I wonder what went wrong there. The F-150 is objectively a very popular truck, right? So I’d expect the electric version to be very popular as well.
I’d love an electric truck, but I wouldn’t want one of these awful giant things with huge cabs and a tiny little bed. However, I don’t think this is the reason, my taste is apparently not very representative. I miss my grandpa’s truck though, single cab, bench seat, loads of garbage in the bed, let’s go to the dump. Simpler times.
Batteries? Assuming a $150/kwh cost for batteries, that would be $14,700 for a 98 kwh pack, or $19,650 for a 131 kwh pack. I think the rumor is that GM is hoping to hit ~$100 for their batteries in 2025. It will be a game changer once batteries get below $50/kwh. And some Chinese batteries are getting close.
What I learned in ECON 101 is that in a competitive market, price decrease to the level the market will bear. Isn't this the "cheaper" alternative to the Cyber-truck?
A quick search said a new one would cost $80k delivered, how much can the price decrease before Ford is losing money?
Where are you located? I'm seeing sub-$60,000 options that have been sitting on the lot for a while, so if you really want one, you could negotiate a below MSRP price, and then get the $7,500 tax credit.
To clarify on other peoples' comments, the cheapest form of the F-150, which is particularly affordable for an electric truck, was very difficult to get ahold of. Additionally, demand for electric vehicles in the US is significantly weaker than manufacturers had hoped.
As someone living in a condo, I am 0% surprised. If you don't have a fully-enclosed garage, I'd be surprised if there was a simple solution for charging, and the idea of sitting at a station for 45 minutes twice a week sounds... miserable at best. Even if you disagree with me on these points, I doubt my point of view is particularly rare.
As an F150 owner, I can largely agree. It certainly is crazy expensive. But if you look at the missions people have for trucks, hauling, towing, road trips with significant cargo, the charging factor just gets ugly. How is that battery life while towing your boat to the lake? How many charging stations are there near the boat ramp so that you can get home again? ??
Now, for the contractor bopping around town, charging is much less of an issue, and being able to power all of your tools 1/2 mile from the nearest power pole is very useful. But the Lightening was not priced at the “tradesman” trim level.
A good work truck is one you don't mind getting scratched and dented. Hard to replicate that with any brand new vehicle, especially one with a $60k starting price.
That said, I think the Lightning serves certain roles really well. They're great for the forest service, for municipalities, utilities, etc. If they were actually cheaper than the ICE version I think they'd gain a lot of adoption for those kinds of fleets.
Since they're quite a bit more expensive, though, buyers have to make the case that they're worth it. Pretty tough proposition unless you're trying to sneak under an emissions budget.
From the pragmatic perspective, either fuel has to be a lot more expensive, or the truck should be like 50% cheaper. Intuitively, the proposition is "it's just batteries and a motor, no complicated pistons, injectors etc...". Yet it's super-expensive.
Then maybe marketing? At least from my limited perspective, the people who would buy F-150 are not exactly the ones to want to sit and wait next to small electric cars to charge for half an hour at charging station. That's why perhaps a cybertruck works, it doesn't look like a "truck" and doesn't appeal to the same crowd. It's a whole new thing. It seems "cool" while this one seems "lame". The Ford marketing department should have sniffed that out better than a rando HN poster at least.
A brief perusing of the Ford website, the non-electric F-150 starts at $38,710, whereas the electric version starts at $62,995. I suspect most people can't afford the 50% premium. The price for the non-electric version is already eye-wateringly expensive for my personal income.
Price and range. IMO EV trucks need at least a 500 mile range unloaded and no less than 250 mile range when towing at max capacity at highway speeds. Yes, ridiculously high requirements but they won’t compete with a gas engine version (much less a diesel one) otherwise.
Three things:
1. It is a very expensive vehicle.
2. Towing reduces the range substantially.
3. Charging infrastructure needs to be more reliable and we need much more of it. There are times when you won't charge at home.
I have the F-150 Lightning and I love it. I think I could love a smaller truck, maybe between the Maverick and the modern Ranger. The F-150 is huge.
I think of demand for EVs as being a little stronger among liberals and demand for trucks as being a little stronger among conservatives, so perhaps the venn diagram intersection takes a (small) hit from that.
This. Everyone in the South drives a truck, and most of those people have lumped "EV" in with "big city liberal". Cost is the other big factor and maybe range anxiety.
I think this is Elon's big problem. He already has all the liberal geeks interested in that tech, but has to expand and is thus trying to endear himself to the conservative crowd hoping the backlash in his main customer base isn't too bad. It's not working. The cyber truck is not only expensive and extremely poorly made, but it's also far too radical for most of that crowd.
Given that cars are such a large investment and that virtually the entire addressable market already has one, the bar to buying an EV is incredibly high: "can it do everything my old vehicle does?"
The answer today fpr truck buyers is no, no matter how you slice it. I think Toyota played their hand perfectly with the hybrid Prius, keeping it familiar enough to regular cars that the sole element of comparison came down to something they could win at (gas mileage). EV trucks get dinged on a dozen other points of comparison where they lose, eg towing, refueling time, etc.
I'd be really curious to know if a major truck maker has a hybrid truck in development, eg a hybrid Toyota Tacoma/HiLux. That would be very interesting indeed. If nothing else it would seed the consumers' brains with real data on how they actually drive, which could influence their buying behavior for the next truck.
A lot of folks here are saying price. They’re not necessarily wrong, list price IS an issue. However Ford dealers have implemented huge incentives to sell them. Leasing and Financing, one dealer offered me 20k off MSRP to buy one.
I would actually argue price isn’t the issue but is an easy low hanging fruit we can blame.
When people buy trucks they do so for security mentally and otherwise. Americans buy trucks to be able to haul around something once a year, to have enough room for the family, to tow things, to go on long road trips, to go over landing, to have the ability to go off-road as needed.
Much of America is rural and has dirt roads or other light infrastructure. During storms trees fall on roads and have to be moved or gone around. I lived 10 minutes from an urban center and my house had one road to/from. Once every 6 months a tree would fall on the road and block access.
Tl;dr people buy trucks for peace of mind, their capability, and rare events that can affect them. Because vehicles are such a huge purchase they buy more incase they need it.
The lightning is neither capable nor offers peace of mind due to its limitations in range, towing, and charging station availability.
I bought a used F-150 Lightning with 1000 miles on it. I paid $21k under the sticker price. It was still expensive. I have no range concerns but I'm mostly in the city.
I’d love an electric truck, but I wouldn’t want one of these awful giant things with huge cabs and a tiny little bed. However, I don’t think this is the reason, my taste is apparently not very representative. I miss my grandpa’s truck though, single cab, bench seat, loads of garbage in the bed, let’s go to the dump. Simpler times.