Ford F-150 Lightning Platinum Evaluate: Time’s Up for ICE Vehicles

I come from an extended line of F-150s. One among my earliest vehicular reminiscences is bouncing round at the back of a purple, late-90s step-side that my grandpa trucked round his cattle ranch within the Sierra Nevadas. That truck finally gave approach to a silver 2004 mannequin that received handed right down to me in 2014, then a blue-green 2015 mannequin that I inherited when Gammy and Papa (as I nonetheless name them) bought the ranch a couple of years later. And I have been driving them arduous across the Pacific Northwest ever since.

For myself and Papa Corridor, now in his mid-eighties, vehicles are instruments. Although he did shell out for extras like an extra-large tank (“in order that I would not must pay for gasoline in California”), they had been for hauling firewood, towing trailers, and driving a sequence of black and brown labs to go duck looking. He banged his F-150s up so typically that he had a devoted bumper man named Mort.

The brand new F-150 Lightning Platinum—a completely electrified truck with a large touchscreen, heated and cooled seats, and a panoramic sunroof—can be unfamiliar to my grandpa. It feels, seems, and smells extra like a German luxurious automobile than the canine hair and mud any of our F150s ever did.

And but, after truly utilizing it to haul a trailer throughout city, my two muddy canine from after the park, and a pair a whole lot of kilos of apples to a cider press, I’ve come to see my future. These vehicles aren’t posh facsimiles of the tough and tumble autos Papa and I owned and beloved. The F-150 Lightning does the whole lot I’ve requested it to do, in just about all instances higher than gasoline fashions.

Except you’re a renter with out entry to a charging port, or a relentless long-hauler who tows a journey trailer typically, that is most likely probably the most succesful automobile for any state of affairs you will ever face. For individuals who can swing the upfront value, it is the Leatherman of vehicles.

Grease-Much less Lightning

This is not the primary F-150 Lightning. A pair many years in the past, Ford made a super-fast gas version of the F-150, nonetheless considerably slower than this newer electrified model, with the identical title. Moreover the truth that the brand new F-150 Lighting Platinum with towing package deal that I examined does 0-60 mph in about 4 seconds, the brand new Lighting and Ye Olde Lightning don’t have anything in widespread.

My assessment truck (the $92,000 Platinum trim) compares pretty on to a high-end hybrid F-150 Restricted with all of the trimmings (about $83,000). Just like the gasoline truck of us know and purchase in droves (for these unaware, the F-150 has been the best-selling automobile in america since 1981), my crew cab assessment unit arrived with a large array of different bells and whistles that you simply’d count on from any premium truck in 2023.

It has heated and cooled seats, adaptive cruise management, a large sunroof, and a 360-degree digital camera. Like many EVs, it provides one-pedal driving that permits you to by no means contact the brakes, and it will possibly steer for you on many roads. Ford’s Blue Cruise performance goes as far as letting you’re taking your arms off the wheel throughout segments on main highways, supplied you look out the entrance window. To do that, it has sensors that have a look at your eyes and be sure to’re watching. Sure, it feels as nuts to drive with no arms because it sounds.

The interiors between gasoline and electrical vehicles are close to equivalent, however the F-150 Lightning has a large entrance trunk the place its engine needs to be. The “frunk” of this factor can match, Ford claims, three units of ordinary golf golf equipment. Stated frunk additionally consists of 4 120-volt energy shops and two USB shops (one USB-C, one USB-A), which implies you may plug in your units whilst you journey, or cost up your laptop computer or instruments on the way in which between job websites (or fields on a ranch).

Motown Energy

The rear of the truck has 4 extra 120-volt energy shops, in addition to a 220-volt outlet above it. Sure, you should utilize the Lightning together with your full-size dryer, sizzling tub, and even cost one other electrical automobile off of it, with the flexibility to inform it when to cease so you’ve sufficient vary to drive residence. That is each epic and superior. The hybrid truck can even do that within the Restricted trim, however energy technology caps out at 7.2 kWh of energy in comparison with the Lightning’s 131 kWh. Customary gasoline fashions might be outfitted with 2.Zero kWh or 2.four kWh, relying on trim and engine.

On the Lightning, there may be additionally an choice to let the large 131-kWh battery of extended-range vehicles (versus the 98-kWh battery from standard-range fashions) act like a generator to your home, so long as you buy a $1,300 wall charger from Ford. That charger and the extended-range battery sound so much cheaper once you begin pricing out whole-home generators, their upkeep, and the price of gasoline.