SilveradoEV 4wt is one of the best and most economical work truck, but it isn't right for everyone. Read more in details.
So, here's a post about using Silverado as a work truck for a landscaping business that I made about three months ago
https://www.reddit.com/r/SilveradoEV/s/oTvCSRuQOP
We usually buy our trucks from the same dealer and on a recent visit to replace one of our older gas trucks, stopped by and was looking at a few SilveradoEVs that they had on the lot.
Turns out the sales guy told us to give it a go for a month or so. We took two, and paid a monthly rental fee for them.
Now, if you read the other thread, I've linked above, we allow our work trucks to be parked at our employee's homes, this saves them a trip of coming in to depot/office to take the truck, and it also means they can start earlier/finish earlier. Also, this is one of the reasons for employee retention for us - coming to and fro to the office can be 1hr or more two-way trip for some employees. It saves them significant unpaid time (coming in to 'work'). Of course, if the equipment is not already on the truck or trailer, they do have to come in anyways, but it happens maybe once or twice a month.
Also, whoever has the truck parked at their place, picks up others supposed to be in the same truck or on the same jobs that day.
We got the EV, but didn't need to have any charging equipment as we already have a Ford EV lvl 2 charger.
Some things we learned along the month long use
as a use case for a business purpose that involves towing, get a hardwired 100 amp evse. The Silverado battery is huge, and you need big power to fill it in reasonable time, especially if you get variable electric rates.
we usually got ours back with anywhere from 10-35% charge remaining, and charged it back up to 90-92%. With a 215kWh total battery.
that's about 150kWh of charging every day. Even a hardwired 100amp circuit, which supplies max of 80 amp continuous needs about 8 hours to fill that up. This is why, I recommend getting a 100amp hardwired, 80amp max evse.
While the truck itself is exceptional for towing, itself being so heavy - our employees still like Ford's towing technology the best. According to them none of other manufacturers come close.
Performance. It was one of the best performing vehicles. Towing 8k pounds on inclines was effortless, you don't even know the truck is exerting any extra effort.
payload. The payload is definitely an issue. Payload rating of 1400lbs, of which 800-850 is already used up by tow weight, is measley especially compared to diesel, 6+L V8 or the 5.3L V8 the regular Silverados come with. Throw in the gear in the bed, and often times, the truck can't have two 200 lb men, because the driver alone is already 20lbs above the payload rating. Payload definitely needs to go above 1800lbs for this to be effective work truck. Some people are going to end up in crashes where they overload the truck due to its tiny payload and towing 9klbs+.
range is very good. With a tall 8k lb trailer, max speed of 60-65mph, we would get about 1mi/kwh, which isn't half bad. Compared to gas where mileage can be as low as 7-8mpg.
handling in snow and ice. Perfect. I suspect real reason is the weight. The truck felt planted on the road when driving, no fear while making turns and no worries about hydroplaning. All because of the weight.
Android Auto works better with the truck than Carplay.
Use case issues
- the truck needs to be parked at depot to be able to charge overnight, enough to last all day the next day. Employees would much rather prefer the current arrangement.
- payload. A few times, another truck had to pickup employees that were supposed to travel in the EV.
- it doesn't perform as well as the gas or diesel trucks - primarily due to being awd. It does really well on dirt roads, gravel etc. but muddy access roads or grass, and some other surfaces it kinda sucks.
While a very good truck, and with potential for savings, this wasn't the correct truck for us for the time being.