Ford Made Sure The F-150 Lightning Could Charge A Tesla

Ford’s Pro Power Onboard is one of the more innovative features to come off the brand’s most successful truck of late. We are, of course, talking about the Ford F-150 and its electric Ford F-150 Lightning sibling. The fully-electric truck’s batteries can be used to power just about anything. For that matter, they can also be used to charge just about anything. Including your average Tesla Model 3.

Posts on a Lightning owners forum show that Ford includes an adapter complete with instructions to charge a Tesla. Some saw this as Ford trying to throw shade at the Californian carmaker. CEO Jim Farley was quick to counter this. Per his Tweet, Ford is “not trolling. Just helpful.”

To be clear, the user that found this material says it was included with his Lightning. The box even says “Compatible with All Tesla Vehicles.” We find it strange that Ford would specifically include an adapter for Teslas, but digging a little deeper reveals a much more logical reason.

Most EVs sold in the US use a standardized charger (as they damn well should, let’s not do the iPhone charger thing again). That charging plug is called COMBO1. Even foreign-made vehicles like the Mercedes EQS use this. So does the Rivian R1T. Tesla is notably an odd one out, thanks largely to the brand’s Supercharger network. Tesla built the chargers and the plugs. Much like Apple built the phones and the charging cables.

So, it makes sense that Ford would include an adapter so that customers can use Pro Power Onboard to charge literally any EV (or object) its customers may encounter. We find Ford not guilty on one count of Shade Throwing.

The act of charging whatever EV you may find appears to be a simple one, per the included instructions. Owners connect a 30A adapter to their Lightning’s bed-mounted outlet, then they run that through a coupler and control box to the next car over, thereby saving whichever range-anxiety-addled human the customer is helping.

However, what we don’t know is how quickly said EV will then charge. Ford says all variants can put out up to 2.4kw, so in other words, not enough for much more than a drop in the EV battery bucket. But Lariat and Platinum models can crank out up to 9.6kw. Still, that isn’t much, but perhaps it’s enough to get your stranded comrade to the nearest Supercharger.