Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire New F150's with built in generator

I haven't seen one yet, just read about them. If these things work, they should be great. 1st, though, they have to put them in non-hybrids and in heavier pickups. The largest available is a 7.3 KW generator, only available in a hybrid. It will charge the hybrid battery and run from that until the power drops to a certain level. Then it automatically starts the engine and recharges the battery. They claim that if you pull the full 7.3 KW the whole time, it will run for 85 hours on a tank of gas, considerably longer at partial load. I read that some dealers in TX put some out on loan last week for people who had no power and they're working great. It will generate both 110 and 220. The original idea was for contractors' use on job sites where power isn't available yet. With that many watts, you can run quite a few tools.
They also have 2 and 2.5 KW versions.

Does anyone have any real life experience with one yet?

I have never seen one. all I can say is, it sounds like ford is ahead of any other truck maker.

So a gas generator, to charge the electric motor battery.

Seems to me like the long way around the barn.

Just give me a gas motor.

You're reading it wrong. This isn't for driving. It has a generator built in to run tools, a/c, a camp trailer, whatever electric stuff you normally use a gen for. If your power's out at home, you can plug it into your house wiring like any generator. The engine charges the hybrid battery. When your tool use runs the hybrid battery down, the engine automatically starts to charge the battery to keep your tools running. The engine will cycle on and off as needed to keep it going until it runs out of gas.

I think this is going to be a great idea when they can apply it to a regular, non-hybrid engine and put it in larger pickups.

Depends on your point of view I guess...diesel electric locomotives, tugboats, submarines have been doing quite well since the 1930's. I can personally testify to seeing, on a daily basis the power and torque of DC power on LeTourneau log handling machines, with 35 tons in the forks, around 70 tons gross, spinning the wheels on dry pavement. 8 gallons per hour, fuel consumption.
Don't know if Ford is doing it but the locomotives also use the wheel motors for electric braking. Old tech, modernized may work just fine, but the green freaks are still not going to be happy with the little engine on the genset.

Dodge made a Ram Contractor Special about 15 years ago with 20kw capacity IIRC - don't know how many were made but it was a low production run and I've never seen one.

I'll just stick with a backup generator.

(May want to power the house and drive the truck further than an extension cord allows...)

I hadn't heard of it so I looked it up. It was only made for 2 years, '02-04. It was a hybrid, too. Hybrids have gained a lot more acceptance since then so maybe this one will fly. The Dodge put out way more power than most homeowners or RVers would need and it cost too much at the time. I don't know what the Ford versions costs.

Here's an article about it: RAM GENERATOR

I wonder if those Ram's are collectable - if you can even find one?

The constant torque at any speed that electrics offer would be nice to have.

Seems some Texans were using them......


https://thechive.com/2021/02/21/tex...t-his-house-during-texasfreeze-6-photos/

Guy started building a stand-alone unit a few years ago as a result of a power outage.

https://www.cargenerator.com/

I’ve got a similar setup for my Prius. I’ve only experienced one long-term power outage (in 2004) but even then my power was back on in a couple hours where other people took almost a week.

In any case, I’ve got it set up and adapted to run my furnace if need be.

I can't look at the link without killing my ad blocker. The article I posted in the OP said that some Ford dealers in TX had loaned out some of these to people whose power was out.

No issue about power to generate - plenty of that if you want to pay the fuel cost - key is an excellent onboard generator driven by that power. Will weigh a bit. Someone noted the benefits of DC power - could generate plenty of that and have a serious inverter for AC.

So when it's bedtime in the 5th wheel you can just hit the truck's key fob and shut everything down? Remote start in the morning?

Cool. But I won't be buying any 60 thousand dollar pickup truck. I like not having truck payments.

It'll be a small 5th wheel. This is only available in the 1/2 ton hybrid.

My wife's 2020 F150 has it- and it works great, after using it our son bought me a 1000 inverter for my older truck- works great too.
GMC trucks had them for a while- don't know if they still do.

bottom line is that the F150 is a damned expensive 7KW generator.

Unless you need a truck.