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Ford F-150 Lightning Breezes Up Obstacle Where Tesla Cybertruck Struggled

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61–70 of 93 posts

Re: Ford F-150 Lightning Breezes Up Obstacle Where Tesla Cybertruck Struggled

#61
post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if the tri-motor CT models will be able to simulate a locked rear diff, much like the quad motor rivian models can simulate a locked diff front and rear thanks to being able to adjust torque to all four wheels individually. Only the rear axle of the CT would presumably be able to do this due to the tri-motor layout, unless they resort to the individual wheel braking like they've done on their road cars to si…

Quad motor is even better than a locking diff if all the motors are modulated right. I dunno what Rivian does, but I saw that Rimac does 1 motor per wheel, and each motor madly modulates itself during launch control to stop its wheel from slipping... Perfect, maximum torque, all the time.

I believe that Rivian offers a quad-motor option, and a standard dual-motor with an open-diff that uses the brakes to try to compensate (similar to a typical AWD system).

Re: Ford F-150 Lightning Breezes Up Obstacle Where Tesla Cybertruck Struggled

#62

All these comments about a lack of locking diff on the CT could be the reason but it seems that this capability can be achieved in software with motors on all 4 wheels. - you don't allow the motor/wheel to move at a different speed to another on the same axle. Therefore this, to me at least, seems like an easy pathway for improvement for the CT. And we have already seen, telsa has the best software team with companie…

It's not yet clear virtual locking diffs on quad motor cars will be as effective as a fully locked diff.

A software system will likely have to detect some small degree of slip before intervening to sync the wheel speed again - that slip just wouldn't occur in the first place on a fully locked setup given its impossible for one wheel to spin faster than the other. This seems to be the experience of Rivian owners who have quad motor cars with virtual locking diffs.

Re: Ford F-150 Lightning Breezes Up Obstacle Where Tesla Cybertruck Struggled

#63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hm? Its pretty massive to me. The Tesla has like no suspension travel. The suspension is barely compressing, and you can see the body bounce over the terrain as the wheels lift or almost lift. If you covered the top of the truck from view, I'd say it looks like a cheap crossover. And the base F-150 is not really a long travel truck, its just... you know, sprung like a truck. A little side by side UTV could run over t…

Lack of suspension travel under compression is a common issue off-road for air suspension vehicles like the Grand Cherokee and to a lesser extent Range Rovers. Maybe same for the Cybertruck.

Interesting. Hence the accusations that they are being citified.

Re: Ford F-150 Lightning Breezes Up Obstacle Where Tesla Cybertruck Struggled

#64
post #3

To my untrained (WRT off-roading) eye, I didn't see that much difference between the two. I also wonder how much difference there would be due to driver skill. And as mentioned in TFA, Ford has been making trucks a lot longer than Tesla.

I'm with you, both trucks struggled a bit but made it to the top. Is this kind of driving an important use case though? I would think it would be more impressive to compare how these trucks handle towing trailers.

Hills aside, lots of rural roads are really bumpy. The Cybertruck looks so stiff that driving over them could actually be annoying.

Re: Ford F-150 Lightning Breezes Up Obstacle Where Tesla Cybertruck Struggled

#65

Looks like the Tesla has an open diff with poor brake lock diff control, I think the lighting has an option for a locking rear diff wonder if they were using it, looks like it. Interesting thing about the Rivian quad motor version is while it has full software control due to a motor per wheel, this can be a downside for crawling like this because it has no way to send torque from one side to the other, so if say only…

I am no expert at this but I think the Rivian should perform comparably.

The Rivian can do 908 lb-ft of torque. Like you say, that's divided up amongst the 4 wheels, so that's 227 lb-ft per wheel.

The Jeep can do 260 lb-ft total.

The Rivian weighs ~7200 lbs and the Jeep weighs ~5300 lbs.

So, with only one wheel of traction you're right. If you can transfer all of that torque on the jeep with less than ~14% loss (which, I dunno, might be reasonable) then the Jeep has more "oomph".

With two wheels, the Jeep is still figuring out how to distribute 260 lb-ft and the Rivian has 454. It's not close at that point.

Re: Ford F-150 Lightning Breezes Up Obstacle Where Tesla Cybertruck Struggled

#66
post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if the tri-motor CT models will be able to simulate a locked rear diff, much like the quad motor rivian models can simulate a locked diff front and rear thanks to being able to adjust torque to all four wheels individually. Only the rear axle of the CT would presumably be able to do this due to the tri-motor layout, unless they resort to the individual wheel braking like they've done on their road cars to si…

Quad motor is even better than a locking diff if all the motors are modulated right. I dunno what Rivian does, but I saw that Rimac does 1 motor per wheel, and each motor madly modulates itself during launch control to stop its wheel from slipping... Perfect, maximum torque, all the time.

There's still some slip though in all these virtual solutions - a wheel has to start slipping for the software to notice and modulation to kick in. With a real locking diff, it's physically impossible for one wheel to spin faster than the other. For sure they can likely modulate the wheel torque quickly though to get the wheels back to the same rotation speed.

Re: Ford F-150 Lightning Breezes Up Obstacle Where Tesla Cybertruck Struggled

#67
post #62

All these comments about a lack of locking diff on the CT could be the reason but it seems that this capability can be achieved in software with motors on all 4 wheels. - you don't allow the motor/wheel to move at a different speed to another on the same axle. Therefore this, to me at least, seems like an easy pathway for improvement for the CT. And we have already seen, telsa has the best software team with companie…

It's not yet clear virtual locking diffs on quad motor cars will be as effective as a fully locked diff. A software system will likely have to detect some small degree of slip before intervening to sync the wheel speed again - that slip just wouldn't occur in the first place on a fully locked setup given its impossible for one wheel to spin faster than the other. This seems to be the experience of Rivian owners who h…

That's a solvable software problem. The electric motors know how much they are spinning, they just need to be modulated quickly enough and intelligently enough.

Re: Ford F-150 Lightning Breezes Up Obstacle Where Tesla Cybertruck Struggled

#68
post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quad motor is even better than a locking diff if all the motors are modulated right. I dunno what Rivian does, but I saw that Rimac does 1 motor per wheel, and each motor madly modulates itself during launch control to stop its wheel from slipping... Perfect, maximum torque, all the time.

There's still some slip though in all these virtual solutions - a wheel has to start slipping for the software to notice and modulation to kick in. With a real locking diff, it's physically impossible for one wheel to spin faster than the other. For sure they can likely modulate the wheel torque quickly though to get the wheels back to the same rotation speed.

In theory, the system can just monitor rotation and "lock" the wheels together with torque as a goal of the system, instead of trying to detect when the tires are slipping.

As a bonus, a computer is smart enough to spin the tires at slightly different rates when turning, instead of dragging them along like a locked diff.

Re: Ford F-150 Lightning Breezes Up Obstacle Where Tesla Cybertruck Struggled

#69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are you gonna do at a gas station in buttfuck? Ask to borrow the wall plug? How do you pay for that? How long does it take to recharge without a dedicated wall charger or high power charging station?

Yes, gas stations in the middle of nowhere have let me use their 220V 30amps to charge. Campsites too. Billing can be automated with the current EV charging standard. You get about 5 miles of range per hour off a 120V 20A circuit. https://supercharge.info/map https://www.plugshare.com/

> You get about 5 miles of range per hour off a 120V 20A circuit.

I suppose that technically works but I’d imagine you’d be sleeping in the truck all night while it charges to get just enough juice to get out of dodge. 8 hours is 40 miles. If the weather is bad and you need heat that falls apart though.

Re: Ford F-150 Lightning Breezes Up Obstacle Where Tesla Cybertruck Struggled

#70
post #16

For context, this is a video of a traditional truck driving up the same hill: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ptTwpkWQY_s And here's a Range Rover going up it: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/_00ah8lG4yk It seems like the CT doesn't have the equivalent of a locking diff, and had essentially no articulation. It'll be fine for the target demo (on-road usage). Both the Lightning and the CT clearly suffer from their weigh…

Here's someone doing the stairs in a Suzuki Swift with no difflocks: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g9gaTSaTX84

It's fine for the buyers who will be collectors, posers and social media tools - but still worth giggling about because Musk has consistently bragged that it'll be a better truck than any other truck while also being a 'better car'...and yet it does worse than a truck designed to not really see anything more off-road than a jobsite or country dirt road because Ford can

I'm guessing a P1 Touareg/Cayenne, or even a first-gen Audi Allroad wouldn't have a problem.

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