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Sometimes, the best plan does work.
It took Lucid 13 years to get to this point, from a humble battery supplier to an American electric car startup that was worth about $39 billion before delivering a customer car. It took less than 10 seconds to realize that it was worth the wait.
This is how long it takes for the 1111-horsepower Lucid Air Dream Edition Performance to complete a quarter mile, specifically 9.9 seconds at 144 mph. In the Arizona desert, just a few hours away from Lucid’s new factory in Casa Grande, I was content to squeeze my lungs to 120 mph when many cars reached 60 mph. Air is in the electronic whistling Sprint mode, and it is difficult for me to express spatial dislocation in words. Do you know how to throw a stray ant off a picnic table? At Lucid Air, you are the ant.
This story originally appeared in Volume 8 of Road & Track.
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In population 6 of Tortilla Flat, Arizona, Lucid rests on a knotted lasso on the road through the Superstition Mountains, and when it breaks the cover in public, it quickly becomes a friend. They include an excited pickup truck driver who has been buying Lucid stock hoping for the next Tesla, and a group of young gangsters driving Corvette Z06, Mustang Shelby GT500 and Dodge Hellcat. Nice try, guys. Lucid's stretched legs sedan will beat them in a drag racing race. And it won't be particularly close. Lucid stated that the Air can reach 60 mph in 2.5 seconds.
We are accustomed to the ice-melting antics of electric cars, including the three-motor Tesla Model S Plaid, which sells for $131,190. Tesla is expected to sell approximately 800,000 electric vehicles worldwide this year. Lucid has a long way to go before achieving similar success, from brand awareness to sales and showroom selection. But let’s talk about the first Grand Slam: Air is the electric car with the longest range in history. The 933-horsepower Dream Edition Range version has an EPA rating of 520 miles, which is Tesla's best 115 miles, enough for nearly two hours of highway cruising.
The 800-horsepower Air Grand Touring received a 131-MPGe rating, surpassing the 120 MPGe of the 670-hp Model S Long Range, which seems insurmountable.
Air is almost certainly the fastest charging electric car ever. Its 924 volt architecture and onboard Wunderbox charger can travel 300 miles in 20 minutes, or 20 miles in a minute. Range anxiety and thumb fiddling stop charging here—at least as the 350-kilowatt DC charger required for this kind of charging becomes more common. Although there is a 350 kW Electrify America oasis near Tempe, we were unable to test the statement because the software for our pre-production model was not fully operational. Buyers will enjoy three years of free charging at these Electrify America stations.
Lucid CEO Peter Rowlinson, former Model S chief engineer and current Elon Musk’s thorny eye, told me that the power density of the Air drive is almost three times that of Tesla, at 41 horsepower per liter. This electric powder keg can generate 650 hp and 20,000 rpm through a motor weighing only 163 pounds, a reduction gear box, an inverter and a differential. The drive unit is not much larger than the fattest Thanksgiving turkey, which quietly illustrates the company's obsessive focus on miniaturization. Lucid claims that the drag coefficient of Air 0.21 is a new record for any luxury car.
The Air's Dream (US$170,500), GT (US$150,500) and Touring (US$96,500) versions have two such muscle units, one for each axis. They are powered by 6,600 cylindrical 2170 batteries in 22 modules, the same basic battery format used in Tesla's newer cars. Rawlinson will not consider Dream's battery size, but insists that it is not larger than the 112 kWh battery pack in GT. By the end of 2022, Lucid plans to provide a single-motor Pure version with 480 horsepower and a 408-mile range at a price of approximately $79,000. This is about $12,000 less than the ever-expanding Model S Long Range, and about $32,000 less than the Mercedes-Benz S500 in 2022, and the horsepower is reduced by 51 horsepower. Lucid sees the S-Class and other internal combustion engine flagships as true luxury products of its kind, not Model S. Naturally, Lucid will not object to Tesla owners' trade-in, because they miss the freshness and prestige of Silicon Valley. Air Pure will launch the Lucid Gravity SUV in 2023.
At the Casa Grande factory, the ochre soil has been graded for the second phase of the four-part expansion, and we have seen some of the first customers' cars roll off the assembly line. After successive delays, Lucid promised that some customers will drive Airs before the end of 2021, with a production target of 20,000 cars in 2022. As some electric vehicles of traditional automakers such as Chevrolet Bolt and Ford Mustang Mach-E have been stranded due to the recall, this plant and its quality may be the key to Lucid's fate. In an example of forward thinking, the groundbreaking paint spray booth process produces zero waste water. I looked at a sample, it was a spitting image of our pre-production Dream Edition; its Eureka gold paint is very suitable for the ancient prospecting country in Arizona.
If Lucid gets rich, Air's containment and cabin attractiveness will deserve due praise. This elegant sedan has a diamond shape reminiscent of the Citroen DS in the electric era. It is equipped with deep-recessed LED headlights, a flip-top hood, a waistband and full-width front and rear animated lighting. The aluminum body (with a composite trunk lid) is covered with an atrium-like "glass canopy" and brushed aluminum roof pillars. Even one of Lucid's visual scars-a large closed line bordering the trunk like a hatch-marks a packaging advantage, a rare low rise and wide opening.
The dimensions of Lucid, Model S and Porsche Taycan are very close, with almost the same length. Lucid is the narrowest, but feels the most spacious, especially with the spacious rear seats. Compared with higher-roof gas-powered sedans, including the more spacious S-Class sedans—about 1 foot long and 3.7 inches high—Lucid’s rear seat cushions are relatively low to make room. Rear riders must enter and exit under the curled roof. Once boarded, even lanky people will not complain.
That roof, with sun visors fixed to the windshield, enhanced, well, the Airy effect. Lucid managed to surpass Volvo Volvo with the vibe of its Shelter Magazine, something that allows handsome couples to pull out their checkbooks before they know the price. Is it really an S-class rich man? Incomplete. Some equipment does not meet the standards-compare Lucid's internal sound system with Benz's dazzling Burmester stereo. But the massage seat is very good. Lucid beats any Tesla polyester filler with the company's intoxicating fit and finish. In the Dream Editions limited edition of 520 copies, the unique Santa Monica cabin-one of several treatments inspired by the California landscape-is lined with perforated eucalyptus, perforated nappa leather, Alcantara, polished metal, and The tweed yarn blended with alpaca and wool comes from recycled plastic bottles.
An eye-catching 34-inch 5K display (actually three screens connected) is curved in front of the driver like a set of wrap-around shadows. A smaller Pilot Panel is driven from the dashboard, hovering above the center console, filled with cup holders and small rooms like some luxurious minivans. Lucid's screen-centric effect seems to be commonplace in luxury electric vehicles, making its digital dots neither overbearing nor ergonomically minefield. Derek Jenkins, Lucid's senior vice president of design, insisted on keeping some analog switches, including temperature, fan speed, and audio volume. A set of 32 sensors brings a complex 120-degree lidar unit and 14 cameras, one of which is a driver monitoring camera (which can be turned off) to help maintain attention to the road. Driver cameras and lidar are two technologies that most experts believe are essential to the ultimate realization of autonomous driving, but they have caused notorious ridicule by Tesla's Musk.
I originally envisioned driving Lucid for range testing, but the car has other plans. Air is made for highways. The adaptive suspension, steering and power system can be adjusted through Smooth, Swift and Sprint modes. The latter releases all 1,111 horsepower of Dream P, which is higher than the 789 horsepower in soft mode. On the optional 21-inch wheels, the grip feels almost unbreakable, with the Dream P going from 471 to 451 miles in 19 seconds. Considering the compromise in the name of efficiency, the lateral rods are even more impressive: Pirelli developed the first "high load" rated tires to allow Lucid to reach a top speed of 168 mph, but with lower rolling resistance. Even on the largest wheels, their fan-shaped wind blades can remain stable. Only hydraulic brakes can use more initial engagement, but brakes on most large-powered luxury models can also be used. Regenerative braking for throttle lift is textbook-like perfection, but, including a more powerful single-pedal drive setup, works well in corners-corner action. This setting allows me to use my right foot like a rheostat and hardly make a fuss about the brake pedal. Balancing the car becomes a breeze, reducing unnecessary brake wear. It also highlights Taycan's biggest mistake: by abandoning the benefits of optional single-pedal operation, leaving the key regenerative mileage and driver choice on the table.
In the era of Taycans and Lamborghini Uruses, the idea that a 5,050 pound (or more) vehicle can actually handle it should no longer be surprising. Despite this, Lucid was still in a hurry. The well-proportioned steering wheel provides pleasing weight and accuracy, but has little impact on the road feel, which is not surprising in EVs. (Taycan is still the king of sports EV feedback.) But because of such a large thrust, the flat Lucid is simply an unfair battle: step on the accelerator and the next corner seems to be everywhere.
Rawlinson drove to Tortilla Flats and met us in another sky. The next thing you need to know is that the former chief engineer of Lotus personally traveled through these sinister volcanic mountains, and I rode a shotgun. Rawlinson was annoyed by the little tone of the front end and assured me that it was being solved by rolling changes, 10% soft front springs and 10% harder anti-roll bars. Tesla's acceleration lead is being solved by the upcoming three-motor Lucid Air. I roughly estimated 1500 horsepower. Rawlinson does not deny it.
This is a squandering (and squandering) power, but it is only fair: traditional car manufacturers have been playing overkill for more than a century. Now their time is running out. Too dramatic? Well, when Lucid went public through a blank check merger, Saudi House-its CEO and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman-eventually owned approximately 65% of Lucid. The Saudis are ready to make $20 billion in profits from the initial $2.9 billion investment. Rawlinson said that some observers think this arrangement is strange, but it is not true: even the world's largest oil exporter can see text on walls or oil wells.