I’m picking up my used 2023 Ford lightning this week. I had a 2023 Rivian R1T Dual Motor Max Pack that I just lemoned out, which was a blessing. The Ford Lightning is the best driving and towing vehicle based on performance and ease to drive. Charging/ refueling it is the only issue with it hands down. I can’t wait to get my new to me truck. Oh yeah, I’m an 47 year old Diesel truck guy. I know trucks very well from owning my 2002 Ford F250 7.3L for 21 years. These new electric trucks just need a better charge time and infrastructure. More to come…
Love your last point! Spot on. The environmental costs always frustrate me- the research has been around for decades and has not significantly changed. That research is readily available (look for academic journals, with authors from tech schools).
Great video Tim. I got a left over 23 lightning lariat in August. Bought it in California and drove back home to Michigan. No problems at all with range. You’re right it’s really fun to drive! The tech is great. One thing. You had said about the liner you had and the “single charger” what that means is it only has one on board charger. For the 24 model year they deleted the dual chargers. So my 23 can charge up to 80 amps. The 24 can only charge up to 40 amps. You have to be a fleet customer to get dual charging now. On the flip side 24’s and up now have heat pumps where as I have the PTC resistive heater. (Less efficient) but I’m ok with all that. Got almost 26k off the price and 0% for 72 from ford. I’ll take free money all day long!! All th are t said this is the best vehicle I’ve ever owned. Not sure I could go back to a ICE vehicle again. 😆
Good stuff Tim, your last point was spot on. As for the dealer pricing issues: My GMC dealer is putting a $500 up charge on the Hummer EV for catalytic converter VIN etching. (?)
I love my lightning. Between the federal, ford rebate and dealer mark down I got 20k off of a 23 xlt extended range leftover. Best daily driver for a family you could want. My main complaint, turning radius stinks, and DC fast charging is only 160kw tops
Tim love the work but you have old info on California. No state incentives here, in fact I pay $100/year in additional registration to replace what I’m not paying in gas tax. The carpool lane perk expires in 10 months. The only big incentive left is our high fuel prices, and that’s a pretty big incentive.
I love my lightning, but the range has disappointed me. I don't know that i have ever gone more than 250 miles on a full charge. Very fair and informed assessment thank you.
Tim, you're exactly right! Practicality, rationality, and economics are the point. A large percentage of folks seem to not be taking those things into account. Sound bites and headlines have been causing lots of problems over the last 20 years. Great, practical, informed review for the every day truck owner/buyer!!
12:00: The air drag is true for sure. I have been looking at a A frame pop up camper for the family, I think it's the only way to road trip and live with it. 34k km in one year with mine, and of the 4 new half tons I've bought this one is my favorite (so far). Nice final point, agree just a third way to fuel a vehicle, no big deal.
From what I have seen online and personal experience, getting smaller wheels, even non ev ones, will increase range as long as they are the same offset as the stock wheels.
I should also mention, range is relative based on speed. My extended range at 70 mph, 260 miles, 55-60 is 320 miles and 25-35mph is closer to 450 miles.
@ksorsomeplace I don’t think that counts as “variability” so much as “physics”: drive faster, more drag, less range. lol But I agree you’ll see variability IRT temperatures, that’s been well discussed.
@ksorsomeplace that appears on gas/ diesel as well. Drive your rich at 60 mph and then at 120mph, you will see a huge difference. Now drive it as 35 mph. You aren't going to notice much difference at 35 vs 55. By electric regens power and is more efficient.
When Ford introduced this truck they shot themselves in the foot almost immediately. If it would have been priced 2500-5000K more then the ICE version, they would have sold a lot more. Most truck buyers daily commute without towing. Even with the low range people could have justified the price point if it was adjusted accordingly. Now the prices are “better” not great but i feel for this gen lighting it’s too little to late. 🤷♂️
That’s the key for me too. On BC the economics are pretty pro-EV (cheap elec, expensive gas) but even then, with incentives, the payback is many years with a Lightning (Chevy Bolt by comparison is much better, like 3-4 vs a comparable ICE car). Coupled with wanting to go far afield, back country, northern BC…the Lightning is just too much a risk/challenge for OUR needs. But if I had endless money, it’s a GREAT truck for local work. We have lots in our city, used by contractors and others. Obviously they have a bit more bank than me, lol!
good thing that's what most of you use your trucks for. Do you like being able to add 300 miles of range for $5 dollars? Very possible in certain states.
I still love my 2022 Lightning. It's a great truck for local. Ironically, your area isn't that great for road tripping. I did the drive from council bluffs to rapid city last year. My 8 hour drive drive took me 12 hours. Between Sioux city and chamberlain is crapt for charging. I bought it as a tool. It's a moving power bank. It performs great. The single worst part of it is the charging network. It's spotty and iffy in some places. I have 18k miles, and I had a battery issue. They didn't replace the entire battery. They replaced 1 cell in 1 pack in the battery pack. It was down a week. I could still drive it when it was bad, charging was just really slow. And I had a bad GPS antennae.
I like the Ford Lightning, but it needs more range and better charging speeds. It also needs better charging infrastructure. The range needs to be more than 400 miles. Plus depreciation on those are really bad.
Ford can charge at some Tesla chargers now, that should be handy. At the moment, the ratio for range to charging time needs to be improved for all EVs. I read ford is still trying to license Chinese battery technology ( CATL I think) to be build in the US. Those are better batteries and would help some. I think we are still 5-10 years out from having EV batteries that have high density and fast charging. It will happen though.
All the lights on probably drain the battery quickly. Overall, I like this truck even though I can't afford an 80k plus truck. If you look on autotrader at used lightning pickups, the savings are tremendous. So find one used under 30k miles for under 50k, which isn't bad if you like EVs.
Love my 2019 5.0 but thats sweet rig. Anyone who is whining about EV aint paying close to 6$ gallon in CA. “Hell even i thought i was dead, then i found out, its just that i was in Nebraska” Gene Hackman
Maybe you should watch TFL's comparison on the F150 vs the lightening. From a cost standpoint. It looks like owners of the lightening are being sold a can of goods..the F150 was way more affordable to operate. And gas is $4.15 in California.
@@curtthrasher870 TFL loves to dramatize things and as Tim says, mislead and spread the BS. What TFL says is true. When road tripping and using chargers that companies provide to make a profit from, the cost to fill up is similar to ICE vehicles in some cherry picked locations. But what is more true is, 99% of the time you will be charging from your home. It costs me $8 to charge from 0 to 300 miles at home where my rate is .06/kwh. Please show me where I can do that with an ICE F150 (BTW I have ICE F150,s to diesels F450s in our fleet). You are exactly the type of person Tim is talking about in his last point. I have no agenda's with EV's. All I care about is that they are saving us a ton of money in fuel and maintenance.
After driving a Silverado Ev at a ride and drive event in Canada (which has a 725 km range from owners I’ve talked to) I would trade some of that HP for more range.And leave the towing I do for the GMC 2500 I have and run the electric for my daily driver
I just decided between the two and went with the lightning. If you do a lot of long distance driving/towing as you said stick with your 2500. EV trucks are amazing at local driving/towing (where you don't travel over 100miles per day) and where you charge at home for cheap. The huge battery in the Silverado doesn't solve the problem of long distance towing. First off, it's 2000lbs heavier. You are carrying that weight around all the time making the truck less efficient. Now you have twice the battery to charge too. It does have faster charging but no where in Canada is there any fast charger that charges at that rate. In other words it will take you twice as long to charge a Silverado over a Lightning to go 30% further. At home where you charge 99% of the time, the charging speed is the same no matter what, which means it will again always take twice as long to charge. At the end of the day the price of the lightning was way cheaper and the added range of the Silverado is a negative if you use it for what EV trucks are good at (ie. local driving)
I think your math is off on a recharge. 131 kilowatt battery on extended version so lets say a 100 kilowatt recharge at 7,5 cents per kilowatt would equal $7.50 not .75 cents. Still very cheap to drive but not as cheap as mentioned. When California starts taxing people on miles driven and not on gallons of gas, EVs will soon get to pay their fair share.
The Lightning has embarrassing range for the price. These EV trucks will become lawn ornaments with the new Admin coming in. They won’t even be a good boat anchor.
🤣 New admin isn’t going to do anything. You forget the automakers are currently designing tech/vehicles that we won’t see until 2028-2030. It’s not Ohhh, New Admin Tomorrow we go back to all V8s. Not the way it works. As a matter of fact starting in 2026’ all new vehicles will require a gas version of DPF.
@@jayray274 EPA was ruled against by the Supreme Court. Regualtion will be going thru Congress and with new Admin they will be sure it happens. It will be slow but with new admin they will cut regulation and slowly back to normalcy. The Biden admin was pushing the whole country to slowly mandate evs, that will no longer be the case
Definitely agree with your last reason. People overreact so harshly.
I’m picking up my used 2023 Ford lightning this week. I had a 2023 Rivian R1T Dual Motor Max Pack that I just lemoned out, which was a blessing. The Ford Lightning is the best driving and towing vehicle based on performance and ease to drive. Charging/ refueling it is the only issue with it hands down. I can’t wait to get my new to me truck. Oh yeah, I’m an 47 year old Diesel truck guy. I know trucks very well from owning my 2002 Ford F250 7.3L for 21 years. These new electric trucks just need a better charge time and infrastructure. More to come…
I would say the biggest obstacle is the price. I agree I don't drive long distances very frequently.
Love your last point! Spot on. The environmental costs always frustrate me- the research has been around for decades and has not significantly changed. That research is readily available (look for academic journals, with authors from tech schools).
Great video Tim. I got a left over 23 lightning lariat in August. Bought it in California and drove back home to Michigan. No problems at all with range. You’re right it’s really fun to drive! The tech is great. One thing. You had said about the liner you had and the “single charger” what that means is it only has one on board charger. For the 24 model year they deleted the dual chargers. So my 23 can charge up to 80 amps. The 24 can only charge up to 40 amps. You have to be a fleet customer to get dual charging now. On the flip side 24’s and up now have heat pumps where as I have the PTC resistive heater. (Less efficient) but I’m ok with all that. Got almost 26k off the price and 0% for 72 from ford. I’ll take free money all day long!! All th are t said this is the best vehicle I’ve ever owned. Not sure I could go back to a ICE vehicle again. 😆
Good stuff Tim, your last point was spot on.
As for the dealer pricing issues: My GMC dealer is putting a $500 up charge on the Hummer EV for catalytic converter VIN etching. (?)
I love my lightning. Between the federal, ford rebate and dealer mark down I got 20k off of a 23 xlt extended range leftover. Best daily driver for a family you could want. My main complaint, turning radius stinks, and DC fast charging is only 160kw tops
Tim love the work but you have old info on California. No state incentives here, in fact I pay $100/year in additional registration to replace what I’m not paying in gas tax. The carpool lane perk expires in 10 months.
The only big incentive left is our high fuel prices, and that’s a pretty big incentive.
Tim you one of the few journalist who actually gets it on EV's.
I love my lightning, but the range has disappointed me. I don't know that i have ever gone more than 250 miles on a full charge. Very fair and informed assessment thank you.
Tim, you're exactly right! Practicality, rationality, and economics are the point. A large percentage of folks seem to not be taking those things into account. Sound bites and headlines have been causing lots of problems over the last 20 years. Great, practical, informed review for the every day truck owner/buyer!!
Good video, Tim 👍
12:00: The air drag is true for sure. I have been looking at a A frame pop up camper for the family, I think it's the only way to road trip and live with it. 34k km in one year with mine, and of the 4 new half tons I've bought this one is my favorite (so far). Nice final point, agree just a third way to fuel a vehicle, no big deal.
From what I have seen online and personal experience, getting smaller wheels, even non ev ones, will increase range as long as they are the same offset as the stock wheels.
My biggest issues with EV’s are the battery reliability in cold temps
I should also mention, range is relative based on speed. My extended range at 70 mph, 260 miles, 55-60 is 320 miles and 25-35mph is closer to 450 miles.
This is also another issue. The higher variability on range.
@ksorsomeplace I don’t think that counts as “variability” so much as “physics”: drive faster, more drag, less range. lol
But I agree you’ll see variability IRT temperatures, that’s been well discussed.
@ksorsomeplace that appears on gas/ diesel as well. Drive your rich at 60 mph and then at 120mph, you will see a huge difference. Now drive it as 35 mph. You aren't going to notice much difference at 35 vs 55. By electric regens power and is more efficient.
When Ford introduced this truck they shot themselves in the foot almost immediately. If it would have been priced 2500-5000K more then the ICE version, they would have sold a lot more. Most truck buyers daily commute without towing. Even with the low range people could have justified the price point if it was adjusted accordingly. Now the prices are “better” not great but i feel for this gen lighting it’s too little to late. 🤷♂️
That’s the key for me too. On BC the economics are pretty pro-EV (cheap elec, expensive gas) but even then, with incentives, the payback is many years with a Lightning (Chevy Bolt by comparison is much better, like 3-4 vs a comparable ICE car). Coupled with wanting to go far afield, back country, northern BC…the Lightning is just too much a risk/challenge for OUR needs. But if I had endless money, it’s a GREAT truck for local work. We have lots in our city, used by contractors and others. Obviously they have a bit more bank than me, lol!
I love the lightning it’s the perfect grocery hauling vehicle 😅
Most people use them around town. And around town, they shine.
good thing that's what most of you use your trucks for. Do you like being able to add 300 miles of range for $5 dollars? Very possible in certain states.
@@skellington2000 i actually installed a solar system to my house to charge my truck. I pay nothing to drive around 10 months of the year
@@quazaarNow your talking 👍
I still love my 2022 Lightning. It's a great truck for local. Ironically, your area isn't that great for road tripping. I did the drive from council bluffs to rapid city last year. My 8 hour drive drive took me 12 hours. Between Sioux city and chamberlain is crapt for charging.
I bought it as a tool. It's a moving power bank. It performs great.
The single worst part of it is the charging network. It's spotty and iffy in some places.
I have 18k miles, and I had a battery issue. They didn't replace the entire battery. They replaced 1 cell in 1 pack in the battery pack. It was down a week. I could still drive it when it was bad, charging was just really slow. And I had a bad GPS antennae.
F-150 lightning is the best looking EV Truck. Best for City driving but not for a long drive vehicle. $$$$ is the issue right now.
The pricing is out of control.
Good video Tim. I love the Ford Lightning. I think they need better range and faster charging; once that materializes........ I'm on board!
I like the Ford Lightning, but it needs more range and better charging speeds. It also needs better charging infrastructure. The range needs to be more than 400 miles. Plus depreciation on those are really bad.
Ford can charge at some Tesla chargers now, that should be handy. At the moment, the ratio for range to charging time needs to be improved for all EVs. I read ford is still trying to license Chinese battery technology ( CATL I think) to be build in the US. Those are better batteries and would help some. I think we are still 5-10 years out from having EV batteries that have high density and fast charging. It will happen though.
All the lights on probably drain the battery quickly. Overall, I like this truck even though I can't afford an 80k plus truck. If you look on autotrader at used lightning pickups, the savings are tremendous. So find one used under 30k miles for under 50k, which isn't bad if you like EVs.
Hydro will go up,enjoy that while you can.
Love my 2019 5.0 but thats sweet rig. Anyone who is whining about EV aint paying close to 6$ gallon in CA. “Hell even i thought i was dead, then i found out, its just that i was in Nebraska” Gene Hackman
To be fair unleaded is only $4 right now in OC. But yeah Bridgeport in Summer, I’ve seen $7
Maybe you should watch TFL's comparison on the F150 vs the lightening. From a cost standpoint. It looks like owners of the lightening are being sold a can of goods..the F150 was way more affordable to operate. And gas is $4.15 in California.
@@curtthrasher870 TFL loves to dramatize things and as Tim says, mislead and spread the BS. What TFL says is true. When road tripping and using chargers that companies provide to make a profit from, the cost to fill up is similar to ICE vehicles in some cherry picked locations. But what is more true is, 99% of the time you will be charging from your home. It costs me $8 to charge from 0 to 300 miles at home where my rate is .06/kwh. Please show me where I can do that with an ICE F150 (BTW I have ICE F150,s to diesels F450s in our fleet). You are exactly the type of person Tim is talking about in his last point. I have no agenda's with EV's. All I care about is that they are saving us a ton of money in fuel and maintenance.
@@curtthrasher870 thx for tip. Im mostly on freeway and premium gas well over 5$. 4.15$ for regular but Indont run cheap stuff. cheers
After driving a Silverado Ev at a ride and drive event in Canada (which has a 725 km range from owners I’ve talked to) I would trade some of that HP for more range.And leave the towing I do for the GMC 2500 I have and run the electric for my daily driver
You need big motors and cables to handle all the regenerative braking. In return the short bursts of astounding acceleration.
I just decided between the two and went with the lightning. If you do a lot of long distance driving/towing as you said stick with your 2500. EV trucks are amazing at local driving/towing (where you don't travel over 100miles per day) and where you charge at home for cheap. The huge battery in the Silverado doesn't solve the problem of long distance towing. First off, it's 2000lbs heavier. You are carrying that weight around all the time making the truck less efficient. Now you have twice the battery to charge too. It does have faster charging but no where in Canada is there any fast charger that charges at that rate. In other words it will take you twice as long to charge a Silverado over a Lightning to go 30% further. At home where you charge 99% of the time, the charging speed is the same no matter what, which means it will again always take twice as long to charge. At the end of the day the price of the lightning was way cheaper and the added range of the Silverado is a negative if you use it for what EV trucks are good at (ie. local driving)
I was very skeptical at first but not as much now except for the dam price.
Why does the title say 2025 when it’s a 2024 you’re reviewing?
Did I mess that up? It happens.
@ No worries! I originally thought you had an early review 😃
@ 😂 maybe I did!
I think your math is off on a recharge. 131 kilowatt battery on extended version so lets say a 100 kilowatt recharge at 7,5 cents per kilowatt would equal $7.50 not .75 cents. Still very cheap to drive but not as cheap as mentioned. When California starts taxing people on miles driven and not on gallons of gas, EVs will soon get to pay their fair share.
The Lightning has embarrassing range for the price. These EV trucks will become lawn ornaments with the new Admin coming in. They won’t even be a good boat anchor.
Did you listen to Tim at all 😂
@@santiagohills3997 Apparently not
🤣 New admin isn’t going to do anything. You forget the automakers are currently designing tech/vehicles that we won’t see until 2028-2030. It’s not Ohhh, New Admin Tomorrow we go back to all V8s. Not the way it works. As a matter of fact starting in 2026’ all new vehicles will require a gas version of DPF.
@@jayray274 Exactly right!
@@jayray274 EPA was ruled against by the Supreme Court. Regualtion will be going thru Congress and with new Admin they will be sure it happens. It will be slow but with new admin they will cut regulation and slowly back to normalcy. The Biden admin was pushing the whole country to slowly mandate evs, that will no longer be the case