US Postal Service electric trucks are finally here and drivers love them
After years of back and forth, USPS has finally put its new electric "NGDV" trucks into service, and drivers say they love the new trucks.
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"The BEV variant has an estimated range of 70 mi (110 km) and a computed consumption of 1.34 kW⋅h/mi (25.2 mpg‑e). Although using the air conditioner was not expected to affect the range, using the heater was expected to reduce range by up to half. Based on the typical distance driven, it was assumed that only 20% of the battery state of charge would be used each day for most NGDVs; analysis of USPS mail carrier routes demonstrated the all-electric variant's range could accommodate 95% of all routes."
have to go elsewhere for vehicle specs
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oshkosh_NGDV?wprov=sfla1
Is this not the car from Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs?
I’m actually shocked at the inefficiency of the electric powertrain tbh. An F-150 Lightning gets twice the distance per wh, a Model Y is quadruple. I’m not entirely sure if it’s just simply the size, but the lightning has a comparable gvwr. Just seems weird to me
So, I was curious and did some digging on the old LLV. Apparently it has a 13.5 gallon tank, and the vehicle is rated at 17mpg, but in actual use it gets more like 8-10mpg. So taking the worst case of 8, that's about 100 mile range, so the NGDV isn't really all that much worse. I'm guessing that's going to cover the majority of routes, with the few outliers being covered by the gas powered versions.
Maybe these people are actually reporting the real world mileage with AC turned on and constant stops to deliver mail, as opposed to Ford who is financially incentivized to exaggerate mileage in optimal conditions.
I wonder how they calculated the range. If it's representative of the real world drive cycle these will experience, the estimate might not be too far off. A postal route is constant low speed stop and go. Regen is much more effective at higher speeds, so they're probably dumping most of their kenetic energy to hear via friction brakes. Suspect their drive cycle is going to be something like an endless cycle of 25 kw acceleration, rest, 25 kw acceleration, rest, etc.
I bet it’s this exactly. Cars get more efficient metrics on highway vs city start and stop. If the vehicle ONLY starts and stops it must be terrible, even if these have regen brakes.
I mean how many miles a day are most routes? Why order bigger specs if you don't need them? I can't imagine most carriers go more than 20 mi a day. I am curious though, I'm sure someone's crunched the numbers on it.
