The $80,000 Lucid Air: It’ll be nice when we are in a position to power it

Lucid they’ll be, nonetheless they’re no longer exactly transparent. 

The buzzworthy Bay Plan vehicle firm, which makes engines for electric Arrangement One racing, looks to acquire leapfrogged Elon Musk’s line of Tesla electric autos. The Lucid Air EV unveiled in a Wednesday afternoon livestream (and no longer without extend mark-tagged at $80,000) has an EPA-reported vary of 517 miles, without extend turning the 400-mile-vary Tesla Model S into the previous day’s news. 

But a literal cloud hung over the Lucid factory and HQ in Newark, California the day the Air used to be unveiled. Smoke from wooded space fires effectively interior any EV’s vary lined the Bay Plan in a sunless orange pall. It used to be each and each horrific and someway acceptable for the disclosing, equipped that Lucid’s press match for the Air — held weeks earlier nonetheless embargoed till this moment — used to be practically as obscuring because the smoke.

For one element, Lucid equipped no test power of their Tesla-killer. No longer even a travel-along used to be incorporated within the 2-hour agenda. Which used to be particularly fresh, equipped that I spoke to a probably Lucid Air buyer who got an exhilarating travel-along in a Lucid prototype — back in December 2016.  

“It is most definitely essentially the most delightful I’ve had in a vehicle since racing wobble-karts as a teen,” enthused Jos Boumans, a San Francisco tech executive who’s pushed deal of Teslas. “As with any exact luxury avenue racer, you in actuality feel it come alive because the rate climbs… the bite [how much the car sticks to the road while accelerating] felt exact.” 

According to Lucid, here’s the valid electric sedan that can wobble a quarter mile in below 10 seconds. Boumans might per chance maybe well no longer explain distance or wobble — the vehicle used to be so fresh in 2016 that there wasn’t even a speedometer on the dashboard, nonetheless it without a doubt used to be clearly screamingly fleet. “It has the art and science of F1 written all over it,” he says. “While you ever fantasized about speeding along the panoramic dual carriageway, taking these winding turns at high wobble, I might per chance maybe well finish it in a Lucid over any assorted vehicle.” 

And how did the Tesla S in actuality feel compared? “Treasure a in actuality nice Prius,” said Boumans dryly, damning with faint Prius praise. (He did no longer stop up justifying a deposit to himself, equipped that it used to be four years earlier than time and he’s a metropolis dweller who by no map desires to power, nonetheless suggested he’d pay $80,000 — without brilliant that used to be the valid sticky label mark Lucid used to be about to unveil.) 

So why no longer give the media a taste of that dual carriageway-hugging vitality? Why leave any doubt about whether this vehicle is vaporware? “We aren’t scheduling any press drives till we are in a position to construct up production-consultant examples of the Lucid Air constructed at our fresh factory in Casa Grande [Arizona, in early 2021],” spoke back a Lucid spokesperson — a response that did no longer exactly address the “why,” nonetheless means that caution is endemic at this secretive firm.  

Granted, 2020 is a posh year to unveil any fresh product. That noteworthy used to be sure at the press match, the first I have been to for the reason that pandemic started, and positively the first the put PR reps issued Lucid-branded masks and Lucid-branded hand sanitizer at the door. The day used to be one of low stage administration as I used to be whisked from one stop of the factory, which handles the total invent work (rather then the production), to any other. 

I seen…more than just a few stuff! I used to be ushered interior the van that Lucid will send in case of repairs, in exclaim to detect that it had a coffee machine. I wasn’t allowed to touch the VR headsets that prospects will employ to detect what their vehicle will detect love with varied trims. I spent longer than someone ought to being ushered round a point out cupboard of inspirations for these pastel-unlit trims, named Apple-vogue for assorted areas of California. (Who desires to steal a $80,000 electric vehicle based completely totally on the truth you might maybe accumulate interior natty in a smoky color based completely totally on Mojave at night?) 

The truth that the total match used to be held indoors used to be particularly exclusive, equipped that coronavirus transmission is less likely outdoors, and equipped that this used to be an fine sunny day earlier than the wildfire smoke descended. There were two interestingly creep-ready Lucid autos sitting out entrance of the HQ, next to an infinite and curvaceous automobile parking space. 

Ah, nonetheless the outdoors would acquire made the absence of any roughly driving at a vehicle match even more glaring. I already got to sit within the vehicle with a Lucid worker, each and each of us masked. Would driving round acquire introduced any roughly an infection probably? Doubtlessly none more so than talking with Lucid CEO Peter Rawlinson. The feeble chief engineer at Tesla, Rawlinson is a fellow soundless-spoken Brit, and I needed to lean in far nearer than six feet to listen to him as we wandered the showroom. 

“It is love a TARDIS,” is what Rawlinson used to be announcing, a reference that gladdened my nerdy heart. He is lawful — the Lucid Air prototypes we were allowed to sit in in actuality felt bigger on the interior. The usage of space is unprecedented. It is a combination of the tinted sunroof that looks to swallow the total high of the vehicle, the wrap-round dashboard show camouflage, deal of legroom, a in actuality recessed glove compartment, and seats which might per chance maybe well be designed for optimum comfort at minimal size. 

But as any Who fan love Rawlinson is conscious of, the defining characteristic of the TARDIS is that the Doctor lawful can no longer wait to retract you for a tear in it — even though it’s no longer exactly 100 p.c gorgeous. The Lucid Air, meanwhile, will remain earthbound and un-test-drivable till next year. While you have not already pre-ordered, the unhealthy mannequin obtained’t be accessible till 2022. As a brand fresh customer next year, strive in an effort to steal “Touring” and “Dream” editions with bells and whistles, which is ready to stir from $95,000 to $169,000, no longer counting any probably federal tax credit, which will be as high as $7,500.

Later within the final decade, Rawlinson hopes sales of the lush Lucid Air will relieve him ramp up production in hiss that a promised SUV and autos with mass-market mark tags will be next. For the sake of the wildfire-choked planet, which badly desires competition between EV corporations to power down the worth of carbon-free transport, let’s hope he’s lawful. 

I for one can no longer wait to construct up within the back of the wheel.