Ford electric pickup

Very interesting.

For 52k in 1998 dollars I can see why they were not popular.

Electric trucks could have been a new slur for Ford: Fix Or Rewire Daily. :)

gbopp wrote:
For 52k in 1998 dollars I can see why they were not popular.

Electric trucks could have been a new slur for Ford: Fix Or Rewire Daily. :)

That is a good one and maybe true. Considering all the lowest bidder components that automakers use today.

Lot of progress in 20 years.

https://electrek.co/2019/01/16/ford-all-electric-f150-pickup-truck/

colliehauler wrote:
I did not know Ford built a electric Ranger from 98 to 02. It had a 50 mile range on lead acid batteries , 65 mile with the optional nickel metal hydride. Cost was $52,720 and only 1500 were built. Ford crushed all but 100 of them when the lease was up.

The OG Ranger EV was pretty cool. There's still a cult of owners out there, and a few guys who will retrofit with new lithium cells. It was a good drive system (motor and controller by Siemens). And while the electronics are certainly old and mostly unavailable, there's a network of dude's who can still repair them.

I see them pop up on craigslist once in a while, and it's tempting. :B

Chevy had a similar truck at the same time frame, an S-10 with essentially the EV-1 drivetrain. They are even more rare.

General Motors got in on it, too!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chevrolet_S-10_EV

gbopp wrote:
For 52k in 1998 dollars I can see why they were not popular.

Electric trucks could have been a new slur for Ford: Fix Or Rewire Daily. :)

For sure, My first new Diesel crew cab F-250 was less then that.

:) Hi, I was working at a Ford dealer at that time; We didn't have to deal with any of those electric Rangers, but one of our commercial accounts had some. The idea was good, but the people who drove them said that they were only good for about 20 miles.

I know at one point (10-20yrs ago) Ranger/S-10 were popular for after market conversions.

If you could get one cheap with a dead engine, it was a pretty simple conversion with lots of room to work in the engine compartment and simple to bolt in.

Basically an upsized golf cart drivetrain mated to the existing transmission made it really simple. As long as you were just using it as a commuter vehicle, it would be a nice pet project.

$55k for such a truck in today's dollars would be insane.