The Ford F-150 Lightning has been a resounding success for civilian consumers with production for the next year or two virtually sold out with pre-orders. As the market will cool, Ford is ready to market it to government public safety agencies with the new Ford Pro F-150 Lightning SSV.
The all-electric special service vehicle offered to government agencies is primarily aimed at non pursuit use pursuit uses like special investigations, supervisor transport and other uses where cargo and towing capabilities are needed such as park rangers and water patrol where trailers are often towed.
In creating the F-150 Lightning SSV a combination of XL grade interior levels and special equipment have been packaged together to provide for the special needs of law enforcement in the way of equipment and flexibility for aftermarket upfitters.
The dash is reinforced to enable additional equipment to be mounted and comes standard with a 12-inch digital cluster and 12-inch landscape-style touchscreen on the center stack
The most notable interior change is the lack of a civilian center console, space given to upfitters to create a range of custom solutions for the myriad electronic and communications gear often needed for law enforcement duty.
Here a custom sheet metal console houses switch gear and radio equipment along with factory components like the shifter, cup holders and the like.
Front seating is a basic heavy-duty cloth with reduced bolstering to allow for easier ingress and egress on the daily. The front seats include steel intrusion plating to prevent rear passengers from injuring officers up front. Rear seating is vinyl and flooring heavy-duty rubber for easy cleaning.
Base models come with front and rear motors with AWD putting down 452 horsepower and 775 pound-feet of torque. It offers a healthy 7,700-pound towing capacity and 2,235 pounds of payload when paired with the smaller lighter standard-range battery.
Stepping all the way up in power and battery gets you 580 horsepower and 775 pound-feet of torque that can launch the SSV from 0-60 in less than 4 seconds. It can also tow 10,000-pounds with equipped with the larger extended-range battery. Payload would be a bit less.
Up front, the available Mega Power “frunk” gives has 14.1 cubic feet of lockable storage with a washout floor. Here, an upfit 220-amp DC-DC power source is shown but many other possibilities exist depending on a department’s needs.
The new 2023 Ford F-150 Lightning Pro Special Service Vehicle isn’t likely to become ubiquitous right away as it is mainly intended to be a support vehicle rather than one for pursuit and patrol. It will however offer municipalities with mandated migration to zero-emissions vehicles a way to meet their benchmarks.
Additional and detailed specifications for the 2023 F-150 Lightning including its certified driving range will come closer to its production start later this summer.
