Lightning Commuter: 1 year and 26K on the 2023

[Jseis]

Long post.

Most those miles are a consequence of my 5 days a week 90-100 mile commute. Since I drive the same route I mess around with speed, tire pressure, driving style, to find a happy medium. One 7 mile section has 3 dozen curves that love a 50 mph power through but that’s 72 tire rounding corners a day so I take easy unlike days of yore with the tire shredding 5.0 GT . The front wheel drive Subie GL 1300 wagon was a hoot.

I’ve laid down 3/4 of a million miles on this commute route in 50+ years from high school through college & 4 decades in various employment, all requiring long drives. Thus I’ve driven 1/2 ton & 3/4 ton trucks, SUV’s, station wagons, pony cars, bug, microbus, convertibles, 1.5 ton & 5 yard hay/farm trucks, with several vehicles accruing 165K, 170K, 220K, many well over 100K. Pushed the limit on a few: Hitting 94 mph in my ‘99 7.3 F250 (6 spd manual), picked up by a trooper for doing 90 mph at midnight in my ‘89 Subaru XT, nearly wiped out in a herd of elk hustling across the road as I drove between them at 70 mph in my dad’s ‘66 Olds 88. I was 18 at the time.

Hit two deer, occasional flat tires, cut & pulled trees off the highway, laid out flares, put brush fires out, fueled out-of gas travelers, waved for years at people I never met, raced more than a few people home.

The Sheriff complained one morning at the courthouse that I drove too slow. I said “Well if I’m in a hurry I can go from Stenlin’s Corner to the courthouse in 35 minutes”, he says “Yea that’s pretty good but my guys do it in 34”… “Well, (I said) your guys have lights!”

Some favorite rigs?The ‘62 bug and microbus were slow. The ‘70 Honda SL 350 was a blast. Then came the ‘89 XT, ‘93 Mustang GT, ‘99 7.3 SD F250 (woke the dead on startup), 2010 4.6 V8 Adrenalin, 2018 Twin Turbo V6 Flex…..

and now the ‘23 Lightning….the most useful, most powerful, quietest, serene, comfortable & charming of them all. And it averages year round ~80 mpge. Stunning.

A GT muscle truck w/IRS, AWD, floats like butterfly & stings like a bee. Hauls 5/6ths of a rack of bodies plus all their gear. Has enough tech to remind me I’m soon hitting 7 decades. Is so intriguing that my crew supervisor always wants to “take my truck”, good old boy contractors driving F450s-650s, bigger service rigs, are intrigued & appreciate & respect the power & sleeper vibe.

With a tonneau, some hyper style slow acceleration and gain speed downhill, bleed some uphill and staying right at 53 mph in this summer like weather I can average 2.7 miles/kWH if dead calm. With tires pumped to 50 I can occasionally push that to 2.8, even 3.0 but that requires 80-90 degree temps, tail wind and 45-55 traffic (like summer travelers in long packs led by the slowest dog). Point being.. driving style really determines mi/kwh. With load range E tires at a teeth jarring 70 psi no reason why 3.0 mi/kwh wouldn’t be in sight. And even at 1.0 mi/kwh the LT is efficient. And for a guy like me with a 50 mile commute-work radius.. the truck is a contender.

So the truck is late spring-summer-late fall efficient. Late fall through early spring the truck averages 2.1-2.4 with cold temps (below 40’s to mid 20’s) and headwinds the biggest obstacles to higher kWh averages.

In reality it doesn’t really matter.. the LT is efficient. More efficient than any computer mapped, variable timed, injected & boosted state of the art ICE.

Locally I’ve towed 3 trailers (car hauler, flatbed, boat & trailer) and.. whoa.. a towing machine. Since there are 25+ boat launches with 50-60 miles, range isn’t an issue.

Two trips to Great Falls last year, each racking up 1800 miles. Definitely a long distance road tripper. Never a problem with EA charging though occasional glitches with 1/4 chargers not working and one modest wait time when I hit the afternoon rush at the Spokane Valley Mall EA site.

My father & grandfather were union electricians that built big stuff (generator installs on hydro-dams) & they knew full startup torque electrical motor power. They’d be so pleased to see the LT at full boil power.

Features I use regularly: Cruise, (no sign reading, no lane centering), defrost w/modest heat, frunk, charge at home (CP Home Flex), tire pressure monitoring (two nails recently in tires..from construction sites), auto play music (reasonably long playlist), speech to text, phone, messaging, pro power around house site & farm, trailer assist, heat seat in winter, tailgate step, Ford installed tonneau (roll back), rear window defrost, nav system, ford pass app- charge monitoring, bed tie downs, trip energy, Google maps, rear window defogger. I occasionally mess with the screen menu to keep familiar with options.

Things I don’t use as much; frunk outlets, rear under seat storage, sun roof open, zone lighting, valet option (and a lot of other choices.. I tend to set & forget).

Service repairs- BMS replacement and frunk button wonkiness (under grill).

Unexplainable observations: I was able to repeat this. Uphill left hand curves, under power-load at say 45 mph appear to slightly unload left rear wheel and that imparts an odd out of balance feeling. It appears that some differential response-torque adjustment related to the AWD system may be at play. But WTF do I know?

Take home message: A serene Pullman car on the backend of a locomotive disguised as a very useful pickup truck.

Nailed it.

Sponsored

 

[Tony Burgh]

OG’s rule. Or whatever kids say today.

 

[Pod]

Love to see this kind of report. I think my Lightning is the greatest vehicle I’ve ever owned. It just hits the sweet spot of ground breaking tech and traditional comfort and convenience. Plus…fast as heck

 

[Sgt. Carter]

Long post.

Most those miles are a consequence of my 5 days a week 90-100 mile commute. Since I drive the same route I mess around with speed, tire pressure, driving style, to find a happy medium. One 7 mile section has 3 dozen curves that love a 50 mph power through but that’s 72 tire rounding corners a day so I take easy unlike days of yore with the tire shredding 5.0 GT . The front wheel drive Subie GL 1300 wagon was a hoot.

I’ve laid down 3/4 of a million miles on this commute route in 50+ years from high school through college & 4 decades in various employment, all requiring long drives. Thus I’ve driven 1/2 ton & 3/4 ton trucks, SUV’s, station wagons, pony cars, bug, microbus, convertibles, 1.5 ton & 5 yard hay/farm trucks, with several vehicles accruing 165K, 170K, 220K, many well over 100K. Pushed the limit on a few: Hitting 94 mph in my ‘99 7.3 F250 (6 spd manual), picked up by a trooper for doing 90 mph at midnight in my ‘89 Subaru XT, nearly wiped out in a herd of elk hustling across the road as I drove between them at 70 mph in my dad’s ‘66 Olds 88. I was 18 at the time.

Hit two deer, three flat tires, cut & pulled trees of the highway, laid out flares, put brush fires out, fueled out-of gas travelers, waved for years at people I never met, raced more than a few people home.

The Sheriff complained one morning at the courthouse that I drove too slow. I said “Well if I’m in a hurry I can go from Stenlin’s Corner to the courthouse in 35 minutes”, he says “Yea that’s pretty good but my guys do it in 34”… “Well, (I said) your guys have lights!”

Some favorite rigs? Well the ‘62 bug and microbus were slow. The ‘70 Honda SL 350 was a blast. Then came the ‘89 XT, ‘93 Mustang GT, ‘99 7.3 SD F250 (woke the dead on startup), 2010 4.6 V8 Adrenalin, 2018 Twin Turbo V6 Flex…..

and now the ‘23 Lightning….the most useful, most powerful, quietest, serene, comfortable & charming of them all. And it averages year round ~80 mpge. Stunning.

A GT muscle truck w/IRS, AWD, floats like butterfly & stings like a bee. Hauls 5/6ths of a rack of bodies plus all their gear. Has enough tech to remind me I’m soon hitting 7 decades. Is so intriguing that my crew supervisor always wants to “take my truck”, good old boy contractors driving F450s-650s, bigger service rigs are intrigued & appreciate & respect the power & sleeper vibe.

With a tonneau, some hyper style slow acceleration and gain speed downhill, bleed some uphill and staying right at 53 mph in this summer like weather I can average 2.7 miles/kWH if dead calm. With tires pumped to 50 I can occasionally push that to 2.8, even 3.0 but that requires 80-90 degree temps, tail wind and 45-55 traffic (like summer travelers in long packs led by the slowest dog). Point being.. driving style really determines mi/kwh. With load range E tires at a teeth jarring 70 psi no reason why 3.0 mi/kwh wouldn’t be in sight. And even at 1.0 mi/kwh the LT is efficient. And for a guy like me with a 50 mile commute-work radius.. the truck is a contender.

So the truck is late spring-summer-late fall efficient. Late fall through early spring the truck averages 2.1-2.4 with cold temps (below 40’s to mid 20’s) and headwinds the biggest obstacles to higher kWh averages.

In reality it doesn’t really matter.. the LT is efficient. More efficient than any computer mapped, variable timed, injected & boosted state of the art ICE.

Locally I’ve towed 3 trailers (car hauler, flatbed, boat & trailer) and.. whoa.. a towing machine. Since there are 25+ boat launches with 50-60 miles, range isn’t an issue.

Two trips to Great Falls last year, each racking up 1800 miles. Definitely a long distance road tripper. Never a problem with EA charging though occasional glitches with 1/4 chargers not working and one modest wait time when I hit the afternoon rush at the Spokane Valley Mall EA site.

My father & grandfather were union electricians that built big stuff (generator installs on hydro-dams) & they knew full startup torque electrical motor power. They’d be so pleased to see the LT at full boil power.

Features I use regularly: Cruise, (no sign reading, no lane centering), defrost w/modest heat, frunk, charge at home (CP Home Flex), tire pressure monitoring (two nails in tires from construction sites), auto play music (reasonably long playlist), speech to text, phone, messaging, pro power around house site & farm, trailer assist, heat seat in winter, tailgate step, Ford installed tonneau (roll back), rear window defrost, nav system, ford pass app- charge monitoring, bed tie downs, trip energy, Google maps, rear window defogger. I occasionally mess with the screen menu to keep familiar with options.

Things I don’t use as much; frunk outlets, rear under seat storage, sun roof open, zone lighting, valet option (and a lot of other choices.. I tend to set & forget).

Service repairs- BMS replacement and frunk button wonkiness (under grill).

Unexplainable observations: I was able to repeat this. Uphill left hand curves, under power-load at say 45 mph appear to slightly unload left rear wheel and that imparts an odd out of balance feeling. It appears that some differential response-adjustment related to the AWD system may be at play. But WTF do I know?

Take home message: A serene Pullman car on the backend of a locomotive disguised as a very useful pickup truck.

Nailed it.

Superb report! Thanks.

 

[3rdgenfan]

Hurray for commuters! I've got 29k on my XLT. Was working with a dealer on a trade in for their Lariat ER and was told I have "the 2nd highest mileage XLT in a 2000 mile radius"

 

[MTcowpoke]

Aren't our Lightnings great? Like you I seem to put on 50 to a 100 miles per day and absolutely love the truck. I'm about to hit 27k in the 14.5 months I've had it. I have several diesels that need to go down the road because I want another Lightning with ER for traveling. You must juice up in Missoula and be able to make the round trip with no charging in Great Falls till the Tesla site opened up. I went to Missoula last Friday night from central Montana to see Robert Plant and Alison Krauss at the Kettle House venue. I had to grab some juice in Helena at the SC's (EA isn't online yet) and then at the SC's west of Missoula because the EA there has had issues. Concert over and head home, grab some juice in Helena again and arrive home with 14%. A little over 500 miles and the truck is just awesome, comfortable and quiet. I feel bad for the people that can't quite wrap their head around an electric vehicle, they are missing out.

 

[Jseis]

Aren't our Lightnings great? Like you I seem to put on 50 to a 100 miles per day and absolutely love the truck. I'm about to hit 27k in the 14.5 months I've had it. I have several diesels that need to go down the road because I want another Lightning with ER for traveling. You must juice up in Missoula and be able to make the round trip with no charging in Great Falls till the Tesla site opened up. I went to Missoula last Friday night from central Montana to see Robert Plant and Alison Krauss at the Kettle House venue. I had to grab some juice in Helena at the SC's (EA isn't online yet) and then at the SC's west of Missoula because the EA there has had issues. Concert over and head home, grab some juice in Helena again and arrive home with 14%. A little over 500 miles and the truck is just awesome, comfortable and quiet. I feel bad for the people that can't quite wrap their head around an electric vehicle, they are missing out.

I charge to ~90% at the Missoula EA site and the trick was charging overnight at the Credit Union L2 chargers near the Staybridge Suites in Great Falls since I had driving to do east near Fort Benton. Worked out pretty well. Never saw anyone else there charging. With the adapter, the Tesla site will make GF a breeze.

 

[FirstF150InCasco]

Brilliant write up. Thank you. Loved the summary line, "A serene Pullman car on the backend of a locomotive disguised as a very useful pickup truck." Thank you.

 

[Jajar1124]

Hurray for commuters! I've got 29k on my XLT. Was working with a dealer on a trade in for their Lariat ER and was told I have "the 2nd highest mileage XLT in a 2000 mile radius"

I must be first at 30k lol

 

[3rdgenfan]

I must be first at 30k lol

Probably! Even still they came in at 36k for the first trade number, so that's promising. Unfortunately I found out they won't do the tax credit at time of sale, so I'll be waiting to see what 2025 brings if there is a refresh.

 

[Jajar1124]

Probably! Even still they came in at 36k for the first trade number, so that's promising. Unfortunately I found out they won't do the tax credit at time of sale, so I'll be waiting to see what 2025 brings if there is a refresh.

Eh that’s a bummer, my dad scored an XLT ER for a great price and had me thinking but I plan on riding this until it quits I think. Lowered the rear end and powder coated some Lariat wheels and love the look now anyway!

 

[chl]

What, no motorcycles in your past?

Could not agree more with your assessment of the Lightning.

I passed along to a grand-kid my 2001 Ranger when I got the Lightning. Now the only things I ever drive on the road that burn gas are my wife's Prius and my old MC now and then.

I still drive the 2012 Nissan Leaf that I bought in 2011. It is useful when I need to traverse narrow streets, low parking garages and tight parking. With 10 of 12 bars left its range is about 80mi. Leaf efficiency is better than the Lightning, 4.8mi/kWh often, but it can't tow a boat, or haul furniture for a friend, or bring home lumber, gravel, etc. It was a good commute vehicle before I changed to working from home.

After I got the Leaf I said to myself, if only there were an electric pickup truck, driving electric is the way to go. I was considering a conversion on the Ranger before the Lightning was born. Never had a single issue with the Leaf. Maintenance? Rotate tires, add windshield wiper fluid, change cabin air filter.

Back in 2011, EVSE's were pricey compared to today. I bought a GE Watt Station for about $1,000, which provided 240v/30A L2 charging.

But the local power company had an special time-of-day rate plan for EV's so in the summer (Apr-Oct) I could charge between 1am and 5am for 4.8 cents per kWh, winter (Oct-Apr) 5.79 cents.

The Virgina DMV charges an extra fee for EV's and hybrids, but they recently changed to a fee based on miles driven in a year - if the EV is driven 11,650 miles in a year you pay the full amount based on 1 cent per mile. Drive less than that, pay less.

A lot less expensive to operate and maintain an EV, so worth the extra up-front cost in the long run.

 

[MTcowpoke]

I charge to ~90% at the Missoula EA site and the trick was charging overnight at the Credit Union L2 chargers near the Staybridge Suites in Great Falls since I had driving to do east near Fort Benton. Worked out pretty well. Never saw anyone else there charging. With the adapter, the Tesla site will make GF a breeze.

I wonder if people knew what they saw when you were by FB, you have a better chance of seeing a UFO than a Lightning out there.

 

[Rthol21]

Long post.

Most those miles are a consequence of my 5 days a week 90-100 mile commute. Since I drive the same route I mess around with speed, tire pressure, driving style, to find a happy medium. One 7 mile section has 3 dozen curves that love a 50 mph power through but that’s 72 tire rounding corners a day so I take easy unlike days of yore with the tire shredding 5.0 GT . The front wheel drive Subie GL 1300 wagon was a hoot.

I’ve laid down 3/4 of a million miles on this commute route in 50+ years from high school through college & 4 decades in various employment, all requiring long drives. Thus I’ve driven 1/2 ton & 3/4 ton trucks, SUV’s, station wagons, pony cars, bug, microbus, convertibles, 1.5 ton & 5 yard hay/farm trucks, with several vehicles accruing 165K, 170K, 220K, many well over 100K. Pushed the limit on a few: Hitting 94 mph in my ‘99 7.3 F250 (6 spd manual), picked up by a trooper for doing 90 mph at midnight in my ‘89 Subaru XT, nearly wiped out in a herd of elk hustling across the road as I drove between them at 70 mph in my dad’s ‘66 Olds 88. I was 18 at the time.

Hit two deer, occasional flat tires, cut & pulled trees off the highway, laid out flares, put brush fires out, fueled out-of gas travelers, waved for years at people I never met, raced more than a few people home.

The Sheriff complained one morning at the courthouse that I drove too slow. I said “Well if I’m in a hurry I can go from Stenlin’s Corner to the courthouse in 35 minutes”, he says “Yea that’s pretty good but my guys do it in 34”… “Well, (I said) your guys have lights!”

Some favorite rigs?The ‘62 bug and microbus were slow. The ‘70 Honda SL 350 was a blast. Then came the ‘89 XT, ‘93 Mustang GT, ‘99 7.3 SD F250 (woke the dead on startup), 2010 4.6 V8 Adrenalin, 2018 Twin Turbo V6 Flex…..

and now the ‘23 Lightning….the most useful, most powerful, quietest, serene, comfortable & charming of them all. And it averages year round ~80 mpge. Stunning.

A GT muscle truck w/IRS, AWD, floats like butterfly & stings like a bee. Hauls 5/6ths of a rack of bodies plus all their gear. Has enough tech to remind me I’m soon hitting 7 decades. Is so intriguing that my crew supervisor always wants to “take my truck”, good old boy contractors driving F450s-650s, bigger service rigs, are intrigued & appreciate & respect the power & sleeper vibe.

With a tonneau, some hyper style slow acceleration and gain speed downhill, bleed some uphill and staying right at 53 mph in this summer like weather I can average 2.7 miles/kWH if dead calm. With tires pumped to 50 I can occasionally push that to 2.8, even 3.0 but that requires 80-90 degree temps, tail wind and 45-55 traffic (like summer travelers in long packs led by the slowest dog). Point being.. driving style really determines mi/kwh. With load range E tires at a teeth jarring 70 psi no reason why 3.0 mi/kwh wouldn’t be in sight. And even at 1.0 mi/kwh the LT is efficient. And for a guy like me with a 50 mile commute-work radius.. the truck is a contender.

So the truck is late spring-summer-late fall efficient. Late fall through early spring the truck averages 2.1-2.4 with cold temps (below 40’s to mid 20’s) and headwinds the biggest obstacles to higher kWh averages.

In reality it doesn’t really matter.. the LT is efficient. More efficient than any computer mapped, variable timed, injected & boosted state of the art ICE.

Locally I’ve towed 3 trailers (car hauler, flatbed, boat & trailer) and.. whoa.. a towing machine. Since there are 25+ boat launches with 50-60 miles, range isn’t an issue.

Two trips to Great Falls last year, each racking up 1800 miles. Definitely a long distance road tripper. Never a problem with EA charging though occasional glitches with 1/4 chargers not working and one modest wait time when I hit the afternoon rush at the Spokane Valley Mall EA site.

My father & grandfather were union electricians that built big stuff (generator installs on hydro-dams) & they knew full startup torque electrical motor power. They’d be so pleased to see the LT at full boil power.

Features I use regularly: Cruise, (no sign reading, no lane centering), defrost w/modest heat, frunk, charge at home (CP Home Flex), tire pressure monitoring (two nails recently in tires..from construction sites), auto play music (reasonably long playlist), speech to text, phone, messaging, pro power around house site & farm, trailer assist, heat seat in winter, tailgate step, Ford installed tonneau (roll back), rear window defrost, nav system, ford pass app- charge monitoring, bed tie downs, trip energy, Google maps, rear window defogger. I occasionally mess with the screen menu to keep familiar with options.

Things I don’t use as much; frunk outlets, rear under seat storage, sun roof open, zone lighting, valet option (and a lot of other choices.. I tend to set & forget).

Service repairs- BMS replacement and frunk button wonkiness (under grill).

Unexplainable observations: I was able to repeat this. Uphill left hand curves, under power-load at say 45 mph appear to slightly unload left rear wheel and that imparts an odd out of balance feeling. It appears that some differential response-torque adjustment related to the AWD system may be at play. But WTF do I know?

Take home message: A serene Pullman car on the backend of a locomotive disguised as a very useful pickup truck.

Nailed it.

I wonder if people knew what they saw when you were by FB, you have a better chance of seeing a UFO than a Lightning o

Long post.

Most those miles are a consequence of my 5 days a week 90-100 mile commute. Since I drive the same route I mess around with speed, tire pressure, driving style, to find a happy medium. One 7 mile section has 3 dozen curves that love a 50 mph power through but that’s 72 tire rounding corners a day so I take easy unlike days of yore with the tire shredding 5.0 GT . The front wheel drive Subie GL 1300 wagon was a hoot.

I’ve laid down 3/4 of a million miles on this commute route in 50+ years from high school through college & 4 decades in various employment, all requiring long drives. Thus I’ve driven 1/2 ton & 3/4 ton trucks, SUV’s, station wagons, pony cars, bug, microbus, convertibles, 1.5 ton & 5 yard hay/farm trucks, with several vehicles accruing 165K, 170K, 220K, many well over 100K. Pushed the limit on a few: Hitting 94 mph in my ‘99 7.3 F250 (6 spd manual), picked up by a trooper for doing 90 mph at midnight in my ‘89 Subaru XT, nearly wiped out in a herd of elk hustling across the road as I drove between them at 70 mph in my dad’s ‘66 Olds 88. I was 18 at the time.

Hit two deer, occasional flat tires, cut & pulled trees off the highway, laid out flares, put brush fires out, fueled out-of gas travelers, waved for years at people I never met, raced more than a few people home.

The Sheriff complained one morning at the courthouse that I drove too slow. I said “Well if I’m in a hurry I can go from Stenlin’s Corner to the courthouse in 35 minutes”, he says “Yea that’s pretty good but my guys do it in 34”… “Well, (I said) your guys have lights!”

Some favorite rigs?The ‘62 bug and microbus were slow. The ‘70 Honda SL 350 was a blast. Then came the ‘89 XT, ‘93 Mustang GT, ‘99 7.3 SD F250 (woke the dead on startup), 2010 4.6 V8 Adrenalin, 2018 Twin Turbo V6 Flex…..

and now the ‘23 Lightning….the most useful, most powerful, quietest, serene, comfortable & charming of them all. And it averages year round ~80 mpge. Stunning.

A GT muscle truck w/IRS, AWD, floats like butterfly & stings like a bee. Hauls 5/6ths of a rack of bodies plus all their gear. Has enough tech to remind me I’m soon hitting 7 decades. Is so intriguing that my crew supervisor always wants to “take my truck”, good old boy contractors driving F450s-650s, bigger service rigs, are intrigued & appreciate & respect the power & sleeper vibe.

With a tonneau, some hyper style slow acceleration and gain speed downhill, bleed some uphill and staying right at 53 mph in this summer like weather I can average 2.7 miles/kWH if dead calm. With tires pumped to 50 I can occasionally push that to 2.8, even 3.0 but that requires 80-90 degree temps, tail wind and 45-55 traffic (like summer travelers in long packs led by the slowest dog). Point being.. driving style really determines mi/kwh. With load range E tires at a teeth jarring 70 psi no reason why 3.0 mi/kwh wouldn’t be in sight. And even at 1.0 mi/kwh the LT is efficient. And for a guy like me with a 50 mile commute-work radius.. the truck is a contender.

So the truck is late spring-summer-late fall efficient. Late fall through early spring the truck averages 2.1-2.4 with cold temps (below 40’s to mid 20’s) and headwinds the biggest obstacles to higher kWh averages.

In reality it doesn’t really matter.. the LT is efficient. More efficient than any computer mapped, variable timed, injected & boosted state of the art ICE.

Locally I’ve towed 3 trailers (car hauler, flatbed, boat & trailer) and.. whoa.. a towing machine. Since there are 25+ boat launches with 50-60 miles, range isn’t an issue.

Two trips to Great Falls last year, each racking up 1800 miles. Definitely a long distance road tripper. Never a problem with EA charging though occasional glitches with 1/4 chargers not working and one modest wait time when I hit the afternoon rush at the Spokane Valley Mall EA site.

My father & grandfather were union electricians that built big stuff (generator installs on hydro-dams) & they knew full startup torque electrical motor power. They’d be so pleased to see the LT at full boil power.

Features I use regularly: Cruise, (no sign reading, no lane centering), defrost w/modest heat, frunk, charge at home (CP Home Flex), tire pressure monitoring (two nails recently in tires..from construction sites), auto play music (reasonably long playlist), speech to text, phone, messaging, pro power around house site & farm, trailer assist, heat seat in winter, tailgate step, Ford installed tonneau (roll back), rear window defrost, nav system, ford pass app- charge monitoring, bed tie downs, trip energy, Google maps, rear window defogger. I occasionally mess with the screen menu to keep familiar with options.

Things I don’t use as much; frunk outlets, rear under seat storage, sun roof open, zone lighting, valet option (and a lot of other choices.. I tend to set & forget).

Service repairs- BMS replacement and frunk button wonkiness (under grill).

Unexplainable observations: I was able to repeat this. Uphill left hand curves, under power-load at say 45 mph appear to slightly unload left rear wheel and that imparts an odd out of balance feeling. It appears that some differential response-torque adjustment related to the AWD system may be at play. But WTF do I know?

Take home message: A serene Pullman car on the backend of a locomotive disguised as a very useful pickup truck.

Nailed it.

Loved reading this. I grew up in Northern Idaho, my grandpa worked for Washington Water Power Company and my dad is a construction superintendent, both are road warriors with my pops still commuting at least 90 miles per day to CDA for his current project.
Both have their large trucks, my dad’s needing to pull horse and cattle trailers for his ranch along with his camper and toys for hunting season.

I heard plenty from them about concerns of range when I got it, but since I have the 22’ Platinum 300ish range is decent compared to ICE trucks, doesn’t touch my dads diesel rig though. They also had a lot of interest in what it can do after talking about the power, features, and towing cpacity

I live in San Diego now and my commute is 26mi each way of freeway driving (speed and summer heat are my biggest headwinds in efficiency), I have more than enough juice in the tank to not worry about charging. My lady has the Mach-E and we simply alternate charging over night at home. It works great.

I guess what I’m saying is, even though I don’t use my truck as a work truck taking it to sites I always knew it would be awesome at it and loved your post. It’s a heck of a vehicle!

 

[Thunder1809]

I’ve got 20K in 13 months driving mainly freeway to work, 28 miles each way. I had planned to retire a couple years ago partly for the commute, then I reserved the Lightning and had to wait, thinking this would be my retirement gift to myself. It has made the commute bearable with Bluecruise and the comfort and low cost to drive.

I haven’t towed with it and only hauled a load of dirt and a couple of loads of yard waste. Mostly just haul my bikes in the bed on the weekends.

I take it down to the grocery store a mile away because it is better for the environment with the short trip than driving the ICE Lexus.

Have only done a maximum 1000 mile road trip but it wasn’t an issue with EA. Now that I have the A2Z as a backup I am not worried about going on a longer trip.

When people ask how I like it I don’t try to tell them they should get an EV, but that they need to look at the kind of driving they do and whether it would fit their needs. How many times do they go more than 300 miles from their house? If they do go on a road trip do they stop in that time for food an restrooms? How often do they tow? Can they charge at home? I had range anxiety before I bought the Lightning and found for the driving I do it works for me. And if they go for a ride with me most people forget about the range issues.

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