Ranger EV Documents

PDF of 2001 Ranger EV shop manual

Ford response to my request for one of the lottery Ranger EVs.

Darell Dickey -

Thank you for your interest in the purchase on an EV Ranger, your request has been received and documented.

In the late 1990s, Ford Motor Company built about 1,500 Ranger compact pickup trucks powered by nickel metal hydride (NiMH) batteries. The NiMH vehicles got real world driving mileage of 65 to 85 miles on a single charge. The program was an experimental effort to gain knowledge about this particular form of alternative fuel transportation and vehicles were leased to consumers for a finite period of time, generally three years. Most of the vehicle leases have expired and there are less than 100 units still operating, mainly in California. Several lessees have expressed a desire to purchase the EV Rangers when their leases expire and in late January Ford Motor Company decided to sell the vehicles to those customers in question.

Ford Motor Company recognizes that customers are passionate about this product and is working on terms and conditions for customers to purchase available vehicles. Ford Motor Company takes issues of customer satisfaction very seriously. We look forward to working with present, past and future EV Ranger customers.

Thank You
Fran Pilotti
Ford Motor Company
Email: fpilotti@ford.com

(Note: I have never heard back and have purchased a Ranger from a friend who bought on in the lottery)

Why the Rangers finally sold to private parties:

Jumpstart Ford

PRESS RELEASE

BREAKING NEWS: Ford Agrees to Sell Electric Pickup Trucks

Abrupt U-Turn Comes After 7-Day Vigil
For Immediate Release: January 20, 2005

San Francisco – As a Sacramento ‘car-sit’ enters day seven, Ford Motor Company has committed to reverse its unpopular decision to repossess and destroy its last zero emission Ranger EVs. Ford’s abrupt u-turn follows a statewide public outcry that forced it to recant misleading misstatements about the legality, popularity and viability of EV technology.

In a conversation late this afternoon with Jumpstart Ford coalition partners Global Exchange and Rainforest Action Network, Niel Golightly, Ford’s director of sustainable business strategies, agreed that the auto giant would keep its original promise to sell the pollution-free pickup trucks to loyal lessees. Ranger EV drivers Dave and Heather Bernikoff-Raboy, Bill Korthof and their supporters intend to remain in vigil at the downtown Sacramento dealer until Ford formally follows through.

The EV community and Jumpstart Ford coalition will hold an EV parade this Saturday in Sacramento to call on Ford to revive its entire EV program and immediately implement existing technology to improve its longstanding last place EPA ranking and end its addiction to oil.

Ford fights progress

The Ranger EV controversy is the latest in Ford’s ongoing assault on federal and state efforts to improve emissions standards and implement fuel efficiency market incentives like California’s progressive new law allowing carpool lane access to hybrids that achieve at least 45 miles per gallon, a standard that not one Ford model meets. In late 2004, Ford supported the filing of a federal lawsuit to overturn California’s popular new vehicle emissions standards, the nation’s first-ever rules to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions linked to global warming and the most advanced automotive GHG reduction targets in the world.

America’s most oil addicted automaker

“Automaker Rankings 2004,” a recent report from the Union of Concerned Scientists, ranks Ford as having “the absolute worst heat-trapping gas emissions performance of all the Big Six automakers.” According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the overall average fuel efficiency of Ford's fleet today is 18.8 mpg, dead last among the major automakers for the fifth consecutive year. Since the oil crisis of the 1970s, Ford has ranked worst in overall fuel efficiency of all major automakers for 20 out of the last 30 years. From subcompacts to SUVs, Ford's current car and truck fleet gets fewer miles per gallon on average today than its Model-T did 80 years ago. Ford's widely touted 'eco-friendly' Rouge River plant features a water-preserving green roof, yet manufactures 280,000 gas-guzzling F-150s a year, each truck generating up to 100 tons of atmospheric carbon over its lifetime. Marketed as “the first American hybrid,” Ford's so-called 'no
compromise' Escape represents less than one half of one percent of its fleet and will have virtually no impact on its last place fuel efficiency ranking. On September 2, 2004, Niel Golightly, director of environmental strategies for Ford Motor Company, told USA Today, “Clearly, the entire industry could build nothing but zero emissions cars today if it wanted to.”

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