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Lucid Air Dream gets massive 520-mile range rating in preliminary EPA tests

Credit: Lucid Group

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The Lucid Air Dream Edition has received a preliminary EPA range rating of 520 miles, becoming the first elective vehicle to achieve an EPA rating of over 500 miles. With the 520-mile rating, the Lucid Air Dream Edition surpassed its closest competitor, the Tesla Model S Long Range, by over 100 miles.

Lucid has held high hopes for its range ratings since announcing the Dream Edition in September 2020. At its Livestreamed unveiling event for the vehicle, Lucid stated that it had receieved a 517-mile range rating with a 9.9-second quarter-mile time. The vehicle has officially undergone preliminary EPA tests ahead of its initial production and deliveries, which are set to take place later this year.

Lucid Group

“I’m delighted that our Lucid Air Dream Edition Range has been officially accredited with a range of 520 miles by the EPA, a number I believe to be a new record for any EV. Crucially, this landmark has been achieved by Lucid’s world-leading in-house EV technology, not by simply installing an oversize battery pack,” CEO and CTO Peter Rawlinson said. “Our race-proven 900V battery and BMS technology, our miniaturized drive units, coupled with our Wunderbox technology endow Lucid Air with ultra-high efficiency, enabling it to travel more miles from less battery energy. The next generation EV has truly arrived!”

The Dream Edition of the Air sedan is Lucid’s golden egg. With the now confirmed 520-mile range in early tests, the impressive statistic will join the 933 horsepower all-electric motors that make the vehicle one of the fastest, and most fun to drive, on the market. A recent review of the car from MotorTrend revealed the Air’s several driving types, coupled with impressive drag coefficients that make it an aerodynamic marvel. The review also focused on the Air’s range, and MotorTrend drove two vehicles from Los Angeles to San Francisco at highway speeds without stopping for a charge, arriving with plenty of range still left in the car.

Lucid’s 520-mile range rating applies to the Dream Edition with 19″ wheels. Putting 21″ wheels on the vehicle will still give you a 481-mile range rating. Additionally, the EPA also calculated the range for the Air Dream Edition Performance variant with 471 and 451 miles with 19″ and 21″ wheels respectively. The Lucid Air Grand Touring will pack 516 miles of range on the 19″ wheels, and 469 miles on 21″ wheels.

As a result of the tests, Lucid now owns the top six spots on the EPA’s overall range ratings among EVs, as well as the highest MPGe ratings in the Large vehicle class.

Don’t hesitate to contact us with tips! Email us at tips@teslarati.com, or you can email me directly at joey@teslarati.com.

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Joey has been a journalist covering electric mobility at TESLARATI since August 2019. In his spare time, Joey is playing golf, watching MMA, or cheering on any of his favorite sports teams, including the Baltimore Ravens and Orioles, Miami Heat, Washington Capitals, and Penn State Nittany Lions. You can get in touch with joey at joey@teslarati.com. He is also on X @KlenderJoey. If you're looking for great Tesla accessories, check out shop.teslarati.com

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Tesla Model Y L gets suspension complaints in over odd issue China

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Credit: @TeslaNewswire/X

The Tesla Model Y L is arguably the most hyped trim of the all-electric crossover, other than the Performance configuration that comes with white-knuckle speed and sports car-level handling.

However, it is not all perfect. Tesla owners in China who took delivery of the Model Y L, denoted with an L to highlight its longer wheelbase, are experiencing what they are referring to as “collapsing” of the rear wheels, as suspension issues appear to be an issue with some of the builds.

The gap between the wheel arch and tire has narrowed to the point that “not even a single finger” could fit, according to a report from Car News China. The failures are not tied to a specific mileage, as one owner said that after just 9,000 kilometers (5,600 miles), they noticed the suspension issue when their car was fully loaded.

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Another one had the issue at 30,000 kilometers (18,640 miles) and noticed that the wheel gap shrank to two fingers, so not as drastic as the person who reported a similar issue at 9,000 km.

Tesla Model Y L is gaining momentum in China’s premium segment

Along with the visual recognition of the issue, others are saying the sagging is causing abnormal wear on the inside of the tires. Extra weight and instant torque already provide additional stress on the tires in electric vehicles during normal operation, so it is no surprise that this is another complaint.

There has been no recall issued by Tesla, and the company has not yet publicly acknowledged the issue.

Some are suggesting that owners use a “finger test” to self-diagnose whether there is an issue with the suspension. There should be four fingers between the tire and the wheel well; anything less than that starts to get dicey.

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Tesla Cybercab event gains steam ahead of massive launch

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Credit: TechOperator | X

Tesla is starting to truly tease and hype its groundbreaking Cybercab event, which takes place tomorrow in Austin, Texas. It will be the first time members of the public will be able to ride in a Cybercab, a vehicle without any manual controls, on public roads.

Tesla has been dropping some hype on X over the past several days, but this morning, the excitement has truly started to build up for the event. Although Cybercab has been unveiled before, this is truly Tesla’s announcement that it is ready to start offering autonomous rides for public passengers in its new ride-hailing-geared vehicle for the first time.

The hype has started with a variety of different social media posts that are a true indication that Tesla is preparing for something big. Teasing so much of the potential of Cybercab, including its ability to truly revolutionize how people hail rides for local travel, is what the big idea for the event entails. The time that many Tesla owners, fans, and investors have been waiting for is potentially here:

The event has remained slim on details. Even invitees are still awaiting true details about what the event will entail, where they’ll go, and what is in store for the evening. This is pretty typical for an event run by Tesla; they keep things under wraps for the most part until the very last minute.

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However, there is no secret about what the real intention of Tesla is for this event: it is going to be a huge reveal party for a vehicle that has no steering wheel and no pedals. It is a truly massive step for the company moving forward.

Speculation persists as to whether this is going to be an event that simply announces that rides will begin with the Cybercab, or it will be something more substantial. Tesla has said in the past that they plan to sell the Cybercab to the general public in what could become a great way to earn passive income by adding it to a more global fleet of Robotaxi-geared vehicles.

Tomorrow, the show begins in Austin, and the Cybercab goes live at some capacity; we just don’t know exactly how quite yet.

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SpaceX tells the FCC that Starship Flight 14 is going to orbit

SpaceX filed with the FCC for Starship Flight 14, its first true orbital launch attempt.

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SpaceX has asked the Federal Communications Commission for permission to fly Starlink terminals during Starship’s fourteenth flight test, and the filing lays out a genuine trip to orbit, something the program has never attempted.

Every Starship flight so far, including Flight 13’s successful splashdown in the Indian Ocean on July 24, has flown a suborbital arc that ends with the ship reentering the atmosphere within the same hour it launches. The FCC paperwork describes a mission profile built around an actual orbital insertion instead.

The payload is the other half of the story. Flight 13 carried 20 production Starlink V3 satellites, but because that mission never reached orbit, the satellites reentered along with the ship rather than joining the constellation, something Teslarati covered in detail after SpaceX released footage shot from one of those satellites as it drifted away from Starship in space. Flight 14 is designed to close that gap. If the orbital insertion holds, the roughly 20 V3 satellites onboard would separate into an operational orbit and could eventually go into service, each one rated for about 1 terabit per second of downlink capacity by SpaceX’s own account.

SpaceX announces new Starbase for ‘thousands of Starship launches annually’

Elon Musk first flagged the orbital attempt during SpaceX’s August 4 earnings call, the company’s first as a public entity following its June IPO under the ticker SPCX. He also floated catching the ship with the Starbase tower on the same flight, an idea he walked back on August 20, saying the catch attempt would more likely come “in a few months,” as Teslarati reported at the time. Flight 14 will instead target a splashdown for the ship in the Indian Ocean, the same recovery method used since Flight 12.

Hardware has been catching up to the ambition. Booster 21 completed a full 33-engine static fire on August 28, and Ship 41 finished its own six-engine test the week before. An airspace briefing circulated to pilots on August 20 listed September 15 as the target date, later than the end of August window Musk mentioned on the earnings call, though SpaceX has not confirmed a launch date publicly and Starship schedules routinely slip while hardware and FAA paperwork line up.

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The FCC filing itself does not guarantee a launch date. It covers communications authority, and not flight readiness, considering SpaceX still needs Ship 41 fully stacked and cleared by the FAA before Flight 14 can fly. But the filing is a real marker of intent and it puts a specific regulatory process behind what had so far only been Musk’s word on the earnings call.

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