PRO 167 Mile Range on Highway (Road Trip Review)

[beatle]

I didn’t watch the video - I rarely watch them for the very reason you state in paragraph 2.

Did he mention the prevailing wind speed? That’s very relevant.

Ford didn’t “sandbag” on range. They are required to use EPA test method numbers. Highway-only will always be worse.

I think part of the problem is that the MachE often gets better range than its EPA estimate and people were banking on the Lightning following suit.

Instead maybe we're seeing just how much of a penalty the large frontal area hits you with. In addition, the EPA test uses pretty low speeds for the highway test, and since velocity is squared when calculating drag force, the force required to move something through the air just a little faster gets pretty high pretty quickly.

It would be better if the EPA used higher speeds for the test so the estimate could be more accurate to real world speeds, but here we are.

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[FordLightningMan]

This may be a repeat of what happened with most early gen EVs (ie early Nissan Leaf, BMW i3, Fiat 500e, etc) -- if history repeats itself, this will result in short term glut of second hand SR F150 Lightnings in 2-3 years...then again may be not as the effects of the chip shortages and used car pricing surge seem likely to continue into this time period....

Most of these early EVs have less than 100 miles in stated range, especially Leafs. I knew an early Leaf owner who was getting less than 40 miles per charge in winter climates. Even in a worst case scenario (10% battery degradation, 70% highway range, 60% winter range) you are at 80 miles on a 90% charge for a SR. That's still enough for my daily commuting.

My only fear is people who aren't EV savvy getting into a Lightning for a first EV. If they are looking to tow, a road trip vehicle, have a hour+ one-way daily highway work commute, or drive all day for work... these people will be challenged by SR. If you did your homework before buying and none of that stuff lines up with your daily needs, SR will be more than fine!

 

[beatle]

Even in a worst case scenario (10% battery degradation, 70% highway range, 60% winter range) you are at 80 miles on a 90% charge for a SR.

Keep in mind that winter range is not a 40% penalty on top of the highway hit - it's more of an overall reduction in range. Temps around freezing might be 20-25% worse than EPA rated range on long trips, all other variables being equal. On short trips the penalty will be higher than that due to a cold battery and/or running the battery heater and cabin heater, but if you're setting out on a long trip from home or other friendly destination, you'll often have a pre-warmed battery and cabin to start with so it won't be that bad.

 

[Yellow Buddy]

I would assume (with 99% certainly) that the EPA tests were run using the AT tires as that is the default tire. The All Season for XLT/Pro at options.

As a Consumer, you cannot order the Pro w/ another other than AT.

For XLT, you need 312A.

However, I doubt there's much difference between the AS and AT tires. The AT on the F150 are AT-light -- it's not an aggressive thread pattern and was designed for efficiency vs. off-roading.

Keep in mind the EPA tested these as 3 distinct options: F150L / F150L ER / F150L Platinum. So the Pro/XLT were also bucketed with the SR Lariat which comes with AS tires as standard along with the aero wheels.

There's only one way to tell for sure...when I get my Pro and pick up a set of spare aero wheels and tires.

I'm leaning towards it makes a difference though. I ran nearly a dozen sets of tires on the same wheels on my Tesla Model X and found that even between the all season category my usage could increase by over 10% depending on the compound and over 20% if I went from an AS to a sticky performance or AS to a snow tire.

 

[greenne]

I think part of the problem is that the MachE often gets better range than its EPA estimate and people were banking on the Lightning following suit.

Instead maybe we're seeing just how much of a penalty the large frontal area hits you with. In addition, the EPA test uses pretty low speeds for the highway test, and since velocity is squared when calculating drag force, the force required to move something through the air just a little faster gets pretty high pretty quickly.

It would be better if the EPA used higher speeds for the test so the estimate could be more accurate to real world speeds, but here we are.

I think its way too early to draw conclusions on range yet.

 

[gorwell]

I think its way too early to draw conclusions on range yet.

Too early, need @tommolog to get his to run a "controlled" test to establish a baseline of sorts. Won't have Standard range, but whatever efficiency it gets can translate to Standard. It's summer, so perfect time for range tests.

At this time, getting anecdotal notes of range isn't definite as it varies way too much. However, some people need to read these anecdotes to hopefully understand how much range varies.


The conditions in the video posted here seemed perfect, but I do think he was probably driving closer to 75 MPH vs 70 MPH. So, that wouldn't be too surprising if he got 1.8 and probably going 70 would inch closer to EPA.

 

[Lightning_Bob]

Most of these early EVs have less than 100 miles in stated range, especially Leafs. I knew an early Leaf owner who was getting less than 40 miles per charge in winter climates. Even in a worst case scenario (10% battery degradation, 70% highway range, 60% winter range) you are at 80 miles on a 90% charge for a SR. That's still enough for my daily commuting.

My only fear is people who aren't EV savvy getting into a Lightning for a first EV. If they are looking to tow, a road trip vehicle, have a hour+ one-way daily highway work commute, or drive all day for work... these people will be challenged by SR. If you did your homework before buying and none of that stuff lines up with your daily needs, SR will be more than fine!

The first gen Leaf also has horrible thermal management for the batteries - with the first batch cooking themselves in hot climates (Arizona, Texas, FL, etc)...and continue to simmer since they are still air cooled.... for a few months in 2018 you could buy those used for around 3-5K (and freshly replaced batteries by Nissan under warranty)....then they shot up in price after someone figured they could buy them all and export them to EU countries and make a decent profit....

I am hoping the vast majority of the folks that buy the Lightning are doing their homework. However, I wouldn't be surprised if there was an uproar and threating class action lawsuits from first time EV owners who will only know before buying this truck " 4.5 second 0-60, 10K lbs towing, 320 miles range & 1 hour charging", stating Ford deceived them....Hopefully at the dealership they go over these things and pass on knowledge the driver can only pick one of those items at a time (maybe two) at a given situation before one signs the paper work to mitigate this...

 

[Blue Lightning]

The way I see it, I take a break roughly every 2 hours anyway on a road trip. Granted, not a 45 minute break with my ICE, but enough to get coffee, restroom, etc. If I can get 160-180 miles on my Pro going 70-75mph for the RARE road trip I will use it for, that's fine.

The weekly trip to the gas station on the way to work eats up 9 hours a year of my time. That's 11 DC fast charging stops per year on road trips, which ends up being 1900+ miles of road-trip driving. And that's just to break even on my current gas fueling time.

I keep trying to see the forest through the trees. I get range anxiety on my ICE F-150 too, it's just a different anxiety. With it, it's being late to work and forgetting you have to stop for gas. Or, just last weekend, wanting to go on a hike with the family but having to stop on our way to fill the tank. Those go away with the EV.

I hate to say it, but the PRO SR won't be a great road tripper. On a road trip you never want to charge 0-100%. More realistically you will be charging 10-80%. That means (best case) your 180 miles of highway range is now knee capped at about 130 miles. Again, these are optimistic numbers.

It's doable, but it's gonna require some strategizing and stopping way more often than you want. I recently drove my Tesla Model Y LR from Portland to LA and back (about 2,000 miles) and even with it's longer range and Tesla's robust charging network it still required some adjustments from my typical ICE journey. I would expect that to be far more impactful on a SR Lightning Pro.

 

[PV2EV]

I hate to say it, but the PRO SR won't be a great road tripper. On a road trip you never want to charge 0-100%. More realistically you will be charging 10-80%. That means (best case) your 180 miles of highway range is now knee capped at about 130 miles. Again, these are optimistic numbers.

Which makes the limitation on the Pro ER make more sense. Pushes ER buyers to the XLT, which is not to far off the Lariat when you load up the XLT. It worked on me when I had to decide to take an unexpected invitation, or wait.

 

[detroitlightning]

Which makes the limitation on the Pro ER make more sense. Pushes ER buyers to the XLT, which is not to far off the Lariat when you load up the XLT. It worked on me when I had to decide to take an unexpected invitation, or wait.

The push to XLT is one thing, but making it a $20k jump was a brutal move. But then again, I'm currently driving a maverick without cruise control haha. Too bad we can't forscan an extra 90 miles of range for $200.

 

[Rob G]

Keep in mind the EPA tested these as 3 distinct options: F150L / F150L ER / F150L Platinum. So the Pro/XLT were also bucketed with the SR Lariat which comes with AS tires as standard along with the aero wheels.

There's only one way to tell for sure...when I get my Pro and pick up a set of spare aero wheels and tires.

I'm leaning towards it makes a difference though. I ran nearly a dozen sets of tires on the same wheels on my Tesla Model X and found that even between the all season category my usage could increase by over 10% depending on the compound and over 20% if I went from an AS to a sticky performance or AS to a snow tire.

I hope you publish the results for those of us that may select other tires. I have no need for off road capability in this truck. Range is most important and ride quality.

 

[Dave242]

I hate to say it, but the PRO SR won't be a great road tripper. On a road trip you never want to charge 0-100%. More realistically you will be charging 10-80%. That means (best case) your 180 miles of highway range is now knee capped at about 130 miles. Again, these are optimistic numbers.

The lack of lumbar support is a MUCH bigger issue with the PRO SR than your analysis!!

In reality, you add only an hour of charge time on long trips in some long-trip scenarios by choosing PRO SR over a MUCH more expensive higher trim level with ER. This analysis should be intuitive if you take a few moments to make sense of it. Admittedly, it relies on 150kW charging stations to be located in ideal locations.....which is NOT the case today, but will be in the near future.

Bottom line, if you only make a couple long trips per year and you go to a higher trim for that reason alone, you end up paying $100s per hour for your minimal charge time savings!!

 

[LightningShow]

The lack of lumbar support is a MUCH bigger issue with the PRO SR than your analysis!!

In reality, you add only an hour of charge time on long trips in some long-trip scenarios by choosing PRO SR over a MUCH more expensive higher trim level with ER. This analysis should be intuitive if you take a few moments to make sense of it. Admittedly, it relies on 150kW charging stations to be located in ideal locations.....which is NOT the case today, but will be in the near future.

Bottom line, if you only make a couple long trips per year and you go to a higher trim for that reason alone, you have paying $100s per hour for your minimal charge time savings!!

I agree with the overall assessment that the range isn't a huge deal if you aren't road tripping regularly. Also, you will get a lot of the money you paid for the ER back when you sell the vehicle so it's not simply $20k/hrs charging difference. Still...people pay for peace of mind all the time so it's not surprising many are willing to pony up for the bigger battery.

To make it more clear, an SR will need to fast charge 50 minutes for every 150 miles and an ER will need to charge 50 minutes for every 210 miles (approximately). If you're travelling at 65mph while driving that means your average speed, including charge stops, is 52.4 mph for an ER and 48.6 mph for an SR for longer trips, so less than 4 mph difference. If you actually plot out the distance vs time, the ER and the SR make it to the 500 mile mark AT THE SAME TIME. The difference is that the ER will be almost fully charged to 80%, whereas the SR will need to stop to charge. If your stop point was at exactly 500 miles then the ER would likely show up about 30-40 minutes sooner. If you keep traveling the ER will build up about a 40 minute gap for every 500 miles. So, yeah, it's not a huge deal.

 

[astricklin]

I agree with the overall assessment that the range isn't a huge deal if you aren't road tripping regularly. Also, you will get a lot of the money you paid for the ER back when you sell the vehicle so it's not simply $20k/hrs charging difference. Still...people pay for peace of mind all the time so it's not surprising many are willing to pony up for the bigger battery.

To make it more clear, an SR will need to fast charge 50 minutes for every 150 miles and an ER will need to charge 50 minutes for every 210 miles (approximately). If you're travelling at 65mph while driving that means your average speed, including charge stops, is 52.4 mph for an ER and 48.6 mph for an SR for longer trips, so less than 4 mph difference. If you actually plot out the distance vs time, the ER and the SR make it to the 500 mile mark AT THE SAME TIME. The difference is that the ER will be almost fully charged to 80%, whereas the SR will need to stop to charge. If your stop point was at exactly 500 miles then the ER would likely show up about 30-40 minutes sooner. If you keep traveling the ER will build up about a 40 minute gap for every 500 miles. So, yeah, it's not a huge deal.

And if you are able to line up charging with other needed breaks, you lose even less time.

 

[Dave242]

And if you are able to line up charging with other needed breaks, you lose even less time.

Fact is EV's in general are not ideal for road tripping. You could take the paradigm shift you suggest even further by scheduling/planning on using the breaks constructively - like exercising, or working on your golf game, or doing work, or surfing the web (my likely solution ). At the end of the day, even the time wasted driving a SR compared to an ICE is not a huge consideration over the duration of most trips.

I guess what I am saying is that I have convinced myself that for my needs a SR is all I need if I just tweak my mindset a little.....and that the lack of a lumbar adjustment in the PRO is the #1 biggest strike against it (and that is fixable).

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