When I was at the lightning drive event someone from a local utility, water I think, wanted to give an order for 50 trucks as soon they could get them. I think there will be plenty of fleet demand, but availability will drive a lot of that. Getting something in maybe two years doesn’t really work.
One thing to keep in mind with evs unlike gas engines is that when they are moving very slow or stopped they don’t really use the power. It would just be for heating which In your scenario you would ration enough to get to the next charger.
As someone who actually sees how this kind of money gets spent in the government and has worked public and private jobs here is my $0.02.
It will take some time for that actual money to hit the ground.
In the mean time, all the industries that support the rollout now know it’s coming and want...
I could see a lot of fleet use for towing. I’d like to get one at work to have in the yard and be able to deliver stuff out to the jobs in town. Most round trips would be much less than 100 miles. And you don’t have to mess with fuel cards and whatnot.
When I was at an event, one of the Ford employees said that where something like a new iPhone would have around 12 chips, each lightning has about 1800. He seemed more concerned with that than batteries.
I wouldn’t be surprised to see a plug in hybrid at some point in the future too. Might get you to work or the store with 20-30 mile range but could tow as long as you want. Seems like they can’t make the regular hybrids fast enough at the moment.
Also in 5-7 years I expect that the dc fast charging as well as destination charging infrastructure will have grown considerably. It might not be as big of a deal then to have 70 more moles of range of you can get that in 15 minutes at every freeway exit.
Here is a link I posted in one of the other threads. It explains how the DC-DC system functions including how the battery management tops up the 12 volt system when the car is off if necessary.
Found some info on the Mach-e dc/dc. Looks like 220 amps.
https://madocumentupload.marketingassociates.com/api/Document/GetFile?v1=6151879&v2=080921073934&v3=60&v4=afe8280d27b61729a508a131522f5b8cb46fc85e19547a68346dd45e&v5=False
https://abetterrouteplanner.com/?plan_uuid=77045eea-754d-42b9-970c-e16d94462413
here is a route. 13 hours 17 minutes of driving and 3 hours of charging around the route gets you from Winnipeg to Calgary.
Wondering if anyone has heard any info on what changes the max tow package makes to the truck. Better battery/ motor cooling?
Also thinking about trailers. Having trailer brakes would lose energy that could be used for regen. Might be better off without to a point.
Debating if the tow...
The pro seats I found to be very nice. Soft vinyl not like the work trucks I remember from 10 years ago. Seats had lots of padding, would be fine for long trips. Overall an upgrade from my 2014 fusion energi titanium.
At the event the Ford person was very confident they are planning for the battery components to be serviceable inside the pack and the battery easy to drop out.
Yeah I don’t think you can take everything they say as gospel. One rep at the even said that it used round cells not flat which I don’t think is correct.
Attended the fleet ride along in Seattle today. It was about 2 hours and they had the e transit as well. Display was the rolling chassis and the blue lariat. Not sure what the exact color is but it looked great!
the ride along was with a black pro and a red xlt pulling a 5,500 lb trailer. Also...
The MME colors are a joke but not much worse than the other ev options like the id3. At least the lightning will give a few more choices. I would have liked to see some green too but will probably go with a shade of blue