Xiaomi’s second new car, the YU7, has been selling well recently, but on the second day of testing, the brake pads caught fire due to overheating. Prior to this, the YU7 had faced scrutiny for using smartphone chips instead of automotive-grade chips for its cockpit core, as well as discrepancies between the pre-release sales data reported by the media and the actual post-release sales figures.
According to reports from multiple Chinese media outlets such as The Paper and Jiemian News, on June 27th, the information, transaction, and service platform “Car King” conducted the first comprehensive test of the Xiaomi YU7 across the internet. During testing at the Tianjin V1 Racetrack, the tested model, Xiaomi YU7 Max, experienced a situation where the brake disc caught fire. Footage circulating on the internet shows flames erupting from the brake disc position on the right front wheel of the vehicle.
Xiaomi’s new YU7 car is positioned as an SUV model and was launched on June 26th, offering three models: the Standard version priced at 253,500 RMB, the Pro version at 279,900 RMB, and the Max version at 329,900 RMB.
Public records show that the Tianjin V1 Racetrack (also known as V1 Auto World) has a length of 4.29 kilometers, with 19 corners, and is classified as a professional track that can simulate various complex driving scenarios. It provides an ideal venue for testing the performance of vehicles under extreme conditions such as high speeds, frequent steering, and emergency braking.
On June 28th, Xiaomi Automotive responded to the recent media reports circulating about the brake disc catching fire during testing of the Xiaomi YU7 at the racetrack. The official statement cited the incident occurring at the Tianjin V1 Racetrack and explained that the main reason for the fire was the lack of cooling down the brakes directly after parking, which could lead to the organic materials in the brake pads catching fire due to high temperatures.
Previously, at the launch event for the new YU7 car, Xiaomi claimed to have pre-sold over 200,000 units in just 3 minutes. However, some netizens pointed out that Tencent Technology had already reported the pre-sale of over 200,000 units at 19:31, before Xiaomi’s launch event began at 22:00 that night, leading to suspicions of inflated sales numbers.
Furthermore, the cockpit core of the Xiaomi YU7 uses a smartphone chip (consumer-grade, not industrial-grade, nor automotive-grade). According to reports on May 22 from IT Home, at the Xiaomi 15th Anniversary Strategic New Product Launch Event, Lei Jun introduced the Xiaomi YU7 model’s smart cockpit equipped with Qualcomm’s third-generation Snapdragon 8 mobile platform cockpit chip based on 4nm technology.
The Qualcomm third-generation Snapdragon 8 (also known as Snapdragon 8 Gen3) is designed for high-end smartphones, offering powerful performance and various advanced features.
Citing industry experts, The Securities Times reported that while using consumer-grade chips may initially reduce costs, there may be bottlenecks in terms of computing power and iteration speed.