Ford Demos F-150 Electric Prototype, Has it Pull a 1 Million Pound Train

[ThePointblank]

From Ars Technica and Top Gear:

 

https://arstechnica.com/cars/2019/07/ford-shows-off-electric-f-150-truck-by-towing-a-million-pounds-of-train/

https://www.topgear.com/car-news/electric/electric-ford-f-150-prototype-has-towed-over-500-tonnes

 

The video Ford put out is here:

 

 

 

Basically, Ford has a lot riding on the F-150 pickup truck, as it is the best selling vehicle, by far, and Ford's top money earner. Therefore, to showcase a prototype F-150 pickup with a full battery electric drivetrain to convince existing Ford owners, with a major publicity stunt is big news for Ford as the vehicle represents the future of the brand.

 

In the video, the chief engineer of the F-150 electric truck, Linda Zhang, used one of the prototypes to pull 10 double-decker automobile carrier rail cars over a distance of 1000ft, represented by 42 F-150's all in a row. They then load the 42 F-150's into the rail cars, and does the same stunt again, pulling the train easily.

 

While the electric F-150 is not due to reach production soon, a hybrid version of the F-150 pickup truck will hit the market in 2020.

[RejZoR]

What's gonna be the weight of F150? 15 tons? Coz all electric cars are freaking stupid heavy compared to petrol cars...

[Levent]

Reminds me the episode of fifth gear where they pulled a 747 (which weighs 735K lbs and has significantly less wheels) using a V10 TDI toureg. Not that impressive imo, nowadays even 1.5 liter 3 cylinder diesels have bazillion lbft of torque.

[suicidalfranco]

well... im convinced.

where do i sign up?

[Froody129]

Very cool imo. For people who actually use pickups for work/offroading electric makes tons of sense unless you're in the middle of nowhere with no power generation. Much easier to drive, (hopefully) lower centre of gravity and less money to keep it moving. 

 

That said, I see a ton of people driving pickups who've never used them for what a pickup is designed for. I wonder what that market will think of an electric F-150, since they're generally the people who think bigger is better

[leadeater]

2 hours ago, huilun02 said:

I don't know if this is a problem but usually people buy trucks to do work. How easily can it get more juice mid-work? Can it even be charged at the places where it will be put to use? How fast is it going to go through the battery lifespan?

Just put a Diesel generator on the flat bed and you're good 

[leadeater]

2 minutes ago, VegetableStu said:

isn't that the Hammerhead Eagle i-Thrust?

Yep but this is just that prototype with the minor rough edges shaved off, it's not that different 

[Froody129]

2 minutes ago, huilun02 said:

Sure, if the diesel generator comes with the vehicle

So is Ford selling us a solution, or a problem?

Generators aren't that expensive. If you're really going somewhere without power then it's not rare to be taking a generator with you anyway. It's much more efficient to run an engine at a constant, efficient RPM than running a big diesel at constantly changing RPM. These things are huge, I think they'll have space

[Drak3]

Two thoughts on this:

Too much marketing bullshit and undeserved ego stroking on Ford's part, ESPECIALLY if it's about the F150.

Any current truck engine could do this if the tranny was geared for it. But that would kill fuel economy. So, what's the mileage loss doing something like this? Does the truck even have decent mileage to begin with? Can the motor even handle towing more than other half tons on a regular basis?

[leadeater]

4 minutes ago, huilun02 said:

Sure, if the diesel generator comes with the vehicle

So is Ford selling us a solution, or a problem?

They don't plan to even sell an all electric until after 2020 anyway, a lot can change between now and then. There is higher energy density battery technologies that aren't yet being used in cars but that is due to cost, those might be getting worked on and targeted for high volume production to get the cost down. Personally for any pulling vehicle electric drive does make the most sense but I think they should first go to Diesel electric with a smaller battery for short peak power so the generator can stay in optimal fuel efficiency operation, this alone would likely cut emissions by 30%.

 

All electric also won't be the only option either, for sure they'll have other drive options, Ford isn't that stupid..... hmm maybe they are?

[Thaldor]

But can it stand 2 episodes of the old Top Gear and live on?

Where we get to biggest downside of electric or hybrid cars: It breaks while in duty, you're in deep trouble because you are not going to fix it yourself with simple tools, let alone make some MacGyver-fixes to get it at least somehow moving and at least to a place where it's easier to get towed. Being able to pull million tons doesn't do much if it doesn't even start.

[Froody129]

15 minutes ago, Thaldor said:

But can it stand 2 episodes of the old Top Gear and live on?

Where we get to biggest downside of electric or hybrid cars: It breaks while in duty, you're in deep trouble because you are not going to fix it yourself with simple tools, let alone make some MacGyver-fixes to get it at least somehow moving and at least to a place where it's easier to get towed. Being able to pull million tons doesn't do much if it doesn't even start.

How often do electric cars break though? If you isolate problems to the motor, it's orders of magnitude simples than an ICE, and doesn't need oil. They last forever. These trucks are huge anyway, so I think to fit a small diesel or petrol range extender that is used much less will solve any range problems.

 

Anyway, this is just a prototype. It's not worth hating on Ford now for a car that's essentially a tech demo. 

[leadeater]

34 minutes ago, huilun02 said:

Ok I'll look again after 2020 to see if they have revolutionary new product that makes practical sense

For actual work like on a farm for the hours they work, doubt it. But that's much less common, I find it amusing how many 'work vehicles' are purchased for everything other than the designed purpose of the vehicle.

[Levent]

3 minutes ago, Froody129 said:

How often do electric cars break though? If you isolate problems to the motor, it's orders of magnitude simples than an ICE, and doesn't need oil. They last forever. These trucks are huge anyway, so I think to fit a small diesel or petrol range extender that is used much less will solve any range problems.

 

Anyway, this is just a prototype. It's not worth hating on Ford now for a car that's essentially a tech demo. 

Depends on which manufacturer is in question. I hardly hear anyone bitching about Prius being a high maintenance car or having QA issues. Also maintenance in cars is really not that annoying, I replace my cars wear and tear (oil, bushings, filters etc) items myself and hardest one was engine and transmission mounts that took 6 hours because of lack of engine hoist. Other than that unless you are putting 20-30k miles a month in to your car a month I dont see how maintenance aspect of EV cars make it a plus.

[RoseLuck462]

If I had a house I'd get an electric vehicle. 

[Drak3]

17 minutes ago, Froody129 said:

These trucks are huge anyway, so I think to fit a small diesel or petrol range extender that is used much less will solve any range problems.

You're talking fuel tank +engine +EGR +DPF +cat +DEF system +DEF tank if you're running a diesel in your truck.

 

A mild hybrid system, like what RAM now uses, would be better.

[Taf the Ghost]

Pure electric work trucks are just a marketing stunt until somewhere in the 5-10X increase in battery density, and there's nothing on the horizon that's looking viable for those batteries yet. Electric-Drive Hybrids are where this really, really should have gone almost a decade ago. GM so badly botched it up after they got the Volt's drive train working. That's the actual future of electric drive vehicles, but it needs to be put in the right spots for it to work. 

[Thaldor]

17 minutes ago, Froody129 said:

How often do electric cars break though? If you isolate problems to the motor, it's orders of magnitude simples than an ICE, and doesn't need oil. They last forever.

-snip-

Everything can break. Well maintained and treated cars don't usually break, no matter what kind of motor there is. Wear and tear are always present and nothing is forever. The real question is, what can you do when it breaks. Depends on a lot how things break but with electric motors there usually isn't anything you can do unlike with ICEs there's something you can try to do (battery malfunctions and stops giving or charging, you need to get to some licensed garage that has replacement parts vs. punctured fuel tank that you can put a stick to it and/or duct tape or whatever that you hope will stop fuel from leaking and hope it keeps enough fuel to get you to some garage that can weld that hole shut and off you go).

[justpoet]

I'm quite happy to see the demo, even if it is just a concept at this point and "nothing special compared to diesel vehicles with non-production gearing".  This shows that the electrics are just as capable, provided they'll have the range you need. Will some people of course still never have enough range?  Absolutely.  Will many who just want a truck for an occasional home depot run or hunting day out probably have plenty of range?  Absolutely.  I'm actually rather impressed at how quickly they put out this demo after buying Rivian (which had options for 400+ mile range).

[Trik'Stari]

5 hours ago, huilun02 said:

I don't know if this is a problem but usually people buy trucks to do work. How easily can it get more juice mid-work? Can it even be charged at the places where it will be put to use? How fast is it going to go through the battery lifespan?

They need to realize that the way forward is swappable battery packs on the bottom of the vehicle.

 

Pull up to a station, wheels on automated guide path similar to an automatic carwash. Machines underneath unhook and remove the spent battery pack (to be recharged) and replace it with a freshly charged one. You don't necessarily have to come back to get your "original" pack. Someone else will get that when it's been recharged.

 

You pay a certain price with the purchase of the vehicle for the original, then pay a fee when swapping to a newly charged one. Similar to how gas grill propane tanks.

 

Although I'm not sure how it would work in regards to the actual health of the battery pack. Would you have to pay extra for your pack being "end of service life"? I'm not sure how it works if you swap out a busted ass gas propane tank for a fresh new one.

[cj09beira]

6 minutes ago, Trik'Stari said:

They need to realize that the way forward is swappable battery packs on the bottom of the vehicle.

 

Pull up to a station, wheels on automated guide path similar to an automatic carwash. Machines underneath unhook and remove the spent battery pack (to be recharged) and replace it with a freshly charged one. You don't necessarily have to come back to get your "original" pack. Someone else will get that when it's been recharged.

 

You pay a certain price with the purchase of the vehicle for the original, then pay a fee when swapping to a newly charged one. Similar to how gas grill propane tanks.

 

Although I'm not sure how it would work in regards to the actual health of the battery pack. Would you have to pay extra for your pack being "end of service life"? I'm not sure how it works if you swap out a busted ass gas propane tank for a fresh new one.

while charging you can know how good the battery is, then you allow people to choose how much kw they want when swapping, less kw means cheaper,

though i think it might start with the swapped battery being a loaner which you must return the next time you recharge when you will get your own battery back fully charged 

[dalekphalm]

1 hour ago, Trik'Stari said:

They need to realize that the way forward is swappable battery packs on the bottom of the vehicle.

 

Pull up to a station, wheels on automated guide path similar to an automatic carwash. Machines underneath unhook and remove the spent battery pack (to be recharged) and replace it with a freshly charged one. You don't necessarily have to come back to get your "original" pack. Someone else will get that when it's been recharged.

 

You pay a certain price with the purchase of the vehicle for the original, then pay a fee when swapping to a newly charged one. Similar to how gas grill propane tanks.

 

Although I'm not sure how it would work in regards to the actual health of the battery pack. Would you have to pay extra for your pack being "end of service life"? I'm not sure how it works if you swap out a busted ass gas propane tank for a fresh new one.

Tesla did build a system exactly like that - but I don't think it's actually deployed in the wild. Their system can swap a battery, fully automated, faster than you can fill up a car with gas.

 

I'm with @cj09beira in that if such a system were deployed, it would likely be a loaner type system, so that people don't have issues with getting a battery that's much worse than the one they started with.

 

On topic: That was sweet. Yeah it's mostly marketing, but who cares? It was still cool to see. Electric is the future (or certainly, part of the future). Electric pickups will be a thing. Ford is going to be a the forefront of that.
 

Will an Electric Pickup work for every single person with a regular Pickup? No. But it'll work for a lot of them. And that's okay.

 

We need to ditch this attitude where if it's not perfect for literally every little thing in every little possible use-case, then it sucks and shouldn't exist. That's a stupid fucking attitude. If it works for a lot of people, then awesome. Those that need an ICE will still be able to get one.

[PlayStation 2]

Didn't Toyota pull a similar stunt with the Tundra and one of the space rockets in 2012?

[Trik'Stari]

1 hour ago, cj09beira said:

while charging you can know how good the battery is, then you allow people to choose how much kw they want when swapping, less kw means cheaper,

though i think it might start with the swapped battery being a loaner which you must return the next time you recharge when you will get your own battery back fully charged 

The "must return" part isn't doable for attaining the ease of use of liquid fuels. Because not everyone will want to drive out of the way to go back and get their own battery. Especially people who work construction type jobs where they might be in one area one day, another area the next, etc.

 

I prefer the method of "you pay for the battery when you buy the car, pay a small fee to switch for a freshly charged one at any station, that one will go one to be charged and end up in someone elses car, most likely".

 

The fee would need to pay for occasional replacement batteries added into circulation, as well as the cost of charging batteries. Could maybe do a system that tracks individual users and charge more for people who dog the hell out of the batteries and reduce their lifespan more quickly? Makes sense considering they would cause a net increase in the cost of maintaining the system.

[justpoet]

12 minutes ago, Trik'Stari said:

The "must return" part isn't doable for attaining the ease of use of liquid fuels. Because not everyone will want to drive out of the way to go back and get their own battery. Especially people who work construction type jobs where they might be in one area one day, another area the next, etc.

 

I prefer the method of "you pay for the battery when you buy the car, pay a small fee to switch for a freshly charged one at any station, that one will go one to be charged and end up in someone elses car, most likely".

 

The fee would need to pay for occasional replacement batteries added into circulation, as well as the cost of charging batteries. Could maybe do a system that tracks individual users and charge more for people who dog the hell out of the batteries and reduce their lifespan more quickly? Makes sense considering they would cause a net increase in the cost of maintaining the system.

Wouldn't need an extra heavy use fee.  Just pay per swap based on the currently fully charged capacity of the pack you're getting back vs the one you're dropping off.  Factor in any costs you want, but then it is just the cost of a fast fill up.  Sometimes your pack will be better (when new) and result in a credit, other times the pack you get will be better than what you had, resulting in a small fee on top of the charge cost.