In case you’ve just wandered onto this website and have no idea what a Polestar is, it’s basically a Sino-Swedish tie-up that sees Volvo’s parent company Geely working across continents to produce electrified cars with an Ikea aesthetic. Their first car, the Polestar 1, was a hybridized-GT that offered a high level of performance wrapped in concept car skin. It was limited. Their first mainstream model, the Polestar 2, is a crossover-y sedan thing. It gets up 270 miles of range in Long Range trim and starts at about $48,400.
The Polestar 3 is the most conventional offering from the brand. It’s an SUV. People love SUVs. This is of the five-seat variety, somewhere in the Jeep Grand Cherokee range, being longer than the regular GC but shorter than the GC L. It doesn’t look anything like a Grand Cherokee. It looks just concept-y enough to stare at for a while. As is popular today, the Polestar 3 has a dual-motor setup with the bias towards the rear wheels. The two motors produce 489 horsepower combined, though you can option the Performance Pack and get 517 horsepower in exchange for 30 miles of range on the EPA standard. The battery is a monster 111 kWh lithium-ion setup with prismatic cells, which is bigger by about 10% than the Model X 100D battery but, notably, has 48 miles fewer range.
Polestars, historically, have some of the best one-pedal driving feel and the company promises that’s the same here. For those who want performance, a Polestar 1-derived Torque Vectoring Dual Clutch setup sits on the rear axle. Having tried this system on a race track in a Polestar 1 it’s a setup that can actually adjust torque between the rear wheels and not just use the brakes to slow one wheel down. An adaptive dual-chamber air-suspension is also standard. Inside it’s extremely Polestar as well and benefits from a high level of recycled or recyclable materials and welfare-certified leather. The Polestar 2 was the first car to launch with Android Auto as the default vehicle operating system and that continues here.
It sounds like from the press release that a Level 2 ADAS is standard, with a LIDAR-based option as an add-on in the future: You can build your own now, with price starting at $83,900, which is less than a Model X by a good margin ($120,990) and a touch less than the BMW iX ($84,100). 2). $83,900. Cool. Another EV that’s nothing but a virtue signaling status symbol for the 1%. It’s not like we have any of those out there already…oh wait Why compare to model X (a bigger 3 row suv). I think most people would cross shop the Y, not the X with this car. Just because it has 3 rows doesn’t mean it SHOULD have 3 rows. This is the kind of feature I want in other people’s cars, not mine. Until a car can actually drive itself, I don’t value it’s feedback on the topic. I had annoying small issues with the P2 (mostly software related) and the company is slow to give solutions back, mostly software updates. I would not own this car without the warranty The chassis is new and the UI is somewhat updated, but the performance is not improved at all. I’m still trying to figure out what exactly the extra $25k gets you over a P2. Guess I have to keep waiting on an EV purchase. : ( My EV6 (AWD long-range) easily estimates 300 miles when driving in traffic, but drops to the 250-range when on the open road at 75mph (even less at 80mph). Then maybe a modest 15% drop in the winter (213 miles) and charging to 80% will net me 160 miles, and will take longer than 18 minutes in cold temperatures. “The cameras monitor the driver’s eyes and can trigger warning messages, sounds and even an emergency stop function when detecting a distracted, drowsy or disconnected driver.” Says who? https://www.kbb.com/car-news/survey-americans-want-evs-with-over-500-miles-of-range/ Until then, I think hybrid systems are by far the best solutions. They’ve finally moved up to minivans. I’m really looking forward to a meaningful plug-in hybrid system in a nice truck. And really, what is the idea behind ANY hybrid without a plug, and why do plug-ins cost so very much more than without? Most places, non-plug-ins are all we can get, but I would gladly go to the bother of plugging in to get even 5 miles per charge of full electric driving in a hybrid. That’s to the grocery store and back, why not? The battery is already there! If you have 3 cars, an electric car might make sense. That is of course if you want to waste one of your three choices on a car that makes you clammy on a road trip. Or during a freeze. Or a hurricane. Or during a power outage. Or during a holiday weekend. Electric cars are our future. Battery cars as they are now? Not our future.
