Ford's F-150 Lightning now delivered to first customers

The Ford F-150 Lightning is being delivered to the first buyers in the US today. Ford isn't giving away the actual number of vehicles it's sold, but it has reportedly built around 1,800 so far.

Ford is currently the only maker able to ship an electric full-sized pickup truck in the US, with rivals from GM, RAM, and Tesla all out until at least 2023. Ford CEO Jim Farley says the company intends to take full advantage of its lead. Ford has some 200,000 orders for the F-150 Lightning so far, and will reportedly run out of the government-granted 125,000 $7,500 EV tax credits later this year, or early next one.

If you buy an F-150 Lightning right now you'll get 2023 as the earliest quote for delivery.

Ford's aim is to build 150,000 Lightnings per year, but Farley admits it's not on schedule to meet that goal anytime soon. The carmaker has invested $950 million to expand its factories, added 750 jobs, and reportedly doubled production.

Because the F-150 Lightning shares a platform with the two-year-old F-150, many components are up to capacity, like the seats and instrument panel. Farley says Ford is using available chips from the regular F-150 for the F-150 Lightning.

The F-150 Lightning ships with a new charging-locator map that can show fast chargers specifically. The map will allow users to report broken charging stations back to Ford. It's a feature that will arrive on the Ford Mustang Mach-E through an upcoming software update.

Via