2000Firehawk
Well-known member
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Figured I might share some mostly positive news today to distract from the unfortunate double whammy of the tax credit changes and the price increases. Sorry for the really long post, but wanted to give as much detail as possible.
Just got back from an extended weekend trip from the Columbia, Maryland area to Bar Harbor, Maine (Acadia National Park) with a visit with some family and friends mixed in along the way. This is our first trip in an EV over 300 miles round trip.
Couple of quick stats:
Charging:
All data taken from the Ford app charge logs. Take the data and calculations with a grain of salt since there is rounding in the SOC from Ford. Also, on the average DC fast charge rate, note that there were several times I did not jump at the 80% mark. Mostly that was because we didnât finish our lunch or otherwise get back to the charger (talking with other EV owners) at around the 80% mark. In one instance (96%) I wanted to squeeze as much in as (i) a test to see how bad the curve was since I wasnât doing anything else in the late evening and (ii) we were headed to an area where charging might be limited.
Couple of observations about the charging stations.
The Lightning pretty much pulled to the charging curves people have posted (Out of Spec, ect.) on each stop including the initial boost, drop off at exactly 80%, then 90% plus is a waste. I wasnât monitoring the screen exactly, so that is a bit anecdotal. Honestly though, if you arenât in a huge hurry, the extra 10 minutes or so charging to 90% wasnât inconvenient and may well be worth it if making multiple charging stops in a day to avoid the dreaded time winding your way to the charging station.
Spaces at some charging spots are tight for an F150. I also drive a Ram 3500 Mega Cab so Iâm used to driving hard to park vehicles, but the spacing of the chargers, the arrangement of the parking slots behind the row of chargers and not wanting to be a jerk and block a bunch of spots or park at an angle can make it a multipoint turn situation.
The charging stations could really use some trash cans as the charging stop takes the place of the normal throw away time (former gas stops). Add in that you might be bringing food to your charge stop to make efficient use of your time and it makes even more sense. Not all stations are in a functioning/thriving area. I do get the possible challenge of arranging for trash pickup for far away corners of parking lots though.
My wife called the charging stops a car show. People sharing stories and talking about cars. Along the way we were joined at the chargers by two Taycans (in Paramus), lots of Mach-Es, ID4s, and Ionics, a couple of Bolts and one Rivian. People really like their Ionics, are pretty happy with their Mach-Eâs and are more or less satisfied but not impressed by their ID4s. There were always tons of questions about the Lightning because no one had seen one in the wild. Everyone seems to âhave one on order,â but also didnât seem overly impressed with anything but the frunk. It is too big and doesnât make much sense to most people.
Last comment was about the various navigation products. Thanks to the help of others, I was well prepared with planning our route via ABRP, then checking Plug Share for station status and Google maps for actual directions. I also had the Electrify America app open to check the charger availability as we got closer given that there were multiple charging locations within the same general range on the northeast corridor run. I was also playing with all the nav tools during our trip (Ford nav, Google maps, ABRP). Ford nav cancels (actually notes this on the screen) as soon as you start a route on Google via Carplay. Google and ABRP will run navigation and call out over each other if you are running both at the same time. Ford nav did calculate most of the same stops as ABRP, but there were occasions where it randomly either wanted to go way out of the way or stop at a slow charger for no apparent reason. Certainly donât blindly trust the nav as has been said by everyone else.
Overall though, a really great trip without any sense of range anxiety. Our biggest âconcernâ was the section from Portland, Maine to Bar Harbor, Maine and back. There are plenty of chargers (not fast chargers) so not super concerned, but I did find a hotel that had good charging options to ensure I didnât have to give much thought to whatever plans we made along the way. I did do a lot of pre-planning, certainly much more than I would have in a regular ICE vehicle, but I like to planâŚso win-win!
Not an exact map, but pretty close to the drive.
Just got back from an extended weekend trip from the Columbia, Maryland area to Bar Harbor, Maine (Acadia National Park) with a visit with some family and friends mixed in along the way. This is our first trip in an EV over 300 miles round trip.
Couple of quick stats:
- Total trip miles â 1,528
- Total miles on the truck at end â 3,726
- Total drive time â 33 hours, 15 minutes
- Overall average consumption â 2.3 mi/kWh (per the truck), 2.47 mi/kWh (calculated)
- Total charge time â 14 hours, 37 minutes (see table below - not all fast charging)
Charging:
All data taken from the Ford app charge logs. Take the data and calculations with a grain of salt since there is rounding in the SOC from Ford. Also, on the average DC fast charge rate, note that there were several times I did not jump at the 80% mark. Mostly that was because we didnât finish our lunch or otherwise get back to the charger (talking with other EV owners) at around the 80% mark. In one instance (96%) I wanted to squeeze as much in as (i) a test to see how bad the curve was since I wasnât doing anything else in the late evening and (ii) we were headed to an area where charging might be limited.
Couple of observations about the charging stations.
The Lightning pretty much pulled to the charging curves people have posted (Out of Spec, ect.) on each stop including the initial boost, drop off at exactly 80%, then 90% plus is a waste. I wasnât monitoring the screen exactly, so that is a bit anecdotal. Honestly though, if you arenât in a huge hurry, the extra 10 minutes or so charging to 90% wasnât inconvenient and may well be worth it if making multiple charging stops in a day to avoid the dreaded time winding your way to the charging station.
Spaces at some charging spots are tight for an F150. I also drive a Ram 3500 Mega Cab so Iâm used to driving hard to park vehicles, but the spacing of the chargers, the arrangement of the parking slots behind the row of chargers and not wanting to be a jerk and block a bunch of spots or park at an angle can make it a multipoint turn situation.
The charging stations could really use some trash cans as the charging stop takes the place of the normal throw away time (former gas stops). Add in that you might be bringing food to your charge stop to make efficient use of your time and it makes even more sense. Not all stations are in a functioning/thriving area. I do get the possible challenge of arranging for trash pickup for far away corners of parking lots though.
My wife called the charging stops a car show. People sharing stories and talking about cars. Along the way we were joined at the chargers by two Taycans (in Paramus), lots of Mach-Es, ID4s, and Ionics, a couple of Bolts and one Rivian. People really like their Ionics, are pretty happy with their Mach-Eâs and are more or less satisfied but not impressed by their ID4s. There were always tons of questions about the Lightning because no one had seen one in the wild. Everyone seems to âhave one on order,â but also didnât seem overly impressed with anything but the frunk. It is too big and doesnât make much sense to most people.
Last comment was about the various navigation products. Thanks to the help of others, I was well prepared with planning our route via ABRP, then checking Plug Share for station status and Google maps for actual directions. I also had the Electrify America app open to check the charger availability as we got closer given that there were multiple charging locations within the same general range on the northeast corridor run. I was also playing with all the nav tools during our trip (Ford nav, Google maps, ABRP). Ford nav cancels (actually notes this on the screen) as soon as you start a route on Google via Carplay. Google and ABRP will run navigation and call out over each other if you are running both at the same time. Ford nav did calculate most of the same stops as ABRP, but there were occasions where it randomly either wanted to go way out of the way or stop at a slow charger for no apparent reason. Certainly donât blindly trust the nav as has been said by everyone else.
Overall though, a really great trip without any sense of range anxiety. Our biggest âconcernâ was the section from Portland, Maine to Bar Harbor, Maine and back. There are plenty of chargers (not fast chargers) so not super concerned, but I did find a hotel that had good charging options to ensure I didnât have to give much thought to whatever plans we made along the way. I did do a lot of pre-planning, certainly much more than I would have in a regular ICE vehicle, but I like to planâŚso win-win!
Not an exact map, but pretty close to the drive.
