Comment by JPKab | Hacker News Reader

Comment by JPKab | Hacker News Reader

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I don't understand why people think Lucid is going to be so great when they aren't even mass-producing yet.

It's easy to forget that building a concept car or small quantities is dramatically easier than mass producing something that's affordable to the masses.

I own a model 3 and I certainly wasn't dumb enough to pay the 10K for the FSD. That being said I'm not a fan of the other electric cars because the charging infrastructure is garbage. Whenever I stop at a non Tesla charging station I have a very high probability of having to try two or three different plugs before I can get remotely decent current. Electrify America is the network VW was forced to fund after the diesel emission scandal and it's pretty bad. ChargePoint is the other one and they're not very good either.

Definitely don't think the build quality on Tesla's is what it should be and I look forward to the factory in Texas coming out to solve that because Fremont is not going to cut it.

That being said these other cars might be better for the price but good luck charging them.

> I look forward to the factory in Texas coming out to solve that because Fremont is not going to cut it.

How does a factory being in Texas change build quality in a Tesla run environment? (Legitimate question, I know very little about this)

New tooling, new technology and the ability to design it all out from scratch. The Fremont factory was a retrofit of a Toyota factory iirc. It also has been the workhorse for most Tesla cars so it's hard to do any extended updates to it while they didnt have other factories to pick up slack.

Not that I expect the Austin factory to solve all their fit and finish issues, but I am delaying my Model Y purchase till it comes online.

One possibility: they have said on several occasions that it’s very difficult to change how a factory is working when it’s working flat out. And of course, with the huge pressure on Tesla to deliver the numbers, they can’t afford to slow down or have outages for days or weeks while they change the production line.

As a result, meaningful changes or innovations seem to be limited to the design/opening of new factories.

> I don't understand why people think Lucid is going to be so great when they aren't even mass-producing yet.

I assume it’s because their CEO/CTO was the chief engineer for the Tesla Model S. So, not only has he done it before, he presumably has some lessons learned on how to do things better the second time around. Agreed, that’s no guarantee though.

>> I don't understand why people think Lucid is going to be so great when they aren't even mass-producing yet.

Change the name in that statement from Lucid to Tesla and go back in time. People gave Tesla a chance at the beginning. And that's why you're driving a model 3 today.

I'm not in the market for a Lucid or a Tesla, but I think the Air is far more beautiful than the S, and with decent specs, and I would definitely choose the Air.

But that's an early adopter thing, I guess. Luckily there are enough early adopters around so you don't have to worry about the mass-producing issue.

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