Lucid, an electric vehicle company headed by former Tesla Inc engineer Peter Rawlinson, has informed that its upcoming Lucid Air car is expected to get an EPA-rated range of no less than 517 miles.
That’s much higher compared to other electric cars on the market today, including the Tesla Model S Long Range Plus, which has an EPA rated range of 402 miles. The first electric car by Tesla was widely available to consumers to have a driving range of over 400 miles on a single charge.
The final production version of the Lucid Air is expected to be revealed on September 9. The models will be built in Lucid’s Casa Grande factory located in Arizona. The first ones will be delivered to consumers by early 2021.
Lucid’s range claim is based on testing by FEV, a company known for testing and development of various automotive systems. FEV’s range test was carefully modeled on the standardized test used by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to figure out a gasoline car’s fuel economy and an electric car’s range. So it’s expected that the official EPA range should be similar or maybe even a little bit higher, a Lucid spokesman said.
California-based Lucid was established in 2007 and revealed a concept version of its electric car in 2016. The company originally concentrated on making electric vehicle batteries before it decided to produce their own car. The company’s battery operations are now a separate division called Atieva, the automaker’s original name, that supplies the batteries used in Formula E race cars.
Lucid also says the Air will be able of going from zero to 60 miles an hour in only 2.5 seconds. Doing that a lot, though, would probably decrease the car’s total driving range.
Lucid hasn’t yet disclosed the size of the Lucid Air’s battery pack, except to signal that it will be smaller than the 130 kilowatt-hours company executives have discussed earlier. The Tesla Model S Long Range Plus has a 100 KwH battery packet.
The company did not provide information on how this high range was attained but, in general, credited aerodynamics, electronics, temperature control systems, along with the car’s 900-volt electrical system. That’s high voltage for an electric car. If we compare with other models, then we can see Porsche boasts of the 800-volt system it uses in its high-performance Taycan. Voltage is comparable to water pressure in a plumbing system. It’s a measure of how much power can be pushed through an electric vehicle’s cables and wires and how soon.
Lucid’s CEO, Rawlinson, was once vice president of engineering at Tesla before departing from the automaker in 2013 to join the company that is now Lucid.
The other startup companies, which are competing with Tesla include Nikola, Lordstown Motors, and Rivian.
