K6CCC
Well-known member
- First Name
- Jim
- Joined
- Sep 12, 2024
- Threads
- 31
- Messages
- 965
- Reaction score
- 1,012
- Location
- Glendora, Calif.
- Vehicles
- 2024 Lightning Flash ER in Antimatter Blue w/9.6 PPO , 2017 Corolla (wife's car)
- Occupation
- Retired from 2-Way radio systems
- Thread starter
- #1
As of yesterday evening, I have owned my '24 Lightning Flash for one year. Here are some of my observations and stats. I will be touching on various topics in no particular order. Overall impression at the very end. Yea, this is going to get long...
Purchase:
I started my quest to purchase my truck right after Christmas 2024. I had a drop dead date of late May to accomplish the purchase because my previous truck (2003 Dodge Ram 2500) was going to take major engine / drive train work in order to pass a smog inspection that was due at the end of May. So I was not in a major hurry - although I did want to complete the purchase before the tax credit went away. I had looked at the Ford website to determine what I wanted and every local dealer inventory showed multiple trucks in stock (turned out to be false). I started at my local Ford Dealer (Colley Ford in Glendora, CA). The person I was dealing with said that they had only one Lightning on the lot and it was back in service for a recall and he could not even show it to me. I told him what I was looking for and and he said he would see what he could find. Crickets. Talked to him a couple more times on the phone over several weeks and he was getting no where. Finally in late January, I stopped by another Ford Dealer (Envision Ford in Duarte, CA) that I drive right by on my commute to work. The person I was dealing with said that they just sold the only Lightning that they had. Same as before, I told her what I was looking for and she said she would see what she could find. A week or so later I even supplied her an internal Ford link to the EV Replenishment Center (thank you to the out of the area Ford guy that gave me the link). Crickets. A few weeks later I was going to call around to other dealers to find what was ACTUALLY available. The first dealer I called (Performance Ford in West Covina, CA) said that he was looking at a truck that was very close to what I was looking for. He also said he would look around for an exact match. Within two hours he said he found an exact match and could have it on his lot the next day. After work I drove over to Performance Ford and talked to the guy I had talked to on the phone. He showed me the truck that was on the lot and we took it on a test drive - I was impressed. The only two differences between the truck I test drove and what I was looking for was the test truck had All-Season tires rather than the preferred All-Terrain tires, and it did not have the Max Towing package. Once we were back we talked about the Max towing package and he largely talked me out of a need for it (I don't expect to ever do any substantial towing, but I do drive up crappy dirt roads to 2-way radio mountain top sites). Ultimately I bought the truck I had test drove with the knowledge that I would have to change to better times at some point down the road. The truck had 27 miles on the odometer and a 70% charge. As Iof last night when I hit one year, the truck had 17369 miles and 78% charge, so I have put 17,336 miles on it. I likely did not get the deal that some people got, but I did not have any "special" deals available to me. BTW, the sales guy was dealing with drives a Mach-E and the finance guy drives a Lightning. Gee, I wonder if that has something to do with them willing to sell an EV? Well, Duh!
Energy use:
I keep a spreadsheet of every charge session, that give me more data than the Charge History in the Ford app, so all this information is verified - not speculated. I have charged the truck 221 times for a total of 7,521.6 KWH at a cost of $1,539.95. This comes out to an average cost of 20.47 cents / KWH and, with 17,336 miles that I put onto the truck an average of 8.88 cents per mile for electricity.
Charging:
95 home charge sessions for 3914.6 KWH and $1,048.18 for average of 26.77 cents / KWH.
85 free L1/L2 charge sessions for 1945.42 KWH.
7 paid L1/L2 charge sessions for 56.0 KWH and $12.79 for an average of 22.84 cents per KWH.
4 free DCFC charge sessions for 87 KWH.
30 paid DCFC charge sessions for 1507.6 KWH and $478.97 for an average of 31.77 cents / KWH.
Until I retired in October, I had a huge advantage that I could often L2 charge at work for free. Outside my office were four public L2 EVSEs. Right after I bought the truck I charged once for 20 cents / KWH and then the city and Shell Recharge ended their contact. After that, those four chargers became free (six others in the parking structure stopped working after the Shell Recharge contract ended). The only downside was without the contract, the EVSEs were not being maintained, so by the time I retired, only two of the EVSEs were working. This is an area with large numbers of older apartment structures that had no ability for EV owners to charge at home, so public chargers are in high demand - especially after people discovered that these were free. There was a 4 hour parking limit, and Parking Enforcement did moderately enforce it. Most of the 85 free L1/L2 charge sessions listed above were at work. The other advantage I found was that a nearby city Water & Power department had several locations with 150 KW DCFC chargers that were only 15 cents / KWH. One of those locations was an easy stop on my way into work, and when I got there at about 0530 there was usually at least one charger available. 12 of the paid DCFC charge sessions listed above were these inexpensive ones. For entertainment, there was also a Tesla SuperCharger (Tesla only) right next to the city W&P chargers and often the Tesla drivers would use the W&P Dept. chargers because they were quite a bit less expensive. The four free DCFC charge sessions were all at highway rest areas where the California Department of Transportation (CalTrans) has installed a single 62 KW DCFC. Not all rest areas in California have the one free charger, but quite a few do.
When I first bought the truck I charged three times at Tesla SuperChargers because all I had at home was L1 and with a 52 mile commute that would not supply all my needs. I did charge with the Mobile Charge Cord (MCC) at home at 120 volts once. After I installed a 240 volt outlet I charged at home with the MCC at 240 volts seven times. After that I installed a Ford Charge Station Pro where the remainder of my home charge sessions were done.
For paid DCFC, there were the three Tesla sessions near home mentioned above plus one more later that was a test, and 11 Tesla SuperCharge sessions and one E.A. session on road trips. I also charged once at a near to home evGo station when they had a Labor Day $10 free promo, and twice at a bpPulse station in Duarte (once to try it out right after it opened and once primarily as a restroom stop). Except for the first three, all of the Tesla and E.A. charge sessions were with a paid subscription.
Trips:
I have taken five road trips that were long enough that I had to charge on the road plus one more that I didn't really have to charge, but it was convenient and eliminated any possible issues.
The first one was only 100 miles, but I had not been able to charge at work, so stopped for lunch at a Burger King that had a SuperCharger in the parking lot. I specifically mentioned to the person behind the counter that I was there because of the charge station..
The second trip was about 200 miles, and we stopped at a In-N-Out Burger for lunch and there was a SuperCharger in the parking lot. Added about 37 KWH while we ate. At that point I had only had the truck for a month so there was still at least some range anxiety, and there was the possibility that the trip was going to be longer.
The third trip was a 603 mile day out in remote parts of the southern California desert where I really did not want to be low on charge and there are places out that that truly are charging deserts. I charged four times that day - three at Tesla and one E.A. I wrote a detailed trip report on that one here:
https://www.f150lightningforum.com/forum/threads/603-mile-drive-mostly-in-the-socal-desert.27859/
The fourth trip was a one day trip 412 mile to Pismo Beach. We stopped for lunch at an In-N-Out Burger near Pismo that had a Tesla SuperCharger in the parking lot. I added 81 KWH while we ate lunch.
The fifth trip was an 800 mile trip to support a five day bicycle ride. I charged a total of seven times mostly because as a support person we never really know how much driving we will do so I wanted to be fairly well charged at the start of each day. I also wrote a detailed trip report on this trips here:
https://www.f150lightningforum.com/forum/threads/just-under-800-mile-trip-in-california.31816/
The sixth trip was a 397 mile overnight trip out in the southern California desert. I detoured through Baker, CA specifically so I could try out the brand new Tesla SuperCharger that had been open for only a week (there is another SuerCharger in Baker, but it's Tesla only). Overnight I was using PPOB to power my CPAP breathing machine. On the way home I charged at the then largest SuperCharger in the world at Barstow, CA.
Service issues:
I had the recall for the Upper Ball joint nut and service bulletin for the Gear Shift Module along with a 10K service all on the same day. It did take a couple months for the dealer to get the GSM replacement.
I have also been blessed with three flat tires. The first with only about 5K miles, something skittered across the freeway and hit the sidewall of the right front tire. Totally took out the side wall instantly. At 70 MPH that was fun, but no control problems. The second one a few months later was a screw got into the right rear tire right near the edge of the tread. It was also on the freeway, but leaked slow enough to easily get off the freeway and to a safe place to change the tire. Local tire guy plugged it and said it should be OK if it lasts the first few days - it did. I did not want to replace it at that time if possible because as mentioned at the beginning, I will be replacing all four tires with off road tires and did not have the money to replace all four at that time. The third was on a gravel road at slow speed and something took out the right front tire (yes the one that was replaced earlier). The tire guy plug / patched it and said it should be considered as an emergency use only tire. It's now the spare. It leaks about 1 PSI per day so I have to fill it up every week or two. I keep a compressor in the truck and if really needed I have two cans of Fix-A-Flat (only in an emergency). Barring anything going totally wrong I will be replacing all the tires with proper off road tires in about a month.
Overall impressions:
I LOVE my truck! It runs great, is smooth and quiet. Charging has not been a problem at all. Costs far less to fuel than my old Dodge. I can not see me ever going back to a gas vehicle. I have gone up crappy dirt roads to mountain top two way radio sites over a dozen times and the truck has handled those roads just fine. I have a trip to Tucson, AZ next month (about 1,000 miles), and a trip to Colorado Springs in August (will be about 2,500 miles). I have looked at charging options along the way and neither trip will be a charging problem.
Purchase:
I started my quest to purchase my truck right after Christmas 2024. I had a drop dead date of late May to accomplish the purchase because my previous truck (2003 Dodge Ram 2500) was going to take major engine / drive train work in order to pass a smog inspection that was due at the end of May. So I was not in a major hurry - although I did want to complete the purchase before the tax credit went away. I had looked at the Ford website to determine what I wanted and every local dealer inventory showed multiple trucks in stock (turned out to be false). I started at my local Ford Dealer (Colley Ford in Glendora, CA). The person I was dealing with said that they had only one Lightning on the lot and it was back in service for a recall and he could not even show it to me. I told him what I was looking for and and he said he would see what he could find. Crickets. Talked to him a couple more times on the phone over several weeks and he was getting no where. Finally in late January, I stopped by another Ford Dealer (Envision Ford in Duarte, CA) that I drive right by on my commute to work. The person I was dealing with said that they just sold the only Lightning that they had. Same as before, I told her what I was looking for and she said she would see what she could find. A week or so later I even supplied her an internal Ford link to the EV Replenishment Center (thank you to the out of the area Ford guy that gave me the link). Crickets. A few weeks later I was going to call around to other dealers to find what was ACTUALLY available. The first dealer I called (Performance Ford in West Covina, CA) said that he was looking at a truck that was very close to what I was looking for. He also said he would look around for an exact match. Within two hours he said he found an exact match and could have it on his lot the next day. After work I drove over to Performance Ford and talked to the guy I had talked to on the phone. He showed me the truck that was on the lot and we took it on a test drive - I was impressed. The only two differences between the truck I test drove and what I was looking for was the test truck had All-Season tires rather than the preferred All-Terrain tires, and it did not have the Max Towing package. Once we were back we talked about the Max towing package and he largely talked me out of a need for it (I don't expect to ever do any substantial towing, but I do drive up crappy dirt roads to 2-way radio mountain top sites). Ultimately I bought the truck I had test drove with the knowledge that I would have to change to better times at some point down the road. The truck had 27 miles on the odometer and a 70% charge. As Iof last night when I hit one year, the truck had 17369 miles and 78% charge, so I have put 17,336 miles on it. I likely did not get the deal that some people got, but I did not have any "special" deals available to me. BTW, the sales guy was dealing with drives a Mach-E and the finance guy drives a Lightning. Gee, I wonder if that has something to do with them willing to sell an EV? Well, Duh!
Energy use:
I keep a spreadsheet of every charge session, that give me more data than the Charge History in the Ford app, so all this information is verified - not speculated. I have charged the truck 221 times for a total of 7,521.6 KWH at a cost of $1,539.95. This comes out to an average cost of 20.47 cents / KWH and, with 17,336 miles that I put onto the truck an average of 8.88 cents per mile for electricity.
Charging:
95 home charge sessions for 3914.6 KWH and $1,048.18 for average of 26.77 cents / KWH.
85 free L1/L2 charge sessions for 1945.42 KWH.
7 paid L1/L2 charge sessions for 56.0 KWH and $12.79 for an average of 22.84 cents per KWH.
4 free DCFC charge sessions for 87 KWH.
30 paid DCFC charge sessions for 1507.6 KWH and $478.97 for an average of 31.77 cents / KWH.
Until I retired in October, I had a huge advantage that I could often L2 charge at work for free. Outside my office were four public L2 EVSEs. Right after I bought the truck I charged once for 20 cents / KWH and then the city and Shell Recharge ended their contact. After that, those four chargers became free (six others in the parking structure stopped working after the Shell Recharge contract ended). The only downside was without the contract, the EVSEs were not being maintained, so by the time I retired, only two of the EVSEs were working. This is an area with large numbers of older apartment structures that had no ability for EV owners to charge at home, so public chargers are in high demand - especially after people discovered that these were free. There was a 4 hour parking limit, and Parking Enforcement did moderately enforce it. Most of the 85 free L1/L2 charge sessions listed above were at work. The other advantage I found was that a nearby city Water & Power department had several locations with 150 KW DCFC chargers that were only 15 cents / KWH. One of those locations was an easy stop on my way into work, and when I got there at about 0530 there was usually at least one charger available. 12 of the paid DCFC charge sessions listed above were these inexpensive ones. For entertainment, there was also a Tesla SuperCharger (Tesla only) right next to the city W&P chargers and often the Tesla drivers would use the W&P Dept. chargers because they were quite a bit less expensive. The four free DCFC charge sessions were all at highway rest areas where the California Department of Transportation (CalTrans) has installed a single 62 KW DCFC. Not all rest areas in California have the one free charger, but quite a few do.
When I first bought the truck I charged three times at Tesla SuperChargers because all I had at home was L1 and with a 52 mile commute that would not supply all my needs. I did charge with the Mobile Charge Cord (MCC) at home at 120 volts once. After I installed a 240 volt outlet I charged at home with the MCC at 240 volts seven times. After that I installed a Ford Charge Station Pro where the remainder of my home charge sessions were done.
For paid DCFC, there were the three Tesla sessions near home mentioned above plus one more later that was a test, and 11 Tesla SuperCharge sessions and one E.A. session on road trips. I also charged once at a near to home evGo station when they had a Labor Day $10 free promo, and twice at a bpPulse station in Duarte (once to try it out right after it opened and once primarily as a restroom stop). Except for the first three, all of the Tesla and E.A. charge sessions were with a paid subscription.
Trips:
I have taken five road trips that were long enough that I had to charge on the road plus one more that I didn't really have to charge, but it was convenient and eliminated any possible issues.
The first one was only 100 miles, but I had not been able to charge at work, so stopped for lunch at a Burger King that had a SuperCharger in the parking lot. I specifically mentioned to the person behind the counter that I was there because of the charge station..
The second trip was about 200 miles, and we stopped at a In-N-Out Burger for lunch and there was a SuperCharger in the parking lot. Added about 37 KWH while we ate. At that point I had only had the truck for a month so there was still at least some range anxiety, and there was the possibility that the trip was going to be longer.
The third trip was a 603 mile day out in remote parts of the southern California desert where I really did not want to be low on charge and there are places out that that truly are charging deserts. I charged four times that day - three at Tesla and one E.A. I wrote a detailed trip report on that one here:
https://www.f150lightningforum.com/forum/threads/603-mile-drive-mostly-in-the-socal-desert.27859/
The fourth trip was a one day trip 412 mile to Pismo Beach. We stopped for lunch at an In-N-Out Burger near Pismo that had a Tesla SuperCharger in the parking lot. I added 81 KWH while we ate lunch.
The fifth trip was an 800 mile trip to support a five day bicycle ride. I charged a total of seven times mostly because as a support person we never really know how much driving we will do so I wanted to be fairly well charged at the start of each day. I also wrote a detailed trip report on this trips here:
https://www.f150lightningforum.com/forum/threads/just-under-800-mile-trip-in-california.31816/
The sixth trip was a 397 mile overnight trip out in the southern California desert. I detoured through Baker, CA specifically so I could try out the brand new Tesla SuperCharger that had been open for only a week (there is another SuerCharger in Baker, but it's Tesla only). Overnight I was using PPOB to power my CPAP breathing machine. On the way home I charged at the then largest SuperCharger in the world at Barstow, CA.
Service issues:
I had the recall for the Upper Ball joint nut and service bulletin for the Gear Shift Module along with a 10K service all on the same day. It did take a couple months for the dealer to get the GSM replacement.
I have also been blessed with three flat tires. The first with only about 5K miles, something skittered across the freeway and hit the sidewall of the right front tire. Totally took out the side wall instantly. At 70 MPH that was fun, but no control problems. The second one a few months later was a screw got into the right rear tire right near the edge of the tread. It was also on the freeway, but leaked slow enough to easily get off the freeway and to a safe place to change the tire. Local tire guy plugged it and said it should be OK if it lasts the first few days - it did. I did not want to replace it at that time if possible because as mentioned at the beginning, I will be replacing all four tires with off road tires and did not have the money to replace all four at that time. The third was on a gravel road at slow speed and something took out the right front tire (yes the one that was replaced earlier). The tire guy plug / patched it and said it should be considered as an emergency use only tire. It's now the spare. It leaks about 1 PSI per day so I have to fill it up every week or two. I keep a compressor in the truck and if really needed I have two cans of Fix-A-Flat (only in an emergency). Barring anything going totally wrong I will be replacing all the tires with proper off road tires in about a month.
Overall impressions:
I LOVE my truck! It runs great, is smooth and quiet. Charging has not been a problem at all. Costs far less to fuel than my old Dodge. I can not see me ever going back to a gas vehicle. I have gone up crappy dirt roads to mountain top two way radio sites over a dozen times and the truck has handled those roads just fine. I have a trip to Tucson, AZ next month (about 1,000 miles), and a trip to Colorado Springs in August (will be about 2,500 miles). I have looked at charging options along the way and neither trip will be a charging problem.
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