New EV F-150 Lightning

So anybody here got one reserved yet? What do you all think after watching some of the videos out about this new truck. Just reading through the comments seems most like it for the most part. A lot like where it states it looks like a truck because that what it is statement guessing that is toward the Tesla cyber truck. Also talks about how it can power your home up to 3 days with the 9.6kw available power and can haul up to 400 pounds in the all new Mega Frunk (where the engine used to be). Tow up to 10,000 pounds I believe it was. There are quite a few videos out there. Here are a few of them Starting a $39,947 or close to that I believe it was and up to about $90,000.

https://www.autoweek.com/news/green-cars/a36463000/ford-f-150-lightning-video/

https://www.youtube.com/hashtag/builtfordtough

Me and my 2001 Lightning hate it.

They should have called it the "Mach T" or something else equally stupid.

The "Lightning" name already has history as a sport truck that was more than just fast in a straight line.

This feels like Ford just trying to capitalize on name recognition.

Like when that Korean company bought Advent and started rebranding Namsung garbage as Advent. Now everyone thinks Advent is bottom shelf Walmart junk and have no idea what the history behind the name actually is or what kind of pioneers they were in the loudspeaker world.

I guess it doesn't matter though. Younger kids today see my Lightning, have no idea what it is and think I'm just having a mid-life crisis or something. Until I romp on it, that is, and my taillights get real tiny real quick.

Can you still have a midlife crisis vehicle if you bought that vehicle in your 20's and have been the only owner for 20 years? Maybe it's a quarter-life crisis truck?

I did see adds on tv for it, at least it looks like a PU truck un-like the EV Mustang where they were just using the name for an ugly looking SUV thing in my book.

As for the lighting name I also though the same but can also see why because of the EV side.
Besides anyone who would buy this EV truck would they know what the first lighting's were unless they had one or were into the first ones? I dont think they do and maybe not the people at Ford that started to draw this up (to young).

I wonder how stripped down the $40K truck is and what the cost is to install a charger at your house if you can? Up north around NYC & lower CT come summer they have brown outs because the power CO. cannot keep up to power demand now put on all the EV's whats going to happen?
And if you dont think thats not a big deal, I worked at a hospital and the power Co. would tell us to cut back on power we use or go to gen set and off the power grid! Yes a hospital!

Now if the tree huggers are buying the EV's have they thought what happens when the batteries have to be replaced? I dont think so and they are worst for earth I think than gas.
Just my .02
Dave ----

Personally, I think EV's are the coming thing.  But, I stress COMING as I don't believe they have "arrived".  I see two major problems with them at the moment for the kind of driving I tend to do, which is long trips with many days of ~600 miles/day.

The issues I see are:

Batteries: At this point in time driving 600 miles will require at least one recharge, and that assumes that there's a recharging station at exactly the mid-point of the trip.  Otherwise you'll have to recharge more than once, and recharging takes a lot of time.  But, if the manufacturers were to standardize the batteries and be able to swap them out in 20 minutes for fully charged ones, that would be a game changer.

Recharging Stations: There is no standardization of the stations nor connections to the vehicle.  And until we have standardization I don't think there will be a charging station at the point in your trip where you need it.

Again, I think EV's are the coming thing.  But "the system" isn't in place for my kind of driving.

I am no engineer but why is it that we can charge batteries on our vehicle now but there is no way to incorporate that into these new EV vehicles? Is there no kind of alternator or generator that can be designed to be put on the moving part of the vehicle that would at least give some amount of charge while you are moving? Must be something I am not seeing or overlooking since I know they have some of the worlds best engineers working on them.

What you are talking about is perpetual motion - being able to charge off the motion that you currently have to keep on going.  But everything has loss in it, so you cannot generate as much power as you are using.

So, let's say you put an alternator on that can crank out 130A to charge the batteries.  But due to losses it'll take maybe 150A from the batteries to turn the motor to turn the alternator to generate that 130A.  In other words, you lose 20A.

However, there is some "regeneration" built into many of today's EV's.  When you are at speed and drop the throttle, acting like you want to slow, some actually use the motors to generate some power to put back in the batteries.  And when you tap on the brakes lightly they generate more power, causing you to slow.

So while perpetual motion doesn't work due to the losses incurred, when loss is acceptable, like in braking or slowing down, they already use regeneration to charge the batteries.

I think Ford is justified in using the Lightning brand.
They own it, and it does have history as a truck.
No one complained about Crown Victoria being used for their Panther platform fleet vehicles.  

Dave, it's not only summer cooling around here.
There are plenty of times that existing energy infrastructure can't keep up.
I used to be friends with the facilities manager at SUNY Purchase, and in winter cold snaps they were often told to switch from natural gas to oil because of the tremendous volume they used.
Systems installed 50-100 years ago are not going to have a tremendous amount of headroom.

Besides, electric vehicles are most often charged overnight (when demand is lower)
But that definitely is a problem for those who don't own a home and have to park in the street.

I wouldn't be too concerned about battery life, though I'm not sure what kind of warranty Ford is offering.
New Tesla's have an eight year unlimited mile warranty (against degradation, not just failure)
75% at 400k is being reported. But that is anecdotal. Only time will tell.
And we are already seeing the rise of recovery and recycling centers for these chemistries.
Plus new (faster charging) chemistries are being developed all the time.
Maybe we have finally found a good use for graphene?
https://arstechnica.com/science/2021/05/eternally-five-years-away-no-batteries-are-improving-under-your-nose

Electric motors are WAY more efficient than Internal Combustion. And energy cost per mile is a fraction of gasoline or diesel.
Electric vehicles don't need brake service and oil/coolant changes nearly as often because there are no contaminants.
They don't need tune-ups, transmission, fuel or exhaust service at all.
Think of all the energy an ICE throws away as heat through the radiator, exhaust and brakes.
So, shocks and tires.... the same as any other vehicle I'd imagine.

Gary, there is definitely standardization of chargers.
It is a mandate.
Though you have different levels of charging.

And Tesla continues to hold on to a proprietary plug in this country, that's not the case anywhere else in the world.

I can hope that CCS-2 sees universal adoption (by mandate if necessary) just like USB-C has.


Norway is over 50% electric adoption at this point.  (and their winter climate isn't conductive to EV's)

I think Europe will lead in this case.
Roads, cars and distances are typically smaller.
Nations like Germany have 400v three phase to the home, so less converter losses there.

Jim - After you said that I did more reading and found this that I thought was helpful: Electric vehicle (EV) charging standards and how they differ.

And here are some takeaways:

Level 1 - 110v: So if the battery capacity of your 2021 Mustang Mach-E is 88kWh, you’re looking at days to charge, not hours. Nearly 63 hours by our count.

Level 2 - 240V: These chargers are the most common type found at public charging stations. ... So if you’re boasting around 7.7 kW max power at 240V, you can charge that Mach-E significantly quicker. 11.5 hours sounds a lot better than 63 hours, no?

Level 3 – DC rapid/fast/super chargers: Depending on the power available, a Level 3 charger can fully replenish your EV in twenty to thirty minutes.

And then there is Tesla, which is doing its own thing.  

What I didn't follow up on is how many Level 3 chargers there are and where they are placed.  That would be critical.

Anyway, as said, I believe EV's are the coming thing.  And apparently they are getting closer to arrival than I thought.

Tesla is 'doing it's own thing' only because they legally can in this country.
They aren't allowed a proprietary plug in Europe or Asia.

Level one is what you do with an extension cord when there is no option.
Level two is what many people do, as it's no more complicated than putting a dryer or welder outlet in your garage.
Level three is what you get if you use most public spaces around here (with the fallback to level two if your five year old Leaf won't support faster charging)

I must say the Supercharger network at every highway rest stop here in Connecticut is impressive.
At both north and southbound plazas in Darien (the one I pass every day) there is one bank of 16 in the main parking lot and another set of six or eight off on the other side of the building.
Maybe it's just that we have a lot of Tesla's driving around???

VW Electrify America is in the midst of their US charger buildout (as atonement for their diesel cheating)
There are over 600 locations and 2,600 individual fast chargers today.
I personally feel the entire Volkswagen C-suite should be behind bars.

Gary Lewis wrote

Personally, I think EV's are the coming thing.  But, I stress COMING as I don't believe they have "arrived".  I see two major problems with them at the moment for the kind of driving I tend to do, which is long trips with many days of ~600 miles/day.

The issues I see are:

Batteries: At this point in time driving 600 miles will require at least one recharge, and that assumes that there's a recharging station at exactly the mid-point of the trip.  Otherwise you'll have to recharge more than once, and recharging takes a lot of time.  But, if the manufacturers were to standardize the batteries and be able to swap them out in 20 minutes for fully charged ones, that would be a game changer.

Recharging Stations: There is no standardization of the stations nor connections to the vehicle.  And until we have standardization I don't think there will be a charging station at the point in your trip where you need it.

Again, I think EV's are the coming thing.  But "the system" isn't in place for my kind of driving.

There was a time when there were charging stations across the country and people thought electric cars would replace gas.  Then the electric starter came out and put the nail in the electric car.  They have tried numerous times to reboot electric as well as hybrids as well as alternative fueled vehicles and they all failed in the end and never caught on.

Be it the baker electric car of the teens



Or the Doble


Or the Owens Magnetic, the car of a thousand speeds


Or even Fords Hemp car that was never given an offical name and was fully constructed of hemp based materials and was powered by hemp based fuel.


All of these and more failed on doing what they were claimed to do that is replace the combustion engine and they have still yet to do that to this day.  I dont see it happening any time soon, in fact I could see the Ford Nucleon being produced and released before electric/hybrids take over.

For those that dont know the Ford Nucleon was a 1958 concept of a nuclear powered vehicle as the "car of the future".

81f100custom wrote

I am no engineer but why is it that we can charge batteries on our vehicle now but there is no way to incorporate that into these new EV vehicles? Is there no kind of alternator or generator that can be designed to be put on the moving part of the vehicle that would at least give some amount of charge while you are moving? Must be something I am not seeing or overlooking since I know they have some of the worlds best engineers working on them.

As was stated before it goes against the law of physics.

Lets say you are going down the road consuming 50A of power to maintain speed.  Now lets say you have a generator running off one of the wheels to create electricity to charge the battery, which youll need to create 70A of power to off set the 50A consumption to charge the battery.  This load of generating 70A of power now increases the load on the drive motors making the 50A of power to maintain speed to shoot up to 85A.

In a nut shell when ever you try to use something to generate the electricity to run itself it becomes a never ending escalation between energy consumption and energy output.  As output goes up consumption goes up more.

Gotta love those '50's concept cars like the Lincoln Futura.

Rusty, I think people have to get away from the idea of going to the filling station.
If it's down to Amazon building their own fleet because they see the advantages of electric over ICE, then they will lead.
Delivery vans certainly spend more hours on the road each day than 98% of vehicles do.

I'm not really impressed by any of the electric trucks on offer. Ford, Rivian, Tesla, Lordstown, Hummer, whatever...
(though 775 foot pounds does sound impressive)

Four doors and a tiny "bed" isn't my idea of a truck.
If I wanted a Ridgeline I'd buy a Honda.

Obviously I'm old and out of touch with 'the lifestyle' these vehicles are being sold to.

ArdWrknTrk wrote

Obviously I'm old and out of touch with 'the lifestyle' these vehicles are being sold to.

ME TOO!!!  I just have no desire to learn the new system.  And I'm an old internal combustion guy.  

$100 refundable deposit paid.

But I probably will not go through with it unless I can tow my 7300lbs airstream 200 miles when the battery is new. 140miles when the battery is old and degraded.

I only like towing 3-4 hours. I feel like any more is a waste and you are driving past a bunch of cool stuff!

ArdWrknTrk wrote

Gotta love those '50's concept cars like the Lincoln Futura.

Rusty, I think people have to get away from the idea of going to the filling station.
If it's down to Amazon building their own fleet because they see the advantages of electric over ICE, then they will lead.
Delivery vans certainly spend more hours on the road each day than 98% of vehicles do.

I'm not really impressed by any of the electric trucks on offer. Ford, Rivian, Tesla, Lordstown, Hummer, whatever...
(though 775 foot pounds does sound impressive)

Four doors and a tiny "bed" isn't my idea of a truck.
If I wanted a Ridgeline I'd buy a Honda.

Obviously I'm old and out of touch with 'the lifestyle' these vehicles are being sold to.

Yep there was a guy that actually built a metal bodied replica of one and another guy building a fiberglass body replica one but after he built the first one he modified the buck he made off a surviving fiberglass duplicate built back then to replicate the 60s batmobile.  That really sucks because I would sell everything I own to build a replica of the Futura and throw late model powertrain under the hood.


Problem is though that may be fine for urban use but how well will the electric handle rural use that is the big question.  Electric could be possible in large urban centers like Houston or New York where you dont have to drive very far to go to the store.  I feel where the ice beats out the electric is in rural areas like here in Texas in rural areas you can in many instances drive 60 miles one way just to go to the store.  Banking on a 100 mile battery range at 75 mph (which is our highway speed limit) you would have to plug in at the store just to be able to make it back home in that instance.  Why I have always said electric cars are only good for short commutes not long.  While Amazon trucks may be using electric in urban areas they are still as far as I have seen gas/diesel powered in rural areas.

As far as the offerings of the electric truck market, no one will offer a truck like a ice truck with any kind of capability because it will reduce the battery range of said truck so they build them to reduce the amount of weight you can carry to try and offset the power consumption and maintain a reasonable 100 - 130 mile on a charge.

Can you imagine how far a all electric 1 ton truck would go hauling 1 ton worth of cargo?  I bet you it wont be 100 - 130 miles it would be around 50 to 70 miles.

As I have looked around into this further it looks like they are going to be making gas generators to carry around with you. What sense does that make? Just keep the gas engine and go about your business as usual. I mean the whole reason to go with a EV was to cut emissions right now your going to carry a gas burner around that probably emits more than the car would because I would guess the portable generators probably do not run and clean as the emission built into the car.

 https://www.diy-experts.net/charge-ev/

And what about this side of it after they are used up? Hope someone is thinking all this through before it turns into a big disaster.
 
https://tekdeeps.com/a-field-becomes-the-graveyard-of-thousands-of-electric-cars/

It doesn't seem to me that it was anything about those vehicles being electric that caused them to be abandoned in a field.  🙄
If the company hadn't neglected them and then gone bankrupt their contract would still be playing out.
Car sharing (even scooter and bike sharing) has pretty much failed because of abuse.
It's a well intentioned social experiment that refuses to accept that people aren't well intentioned.

Back on topic: I am absolutely sure that Ford has done their homework before commiting to the Lightning design.
They know their target market, how many miles are driven and passengers are carried, or they wouldn't have built the truck they did.

Edit, yep this Ford quote from Ars confirms my conjecture about why the mile range....
"More than 145 million miles of telematics data show that for the average F-150 commercial customer in the US, 95 percent of their daily travel is less than 174 miles," said Ted Cannis, general manager, Ford North America commercial business. "Commercial customers track their business expenses closely—they buy what they need and not a penny more."

This video popped up in my feed today.
While I know the Model 3 Performance isn't an F-150, it does show that for many the infrastructure is there for whatever distance you want to travel.

https://youtu.be/rxA8Y69R6uM

Electrify America has a ways to catch up with the Supercharger network, but they have billions left to pay into it, so it is coming.

As someone who will inevitably be living through the shift towards all electric vehicles, I appreciate this conversation. I know electric motors can provide a lot of instantaneous torque and I can't help but like that. I've been doing the best I can to study electronics the past couple years because whether I like it or not, it's happening.
My dad tells a story about the first time he had trouble with an early fuel-injected Plymouth he had, and how shocked and confused the neighborhood mechanic was when he came over and popped the hood and couldn't find the carbuerator. I'm trying at least to not be that guy.
Luckily, I can't afford any of these vehicles so I have plenty of time to see how all this plays out.

I think it's a fine looking truck. I'm glad they didn't try to make it look like the Tesla Cybertruck. Its definitely following the trend of electricity-themed names, which I'm sure will get played out soon.

I also think Ford was smart to beat its competitors to the punch on an electric truck.