Month: June 2020

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  A prototype Lucid Air undergoing a flow visualization test at the Windshear wind tunnel facility in Concord, North Carolina. [credit: Lucid Motors ]

A few weeks ago, we took a look at the most aerodynamically efficient vehicles ever made. At the time, the lowest-drag production car for sale in the US was the Porsche Taycan, which cuts through the air with a drag coefficient (Cd) of 0.22. But the rather excellent electric Porsche won't wear that crown for very long. Lucid Motors is readying production of its first battery electric vehicle, the Air, and it has just released the results of some wind tunnel testing. Tests at the Windshear facility in North Carolina have determined that the Air has a Cd of only 0.21.

Moving through the air as easily as possible is important if you want to travel the farthest distance using a given amount of energy. As such, optimizing a car for low drag has become more important, first as regulators in Europe demanded more efficient cars, then more recently as range has become the most important attribute of a battery electric vehicle.

"Aerodynamic efficiency plays a key role in achieving world-beating range and performance and is particularly valuable to an EV in that it provides 'smart range' independent of battery pack size. So naturally we intensively focused upon aerodynamics throughout the Lucid Air’s development. Our aero team worked seamlessly with design and engineering counterparts, establishing aero efficiency as a core tenet of Lucid Air from its very inception, enabling us to achieve this new standard," said Peter Rawlinson, CEO and CTO of Lucid Motors.

Enlarge / SpaceX added a new core to its fleet with the Demo-2 mission in late May. (credit: NASA)

4:20pm ET Update: A Falcon 9 rocket lifted off at the end of its launch window on Tuesday afternoon, and delivered a GPS satellite into a good parking orbit. The spacecraft was due to deploy from the Falcon 9 rocket's second stage about 1 hour and 29 minutes after liftoff.

After dropping off the second stage, the first stage descended back toward the Earth to successfully land on the Just Read the Instructions droneship. SpaceX now has five used first stages available for additional missions.

Original post: On Tuesday, SpaceX will attempt to launch a 3.7-ton Global Positioning System (GPS) satellite for the US Air Force. This GPS III launch is scheduled to occur on a Falcon 9 rocket between 3:55pm ET and 4:10pm ET (19:56-20:10 UTC) from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida.