I love my Lightning. But Ford? Not so much...

[ClevelandBeemer]

Given what Donut Labs just did with solid state, I’m really hoping Ford is just taking a step back to rethink. I take the back pedaling and EREV talk as appeasing doubters in this sticky political climate while still working toward adoption.

I agree with all of the videos points as Ford did more harm than good when it comes to selling this product. However 200,000 sales still wouldn’t have moved the needle. Ford needs to scale to 200,000 to 300,000 sales annually to actually scale this truck to a $40,000 to $50,000 contender AND be profitable. Hopefully Ford talking to Donut Labs to get solid state happing in the next 12 months.

For those that don’t know, Donut just dropped a 400wH/kg fully solid state pack that operates between -50C and 100C with no efficiency loss, and is CHEAPER than LFP. Furthermore it’s not a concept, it’s being shipped today in EV motorcycles.

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[Wattsgas]

Nailed it. Totally agree. Ford is without a rudder....if they were serious they should have stayed with Rivian, but sold it.

 

[tdowens]

I've loved my lightning and at end of November convinced my nephew to trade in his ICE truck for a lightning. Not sure where I'll go from here though I plan to hang on to my lightning and get as many miles on it as possible. I traded in my Model X for a Kia EV9 last year and while the Kia is a great car, the lightning is my daily driver. Disheartened by the Ford decisions but equally disheartened by PU truck owners who just couldn't switch to an EV platform.

 

[flypony53]

Watched the video, and while I agree with most of it, there's not a lot new there that wasn't already said on this forum and elsewhere.

Frustrated to once again be in a place where a very good (not perfect, but very good) piece of engineering is hindered and squandered by the company that makes it. GM failed my former Volt (and Voltec drivetrain) in so many ways, not the other way around. Ford failed the Lightning, not the other way around.

The EREV misadventure is a decade and a half late, and another blunder that will result in further billions of dollars of wasted spending.

I won't be buying Ford again. Even firing flip flop Farley wouldn't be enough to get me to set foot in a Ford dealer ever again (after my warranty is up).

agree that most has been said here before, but it is a great summary of why the lightning failed.

Fords segmentation, up charges, dealership networks, etc led to the failure. Features were continually removed and very few feature updates occurred. My truck has not received an OTA in more than 18 months. Ford says there are no updates available, so it is expected. But, this is where they miss the boat completely. My truck should get updates to improve little things, my Tesla gets updates every few weeks, making my ownership experience better every time. All I wanted was the ability to use the in vehicle navigation to take me to a Tesla charger, but for some reason, my 22 is not capable of adding those into the system. Why would I pay for a connected service if I cannot get the basics.

Ford has lost me as a customer. I have stated it before, EREVs and hybrids are the worst of both worlds. the maintenance of an ICE with limited EV range and capabilities due to a smaller battery. So, you get terrible EV range and the maintenance of an ICE.

I spoke to someone yesterday, I will buy the terrible looking CyberTruck as my next vehicle. I hate the looks, but Tesla mostly knows what customers want.

 

[GDN]

Well summed up. It's all been right here in these forums, we've seen it and discussed it since day 1. Have been saying for a couple of years Farley couldn't lead and didn't know what he was doing.

Although I'm a Tesla fanboy, I didn't realize Tesla had changed the Cyber truck from the exoskeleton. So it is more like a regular 1/2 ton with a few issues of its own. Elon is not an idiot, maybe a bit proud at times, but not an idiot. Just imagine if he had 30 engineers locked away reworking the few basic issues of the Cybertruck to improve them, preparing a 600 mile battery for towing, and is readying a standard current half ton look alike body. Would catch Farley truly asleep and come at him at the knees, likely taking him out.

 

[chl]

So far I am fairly happy with my own personal experience of almost 2 years with my 2023 Lightning. But that said...

China is eating American's lunch around the world with EV sales because of legacy automakers in the US dropping the ball on EVs.

The quote that the "EV market is shrinking" is just one example of Ford management's tunnel vision, short-term, thinking. It sure as Hell is not shrinking globally.

Do these genius titans of industry at Ford not read the news?

"...with sales exceeding 17 million in 2024 and projected to reach over 20 million in 2025, making up more than a quarter of global car sales, driven by strong growth in China, Europe, emerging markets, expanding model availability, and improving technology, despite some regional policy impacts..."

Yes, they made mistakes while trying to turn the F-150 into an EV instead of starting from scratch and building an EV pickup from the ground up in their rush to get something to market - greed as a motivation and haste often make for bad or so-so outcomes.

They seem to have put all the legacy problems into the Lightning, like the funky shifter and the 12v battery failure, leaky sunroof, power window switch failures, to name just a few.

Why didn't they take the opportunity to solve them?
Too much trouble?
Not worth the cost involved?
Quality is no longer "job one?"

Go figure!

The sure could have done a better job on the software in some areas. I remember the early days of personal computers - rebooting when things went wrong multiple times a session was the norm. While the Lightning may not as bad as those early DOS PCs, having to hard reboot the truck seems to be a regular solution to some issues.

Have they never heard of beta testing their software under real everyday use scenarios? That is a problem with a lot of programming not just from Ford, and always has been.

The "Universal EV Platform" is where they should have started.
Hopefully they will not abandon that next.

I think some of the Ford brass out to burn their MBAs and get a clue about ECON 101 and price theory, then they might understand where they went wrong with the marketing.

"You just can't find good help these days..." WTF not when the 'help' is getting the big bucks?

Oh, and promising in slick ads a HIS that in reality costs too much and works too infrequently was a really, really bad move.

The production/implementation of the Lightning was like turning in homework at the last minute with spelling and grammar errors.

Cancelling it is like telling the teacher you are not going to rewrite it to get a better grade.

The 'Universal EV Platform' could be the rewrite that gets an 'A' so maybe there is still hope.

Going forward with an EREV is a really bad/stupid decision and will likely be a flop...so many reasons why, I am not going to list them again.

OK, enough ranting for today for me...

 

[chl]

Well summed up. It's all been right here in these forums, we've seen it and discussed it since day 1. Have been saying for a couple of years Farley couldn't lead and didn't know what he was doing.

Although I'm a Tesla fanboy, I didn't realize Tesla had changed the Cyber truck from the exoskeleton. So it is more like a regular 1/2 ton with a few issues of its own. Elon is not an idiot, maybe a bit proud at times, but not an idiot. Just imagine if he had 30 engineers locked away reworking the few basic issues of the Cybertruck to improve them, preparing a 600 mile battery for towing, and is readying a standard current half ton look alike body. Would catch Farley truly asleep and come at him at the knees, likely taking him out.

Re MUSK: He sure posts some idiotic things on line.

 

[Rice_classic]

The ONLY reason I have a Ford Lightning is because the Rivian doesn’t have Carplay and on principal, I could not fathom giving $60k to a company that is so stupid as to not include something so basic and expected by consumers, especially in this price bracket.

A district manager said that once Scout launches, we can expect to see Carplay in Rivians. If that’s true, that gives me two good choices in future options that are not Ford.

 

[Trucked Up EVs]

Well worth the time, and you explain it in a very easy way to understand. As always very well done.
BTW, liked the snow blower vid.

The snowblower vid was Tom's over at State of Charge. But yeah, good video!

 

[MaintGrl]

The snowblower vid was Tom's over at State of Charge. But yeah, good video!

Doh!

 

[Trucked Up EVs]

So far I am fairly happy with my own personal experience of almost 2 years with my 2023 Lightning. But that said...

China is eating American's lunch around the world with EV sales because of legacy automakers in the US dropping the ball on EVs.

The quote that the "EV market is shrinking" is just one example of Ford management's tunnel vision, short-term, thinking. It sure as Hell is not shrinking globally.

Do these genius titans of industry at Ford not read the news?

"...with sales exceeding 17 million in 2024 and projected to reach over 20 million in 2025, making up more than a quarter of global car sales, driven by strong growth in China, Europe, emerging markets, expanding model availability, and improving technology, despite some regional policy impacts..."

Yes, they made mistakes while trying to turn the F-150 into an EV instead of starting from scratch and building an EV pickup from the ground up in their rush to get something to market - greed as a motivation and haste often make for bad or so-so outcomes.

They seem to have put all the legacy problems into the Lightning, like the funky shifter and the 12v battery failure, leaky sunroof, power window switch failures, to name just a few.

Why didn't they take the opportunity to solve them?
Too much trouble?
Not worth the cost involved?
Quality is no longer "job one?"

Go figure!

The sure could have done a better job on the software in some areas. I remember the early days of personal computers - rebooting when things went wrong multiple times a session was the norm. While the Lightning may not as bad as those early DOS PCs, having to hard reboot the truck seems to be a regular solution to some issues.

Have they never heard of beta testing their software under real everyday use scenarios? That is a problem with a lot of programming not just from Ford, and always has been.

The "Universal EV Platform" is where they should have started.
Hopefully they will not abandon that next.

I think some of the Ford brass out to burn their MBAs and get a clue about ECON 101 and price theory, then they might understand where they went wrong with the marketing.

"You just can't find good help these days..." WTF not when the 'help' is getting the big bucks?

Oh, and promising in slick ads a HIS that in reality costs too much and works too infrequently was a really, really bad move.

The production/implementation of the Lightning was like turning in homework at the last minute with spelling and grammar errors.

Cancelling it is like telling the teacher you are not going to rewrite it to get a better grade.

The 'Universal EV Platform' could be the rewrite that gets an 'A' so maybe there is still hope.

Going forward with an EREV is a really bad/stupid decision and will likely be a flop...so many reasons why, I am not going to list them again.

OK, enough ranting for today for me...

Excellent analysis! Thanks for watching the video!

 

[ness70]

Excellent video, it says it all!

 

[kuzzin]

So many negative waves here.

F allegedly dropped ~$20B on 93.5k BEV trucks. If true we’re all driving very expensive, and oh so awesome vehicles.

I choose to be content.

 

[FloridaMan655321]

A district manager said that once Scout launches, we can expect to see Carplay in Rivians. If that’s true, that gives me two good choices in future options that are not Ford.

That will be nice. It would also be nice if Rivian has 240v output as Scout looks to have. This is kind of mandatory for me and I'd like more options than Cybertruck and Chevy, though the Chevy styling has grown on me (though their interior still seems to suck)

 

[Rice_classic]

That will be nice. It would also be nice if Rivian has 240v output as Scout looks to have. This is kind of mandatory for me and I'd like more options than Cybertruck and Chevy, though the Chevy styling has grown on me (though their interior still seems to suck)

Yeah, I like the looks of the Sierra as well.. not the price tag though.

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