Ford Unplugs the Lightning . . . Sort Of

After three years of trying to sell the F-150 Lightning (which is the battery powered version of the F-150 pickup) Ford is going to stop trying.

Well, sort of.

Here’s the official statement emitted by Andrew Frick – who is the president of Ford’s Model e and Ford Blue divisions, which were created to replace (in time) the “old Ford” that sold vehicles with engines – about the cancellation (sort of) of the Lightning:

“The American consumer is speaking clearly and they want the benefits of electrification like instant torque and mobile power. But they also demand affordability  . . . rather than spending billions more on large EVs that now have no path to profitability, we are allocating that money into higher-returning areas.”

Italics added.

If the “American consumer” – it sounds like a pig at the trough, doesn’t it? – “want(s) the benefits of electrification,” why is everyone – even Tesla – having such a hard time selling them on it?

“Mobile power”? Isn’t that what we have had for 100-plus years?

Ford seems to still be addled by EV Fever, a sickness that most of the rest of us have gotten over. Evidence of this being Ford’s determination to keep on “investing” in EVs. Just “smaller” and (ostensibly) “cheaper” ones. This being like those people you still see at the supermarket who are wearing just one “mask” now.

“Smaller” EVs aren’t selling, either – including Ford’s small EV crossover, the Mach e that Ford markets as a “Mustang” (which is like the way drugs that suppress symptoms – supposedly – are now marketed as “vaccines”). As of mid-December, about 41,962 of these have sold and that sounds a lot better than the number of F-150 lightnings that have not sold. EV Defenders of the Faith also like to compare Mach e sales with sales of the actual Mustang, which is not selling well – but the comparison is disingenuous because the Mustang is a boutique car that Ford keeps around because its presence in the showroom helps sell other Fords to people who’d love to have a Mustang but need a more practical car.

The Mach e is marketed as a practical car but it’s not – because it has the short range/long recharge time problems that beset every EV. It is also not very affordable. Unless you think a vehicle with a base price just shy of $40,000 is “affordable.” Plus whatever you have to spend to get your house wired up to be able charge it in less time than a couple of days. This assumes you have a house. Apartment/condo dwellers have no realistic way to plug in at home so they have to drive to a public “fast” charger and wait there for a charge.

The Mach e is also very probably an internally subsidized car, as is true of all EVs. Meaning Ford sells it for less than it costs to manufacture. It is well-known (because Ford admitted this) that each “sale” of an F-150 Lightning cost Ford about $20,000.

How much is it costing Ford to “sell” the Mach e?

It is unlikely Ford is making much money even if it isn’t losing any on each “sale” – because annual sales of 41,962 (of the Mach e) are trivial for a major car company such as Ford. To get a sense of just how trivial, consider that Ford sells close to half a million F-150s (with engines) each year.

That’s where the money is.

But Ford seems determined to throw more money at EVs. Including a new EV’d version of the F-150. This pending iteration will have a plug but also an engine – perhaps mounted in the Frunk –  to try to ameliorate the EV’s range/recharge problems by using the engine as a portable generator rather than to turn the wheels. This will be marketed, apparently, as a “range extender.” Ram has one of these in the works also.

Both are likely to sell as well as the plug-in-only Lightning. (Ram cancelled the plug-in-only version of its half-ton truck before it could be shipped to Ram dealers; probably because Ram knew these would sit like bricks at Ram dealers, as Lightnings have been sitting.)

Why are Ford and Ram – andit’s not just them – continuing to pretend a virus is still afoot, so to speak?

No one asked for this. This is the fundamental problem with EVs, as a class. They were and still are a square peg trying to fit into a round hole. There was never any significant organic market for them. An artificial “market” had to be created – and it was. EVs were then mass-produced for this “market.” But even so, the availability of alternatives meant people didn’t have to buy an EV and that is what ultimately put an end to EV Fever. If the EV pushers had somehow eliminated the alternatives, EVs might have done better – just the same as  rotting horse meat does better when there’s nothing else available to eat.

Speaking of eating.

For says it is going to repurpose all those two-ton (each) batteries that will no longer be embedded in Lightnings. They will be used as in situ storage devices to back-up the power grid. This echoes of what the Germans did when their surface fleet was rendered useless by allied air attacks. They removed the 11 inch gun turrets from the wrecked battleship Gneisenau and used one of them as a shore battery (ha!)

This makes some sense, since after all the things have already been made and it’s better than just throwing them away. But even so, it’s such a waste. It is almost physically painful, if you care about the industry – if you like cars and trucks – to stand by and watch the industry roll over like – well, a gut-shot battleship. All the more so because this “battleship” didn’t fight. The government and its de facto EV mandates (via 50 MPG CAFE “standards” and “emissions” requirements that conflated  carbon dioxide with “pollution”).

Bismarck, Scharnhorst and Gneisenau did fight. Their deaths were honorable.

This one’s just pitiful.

. . .

If you like what you’ve found here please consider supporting EPautos.