Ford's been busy getting the
F-150 Lightning ready for the springtime launch, including some recent cold-weather testing. On one of the final was one of the final cold-weather testing trips up to Alaska, the Lightning team took some time to shoot some video and take some pictures of the electric pickup having some fun in the snow.
Cold weather testing is an important part of vehicle validation regardless of the type of powertrain, but for electric vehicles, it may be even more important.
That's because automakers are still trying to figure out the impact that the cold weather has on the vehicle's performance and driving range. EVs are a relatively new technology, and different battery chemistries have different performance characteristics in very hot and very cold weather conditions, so the OEMs still have a lot to learn.
This round of testing was one of the final sessions before the springtime launch and included temperatures as low as -30° Fahrenheit (-34° Celsius) and lasted for 14 days. A team of eleven Ford engineers was there fine-tuning the F-150 Lightning’s performance on low-traction surfaces like snow and ice for twelve hours per day for the two weeks.
Ford's engineers discuss how the instant response of the all-electric powertrain offers the ability to sense wheel slip and adjust power to the wheels within milliseconds. That allows them to dial in the traction control systems even more precisely than they can with their conventionally-fueled trucks.
