. After receiving instructions from the IT team, the techs are going to have to come back over again. This evening one of the techs told me that they're beginning to get service calls for other cars experiencing the same symptoms. I'm not sure I understood this correctly (on a sketchy cell phone connection), but I think he said they suspect the newer software they are now loading in the cars might be corrupted.

 

[Alex]

I asked why us early owners did not have that version and his response was it was due to rules/legislation/red tape that the software had to be approved to be used in a mass produced vehicle and therefore took longer to come to us.

So it's OK too release crappy software. I guess the legislators allow that. I don't know how Tesla gets away with releasing their software with no legislation approval (I guess just calling it beta is enough).

 

[Alex]

They were unable to resolve the issues with Alexa. In one test drive, Alexa placed a phone call as I asked. A couple of minutes later, from the same location, I requested the same number again. For the next four tries, we got four different responses: (1) Alexa is not supported by the device (i. e., the car); (2) Alexa cannot provide the function requested; (3) no phone is connected to the car; and (4) Alexa does not have access to the contact list. All four responses were incorrect, as verified by the techs. Alexa was equally random in playing or not playing music I requested (although when it did, the bass was mysteriously back in full force). The techs also could not get Alexa to respond to commands to change A/C settings or similar commands.

Alexa programming has many rookie mistakes. Take for example, if you say something that Alexa does not understand and the response includes the word "Alexa", like "XXX is not supported by Alexa," then Alexa hears it's name while the message is playing and prompts again for a command.

 

[hmp10]

I don't know how Tesla gets away with releasing their software with no legislation approval (I guess just calling it beta is enough).

Musk has decided inconvenient laws don't apply to Tesla. That's why he re-opened the Fremont factory against the orders of local health officials, and 450 workers got Covid in short order. It's why he put yoke steering into production without waiting for NTSA review. It's why he tried to manipulate the market when he was hoping to take Tesla private and then ignored the SEC settlement agreement which banned him from tweeting without prior review by his legal department. It's why he's running a $10,000 scam despite requests from DOT that he desist from claiming a car that won't operate without your hands on the steering device be bannered as "full self driving". It's why he moved himself and Tesla HQ to Texas.

 

[Lucken]

And yet people still buy his cars, in effect rewarding him for the very practices and design decisions (yoke steering wheel) many condemn. Personally I’m done with Tesla, regardless of how good their drivetrain is.

 

[Rob Stark]

Musk has decided inconvenient laws don't apply to Tesla. That's why he re-opened the Fremont factory against the orders of local health officials, and 450 workers got Covid in short order. It's why he put yoke steering into production without waiting for NTSA review. It's why he tried to manipulate the market when he was hoping to take Tesla private and then ignored the SEC settlement agreement which banned him from tweeting without prior review by his legal department. It's why he's running a $10,000 scam despite requests from DOT that he desist from claiming a car that won't operate without your hands on the steering device be bannered as "full self driving". It's why he moved himself and Tesla HQ to Texas.

Musk re-opened the Tesla Fremont factory after most automakers opened their US factories against the wishes of 1 unelected county level bureaucrat.

The rate of Covid inside Tesla's Fremont factory was/is lower than the surrounding Alameda County.

There is no law against yoke steering devices in the US EU or China. Don't like it don't buy it. Toyota is introducing the BZ4x in China and maybe Japan with yoke steering.

Musk agreed not to tweet about non disclosed materially relevant info that would affect Tesla stock price without prior review of Tesla legal team. SEC is free to file an injunction/lawsuit if it believes Elon violated the agreement. Elon is not prevented from tweeting about the weather, Biden Administration policies, or Movies.

Like many companies, Elon has moved himself and Tesla headquarters to Texas for less regulation and less taxation.

Elon haters think that laws only apply to Elon and Tesla.

 

[Lucken]

So here’s what I don’t understand in the case of hmp10’s car (and probably a few others). If Lucid is so anal about QC and won’t let a car leave the factory for a customer delivery until it’s perfect, or even nearly so, how did the myriad of issues in his car go undetected by Lucid? Some of the issues are so blatant a blind squirrel could/should have caught them.

I appreciate the fact that the service guys appear to be great, the service vans are fully stocked and customer service is top notch, but holy hell, what’s going on with the final stages of QC?

 

[Maverick]

So here’s what I don’t understand in the case of hmp10’s car (and probably a few others). If Lucid is so anal about QC and won’t let a car leave the factory for a customer delivery until it’s perfect, or even nearly so, how did the myriad of issues in his car go undetected by Lucid? Some of the issues are so blatant a blind squirrel could/should have caught them.

I appreciate the fact that the service guys appear to be great, the service vans are fully stocked and customer service is top notch, but holy hell, what’s going on with the final stages of QC?

This is probably not as clearcut as we think. The biggest problem here as that most of the issues that are being reported are not happening to everyone or when they are they are not at the same frequency or use case. For example, yesterday when the question was raised about taking 10-15 seconds to unlock the door. Some people agreed that when the car was in a sleep state, it took longer. Yet @Alex did not seem to have that problem. @hmp10 seems to be having issues that @hydbob has never experienced. So in many of these cases, the engineers now have to find what is creating a bug for one but not for another, and that is a challenging task.

I do think that the comment someone made about a tech sort of indicating 1.0.7 may have been an unstable release has some merit, and hopefully they have found the reasons for the instability and the new release will help, but finding the instability before release in a very structure, test case environment probably doesn't line up to real-world. And once you actually release the cars into the wild, you have much less time and wiggle room with each OTA. In other words, they had years to work on the initial software. Most of the initial problems reported seemed to be more about what the software didn't have rather than what wasn't working. Remember the discussions about "why don't they have ACC"?

Now they are under pressure to fix bugs and release new features as quickly as possible. So if you do that and introduce some instability (as good a word as any to why some of these issues seem to effect some and not others), you have a problem because you've got to go and figure out why and then push as hard as you can to address it. On top of that, as most software companies have a lot of tasks queued up for each release and specifications written against them that are then worked on in time-based sprints, the ongoing influx of issues creates challenges for delivery schedules. Over the short-term, it's difficult to stop dev work already underway. And for the mid-term, you have to bump other, likely critical, things to fit that in. This is why it would probably make sense for Lucid to run with only the current owners for a bit to keep the sample pool smaller and not continually introduce more cars to the road and then have to sort through which bugs are duplicates and which are brand new. If many of them have to be reviewed by the very engineers that are working on development, you have a problem with getting anything done.

I am guessing that there are many long hours being worked, and hopefully the next release does solve a lot, but keep in mind that they may be excited about the next release because of what it adds. That's great, but that also introduces the potential for more bugs, but maybe less instability. My two cents at any rate.

 

[Lucken]

This is probably not as clearcut as we think. The biggest problem here as that most of the issues that are being reported are not happening to everyone or when they are they are not at the same frequency or use case. For example, yesterday when the question was raised about taking 10-15 seconds to unlock the door. Some people agreed that when the car was in a sleep state, it took longer. Yet @Alex did not seem to have that problem. @hmp10 seems to be having issues that @hydbob has never experienced. So in many of these cases, the engineers now have to find what is creating a bug for one but not for another, and that is a challenging task.

I do think that the comment someone made about a tech sort of indicating 1.0.7 may have been an unstable release has some merit, and hopefully they have found the reasons for the instability and the new release will help, but finding the instability before release in a very structure, test case environment probably doesn't line up to real-world. And once you actually release the cars into the wild, you have much less time and wiggle room with each OTA. In other words, they had years to work on the initial software. Most of the initial problems reported seemed to be more about what the software didn't have rather than what wasn't working. Remember the discussions about "why don't they have ACC"?

Now they are under pressure to fix bugs and release new features as quickly as possible. So if you do that and introduce some instability (as good a word as any to why some of these issues seem to effect some and not others), you have a problem because you've got to go and figure out why and then push as hard as you can to address it. On top of that, as most software companies have a lot of tasks queued up for each release and specifications written against them that are then worked on in time-based sprints, the ongoing influx of issues creates challenges for delivery schedules. Over the short-term, it's difficult to stop dev work already underway. And for the mid-term, you have to bump other, likely critical, things to fit that in. This is why it would probably make sense for Lucid to run with only the current owners for a bit to keep the sample pool smaller and not continually introduce more cars to the road and then have to sort through which bugs are duplicates and which are brand new. If many of them have to be reviewed by the very engineers that are working on development, you have a problem with getting anything done.

I am guessing that there are many long hours being worked, and hopefully the next release does solve a lot, but keep in mind that they may be excited about the next release because of what it adds. That's great, but that also introduces the potential for more bugs, but maybe less instability. My two cents at any rate.

That’s all well and good, but my critique on Lucid’s QC was largely directed at how hmp10’s car could have made it past the final stages of QC.

Remember too that most of his blatant issues, that should have been easy to spot if QC was spending any ‘quality time’ with his car, were manifested in both iterations of the software. I’m sorry, this should have been picked up prior to letting this car go.

Let‘s not do the ‘Tesla shuffle’ here that I saw for years on the Tesla forums, where every blatant QC issue was explained away and excused by the Tesla fanboys.

 

[Maverick]

That’s all well and good, but my critique on Lucid’s QC was largely directed at how hmp10’s car could have made it past the final stages of QC.

Remember too that most of his blatant issues, that should have been easy to spot if QC was spending any ‘quality time’ with his car, were manifested in both iterations of the software. I’m sorry, this should have been picked up prior to letting this car go.

Let‘s not do the ‘Tesla shuffle’ here that I saw for years on the Tesla forums, where every blatant QC issue was explained away and excused by the Tesla fanboys.

Not excusing it at all. I'm actually pretty concerned about how many somewhat significant issues his car and others have had. Yes, they can likely all be corrected by OTAs, but, to your point, many shouldn't have happened at all. Also, the explanation given on why 1.1.0 was showing did not make a ton of sense. My guess is that something happened post QA that caused some issue. If not, you're exactly right, some of that stuff should have been caught during the final QA. I mistook your statement about QC to be around the software itself rather than the individual car QC.

 

[hmp10]

There are a few times when I drive the car and have none of the problems I experience most of the time. Earlier cars were delivered with 100 miles on the odometer, and the DMV affidavit I was asked to sign showed a delivery odometer reading of 100 miles. My car was delivered with 14 miles on it. I'm wondering if the addition of more QC posts on the production line that we heard about, the working of kinks out of the production line, and the attempts to deliver as many cars by year end as possible led them to shortening the post-production test driving during which things such as software instability have a better chance of revealing themselves?

 

[dawktah LucidGT]

That’s all well and good, but my critique on Lucid’s QC was largely directed at how hmp10’s car could have made it past the final stages of QC.

Remember too that most of his blatant issues, that should have been easy to spot if QC was spending any ‘quality time’ with his car, were manifested in both iterations of the software. I’m sorry, this should have been picked up prior to letting this car go.

Let‘s not do the ‘Tesla shuffle’ here that I saw for years on the Tesla forums, where every blatant QC issue was explained away and excused by the Tesla fanboys.

I don't get the impression that the "software" is part of the quality control. Based on reports here it would take a very long time to go through every potential situation software can encounter off the line. You'd never produce a car. ICE cars have not been this dependent on their software until the last two decades. Even still many will still run if you bypass certain components. It seems EV its all or none car and software are one.