The Ford F-150 Lighting will be able to tow up to 10,000 pounds, but how far?
That’s the question on a lot of Fox News Autos readers’ minds, given the sort of range anxiety caused by electric vehicles and the still incomplete charging infrastructure available to support them.
The 2022 Ford F-150 Lightning is rated to tow a maximum of 10,000 pounds.
(Ford)
The F-150 Lightning will come standard with a 230-mile range rating and be offered in an extended range version that can go 300 miles between charges and gets the maximum 10,000-pound rating, but without anything attached to the back of it.
Ford hasn’t yet said how towing or hauling the F-150 Lightning’s maximum 2,000 payload will affect range, but energy is energy and internal combustion engine vehicles offer an idea.
The weight and shape of whatever is being towed can make a dramatic difference on fuel economy, not to mention the road being driven on. Just picture the difference between a cabin cruiser getting hauled to a mountain lake compared to an Airstream trailer cruising through Kansas.
Typically, a truck sees at least a 30% drop in fuel economy when pulling 10,000 pounds, though it can be more than 50% in some situations, according to tests by PickupTrucks.com.
In fact, startup electric truck maker Rivian, in which Ford holds a $500 million stake, says that its R1T pickup will see a 50% drop in efficiency when towing a trailer at its maximum 11,000-pound rating.
That means F-150 Lightning owners can likely expect to make it 150 to 210 miles between charges with the extended battery.
This is assuming, of course, that they started with a full battery. The F-150 Lightning is capable of being recharged at a public fast charging station from 15% to 80% full in 41 minutes, but the process slows down for the last 20% to protect the cells from overheating, so drivers may not want to wait around to top it all the way off during a road trip.
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Ford is fully aware that this poses a new challenge to owners, however, and has programmed the vehicle to account for weight when its calculating the real-time projected range and the navigation system can plot out a route to charging stations within driving distance.
