We bought our Ford F-150 Lightning EV Truck in March of 2024 but only kept it for just over a year….then traded it in for another EV. What gives…why would we do this? Read on to find out:
I liked my Lightning and it was fun to drive, had a great big interior and great acceleration. When we bought it, I paid for the more expensive version in order to get the extended range battery, the truck was supposed to be able to charge and drive up to 320 miles at a time on one charge. So I took this at face value and bought the truck. The truck was supposed to come with a Tesla End Converter and a “free” Ford Home Charging kit (you just have to get it professionally installed in your garage). Neither of these were with the truck and the sales staff had no idea what I was talking about when I mentioned these parts….important parts. I received a phone call several weeks later letting me know these things were supposed to come with the truck and were getting shipped to me. Bought the truck in March, received the Tesla End in November.
The Lightning that I drove did indeed charge to 320 miles with no problems….but it was the driving miles that frustrated me. We live in a rural community with longer drives to get places…so there’s long drives involved with daily life if I need to get somewhere like Home Depot or even further to a Costco. I really noticed the mileage on the truck and where I could or could not go on one charge. I became an expert in trying to squeak out more miles from that truck- often driving with no A/C or heat, turning off the radio, turning off all electronics and ensuring that I was in proper drive mode. Becoming increasingly frustrated with the mileage I WASN’T getting out of the truck, I took it back to my nearest Ford dealer several times to get the batteries and electronic mileage evaluated. Once we reset the whole electrical system in truck while I was on the phone with Ford EV service. None of this helped, so just after a year of ownership I started a “buyback” request with Ford Headquarters. After sitting and waiting and following up on the buyback request for nearly two months, it was denied with little explanation. Ford was supposed to send me written explanation for denial of the buyback request, but that didn’t happen either. So after the abrupt denial of my buyback request and not getting the mileage as advertised for the truck, I was frustrated enough to start looking at other options.
After driving an EV for over a year, I had lost any range anxiety that makes some folks hesitant to buy an EV, but I did have frustration over stopping often to charge. Simply put, there’s charging stations where you need them but you do need to do some extra trip planning as you go. So I knew I was ok with buying and driving another EV, but I wanted an EV with MORE mileage that actually went the mileage advertised for the vehicle. I did my research on this purchase. I knew that I needed to tow, I wanted to be able to seat 6 people, I wanted another EV, I wanted 4×4 capability and robust off-road ability, I wanted an American made car if possible and I wanted it to be fun and fast.
After all my research, there’s only one EV on the market that met all of my criteria, the Rivian R1S.
The R1S met all of my criteria but it’s more expensive than other SUV EV’s on the market. However, it tows most anything you can throw at it (smoothly), you can seat 6 people comfortably, it gets 410 miles per charge and we’ve squeezed nearly 400 miles out of it between charges on our long summer road trip….and it’s got a really nice smooth 4-wheel drive system and handles really, really nicely. I’m really happy that Rivian decided on the one-pedal setup, as I think it has directly impacted my driving fatigue…especially on long, steep and curvy downhill drives like we found in Colorado. The One-Pedal setup incorporates the gas and brake pedals into one pedal that you simply take your foot off when you want to brake. It takes some getting used to, but after an hour or so, I started to really like it. You also have an additional brake pedal beside the gas, but they say to only really use it for emergency braking or for towing.
So we traded in the F-150 Lightning and bought the Rivian in early summer…..then two weeks later started an extended road trip to Colorado then back through New Mexico, Utah and Arizona. We knew the trip would have big miles that we needed to cover quickly (on the way out there) as I was doing a (short) professional donkey hoof trimming apprenticeship, but on the way back we were able to slow down and see the sights. We loved our time in Leadville, Durango, Monument Valley and Prescott. It would have been a much different, slower trip if we needed to charge more often; I was thankful to be driving with the much longer 410 mile range, which we came to rely on as we did some of the longer drives between charging.
When we used the F-150 to haul hay, we could get up to 8-10 bales in the back of the truck. I can only get two bales in the back of the Rivian, which really isn’t worth the longer trip to the feedstore. So now I do fewer trips but buy more hay all at once because I attach the horse trailer to the Rivian and go pick up hay. It’s more work and more complicated but it does get the job done.
So in the end, I wanted MORE mileage per charge than I was getting out of my F-150 Lighting, so I made the decision to switch to another EV. After our massive roadtrip by EV to Colorado and numerous long drives elsewhere (like Monterey)….I made the right decision.
I drive an EV because it’s fun, fast, quiet and clean. Don’t infer any political stuff from my posts.
Disclaimer: I have not written this post because I’m getting any financial or material reward from Rivian. But, if Rivian likes this post and wants to help me out……
Here’s some other posts I’ve written about EV’s:
Hauling Ass: Towing and Hauling with A Ford Lightning EV
Roadtripping An F150 Lightning, An EV Tale
