- Edmunds in contrast the Lucid Air Sapphire with the Tesla Mannequin S Plaid with the elective Monitor Pack.
- Collectively, the 2 American EVs produce over 2,200 horsepower.
We stay in fascinating instances. You possibly can go surfing proper now and place an order for a four-door electrical sedan that goes the gap, is snug and is severely quick–among the many quickest on the planet, in reality.
Two fashions match the invoice at present, they usually’re each made in the USA. There’s the unique Tesla Mannequin S Plaid, with its 1,020 horsepower and sub-2-second dash to 60 miles per hour. Then, there’s the newer, fancier and dearer Lucid Air Sapphire.
There have been loads of comparisons between the 2 EVs, however none fairly just like the one put collectively by our mates at Edmunds. As you’ll see within the video embedded under, Edmunds pitted the 2023 Tesla Mannequin S Plaid with the elective $20,000 Monitor Bundle in opposition to the 2024 Lucid Air Sapphire.
Tesla’s expensive add-on comes with carbon ceramic brakes and solid brake calipers, which permits the 4,810-pound EV to, you recognize, brake correctly. Some fancy wheels are additionally included, as is a few “track-ready brake fluid.” The automobile’s firmware can be barely completely different, to make the most of the brand new stuff.
Just like the Mannequin S Plaid, the Lucid Air Sapphire is powered by three electrical motors. In contrast to the Plaid, nonetheless, Lucid managed to squeeze out 1,234 horsepower from the setup, decreasing the 0-60 mph time to simply 1.89 seconds, versus the Mannequin S Plaid’s 1.99 seconds. On paper, at the very least.
Suffice to say, they’re very quick. Edmunds’ course consists of a quarter-mile drag race, adopted by a braking part, a U-turn after which one other dash towards the beginning/end line. It’s a quite simple structure but it surely’s designed to check acceleration, braking and dealing with. Two runs are clocked and on the finish of the primary run, the drivers swap vehicles to get rid of any potential benefit or drawback.
Within the Mannequin S Plaid, the battery was preconditioned for the Drag Strip mode, which took about quarter-hour to finish. The suspension was set to Sport and within the lowest journey peak.
Within the Lucid Air Sapphire, Monitor mode was chosen, then the Drag Strip choice–a bit of simpler than within the Mannequin S, however I’ll give Tesla credit score for making the entire operation a bit of extra dramatic, particularly relating to the Cheetah stance that the Mannequin S Plaid takes proper earlier than launch.
Now that the specs are out of the way in which, I’ll simply say this: the race you’re about to see within the video is intense. On the finish of the primary run, the Lucid Air was clocked at a velocity of 164 miles per hour. Let’s not overlook that each these vehicles are four-door household sedans, so experiencing this quantity of energy and velocity looks as if dishonest physics a bit of bit.
The second run was a bit of completely different, with the Mannequin S set in Monitor mode as a substitute of Drag Strip mode within the hopes that the automobile would ship extra energy to the wheels when exiting the nook on the finish of the straight. Did it assist? Effectively, not likely. For what it’s value, although, the Mannequin S Plaid, even with the $20,000 Monitor Pack, continues to be half the value of the Air Sapphire, which retails for a candy, candy $250,500. In the meantime, Tesla is asking $91,630 for a base Mannequin S Plaid with out the Monitor Pack.
So, is it value spending 1 / 4 of 1,000,000 {dollars} on an admittedly very good EV? You be the choose.
