Lightning Waves #1-4 have a 47% order conversion rate.

[RT21KRH]

The Lightning's body-on-frame construction is a differentiator from the competition, but I don't understand the bias against modern unibody construction in the half-ton truck segment. It's comical to hear Chevy and GMC talk around the fact that the Hummer and Silverado EV are essentially unibody trucks.

You get better structural rigidity and efficiency with unibody construction and the R1T proves that you can have amazing off-road abilities and almost best-in-class towing capabilities with unibody construction.

Is there something I'm missing or is it just an example of truck buyers being irrationally conservative? It reminds me of the ruckus that happened when the F150 went with aluminum body and truck bed construction.

Frame rails provide load carrying / towing at lower price point for a long wheelbase truck. Easier to manufacture than unibody. An F-150 super crew with 8 foot bed is lots of unibody stamping! Also the rails provide high longitudinal stiffness and that’s what you need in a truck… loaded towing straight down the highway. Torsional stiffness is poor with the frame rails as you mention.

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[TaxmanHog]

Frame rails provide load carrying / towing at lower price point for a long wheelbase truck. Easier to manufacture than unibody. An F-150 super crew with 8 foot bed is lots of unibody stamping! Also the rails provide high longitudinal stiffness and that’s what you need in a truck… loaded towing straight down the highway. Torsional stiffness is poor with the frame rails as you mention.

Also thinking about the guys doing winter plowing with 150's, not sure how well the unibody will put up with hitting sewer manholes at 20-30 MPH.

 

[PungoteagueDave]

Also thinking about the guys doing winter plowing with 150's, not sure how well the unibody will put up with hitting sewer manholes at 20-30 MPH.

gonna catch gief for this, given my towing history, forcing my half-ton to do a Super-Duty's job, but a 150 is not the right rig for serious snow plowing.

 

[rlbussard]

I was wave 3, and when it came down to do the order, I just couldn't stomach the price of the platinum and didn't want to down grade to a Lariat. Even the Lariat is still $12k more then the loaded Platinum power boost that I have ordered. That and the truck being so new, I think I'm going to wait 3-4 years to see how things develop. Not ready to be a beta tester at that price right now.

I'm not sure where you came up with $12k difference. Last year I ordered my 21 F150 Hybrid Powerboost 7.6kw Platinum that had absolutely everything on it for $76,145. My Lightning build for Lariat ER with everything on it was $81.5k. that's only a $5,300 difference, not $12k.

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