Foreign ministers of the world listen up! There’s a clear connection between the Jeep Cherokee and US foreign policy. Seriously.
Cast your minds back to the original, boxy Cherokee — the one we first saw here in South Africa at the end of the Nineties. Well, it was designed during Ronnie Reagan’s Republican presidency — a time when the Cold War was pretty nippy and the Yanks figured themselves to be the guardians of all that was good and decent.
Clearly off the same production line that punched out US Marines, the Cherokee was as square-jawed as its camou’d compatriots. Raising its middle finger to the concept of aerodynamics, this was a no-nonsense, built-for-a-purpose veehickle that went where it wanted to go.
Fortunately there’s only so much of that nonsense that even the Americans can bear, and the world breathed a collective sigh of relief when Bill and his Democrats took over. US imperialism was put into reverse and, while Bill explored his feminine sidekicks, the Cherokee explored its feminine side, softening into the familiar mall cruiser that sold so well here in South Africa.
Enter George Dubyah and once again guess who was marching boldly around the globe telling everyone whut’s whut and dishing out slaps upside the head. Which brings us to the latest incarnation of the Jeep. It might’ve been born on the eve of Obama, but it was conceived during Dubyah Time and, as a result, the current Cherokee has once again girded its loins, butched up its britches, and squared up to the forces of mass destruction.
“Classic” Jeep is the way the marketers have spun it — which is basically another way of saying, “Shucks, we got it wrong last time. The Cherokee’s supposed to be a warrior, not a squaw.” Which really is a little unfair on the last car. It might’ve looked soft-ish, but it was a very capable off-road machine when not negotiating those tight little parking spaces in Sandton.
So much for nostalgia — more about the new car.
Mechanical stuff
I drove the CRD which, of course, is Jeepspeak for diesel — a four-cylinder 2,8-litre turbo unit good for 130kW and 410Nm of torque. Performance was fairly impressive if one made full use if its six-speed manual gearbox, though it isn’t the quietest tdi out there. German engineers would choke on their bratwursts if they heard this kind of noise coming off the Stuttgart, Munich or Ingolstadt production lines.
On tarmac the car’s handling is OK, though not as sharp as a normal soft-roader (if you can call them sharp). It does have a bit of a tall and wobbly feeling to it, but to be fair, the Cherokee does have more off-road abilities then the horde of Japanese softies.
On the rough stuff the new car is apparently as capable as it’s highly capable predecessor. I say “apparently” because I never took it on anything beyond gravel — I’m not really an off-road kinda guy and my rock-climbing driving skills reflect that fairly accurately. Still, Jeep claim their new Selec-Trac II 4wd system with its “on-demand” four-wheel drive system to be the real deal … and judging by the reports written by all those other 4wd specialists our there, there’s every reason to believe them.
Apart from its 4wd Auto mode that automatically distributes to tyres beginning to slip, the 4wd Lo mode and 2wd High modes mean you can toggle between pukka off-road stuff and highway cruising. Having said that, its ground clearance isn’t fantastic — 189mm up front and 196mm at the rear on standard 235/65 tyres — which is probably Detroit acknowledging that this car ain’t gonna spend too much time on the trail.
Looks
I’ll say it straight — I preferred the old one. It’s not so much the chiselled corners — I’m a fan of that 80s/90s boxy version — it’s the grill. Those headlights are a shocker. They look like a big pair of bi-foculs. Imagine Arnold Schwarzenegger wearing spectacles with bottle-end lenses. Doesn’t really work does it? Pity — the rest of the car hangs together well. It’s suitably muscular without going all Hummer and it really does represent the essence of the current Jeep design language.
The interior, too, is OK, if a little flawed. Or perhaps “a little American” is a better way of putting it. The Yanks are still a couple of administrations behind the rest of the world when it comes to car interiors. It’s all very flat and upright with plenty of plastic going on — never a plus point when the test car’s interior colour scheme is grey — On the upside there’s plenty of storage space and pretty good rear passenger legroom. You’ll also be happy to know that Jeep have finally put the spare wheel underneath the car (as opposed to inside the luggage space or bolted onto the rear door as they been in past models), which means you have 420-litres to fill with assorted consumer goods.
If you’re in an optional-extra frame of mind, two notables to improve your journey would be the MyGIG infotainment system — basically a nav, entertainment and communication system all rolled into one. It features a 6,5-inch screen and a 20-gig hard rive giving you space for 1 600-ish songs. And yup, it will talk to your ipod. Though at R13 900, that’s a fairly pricey conversation.
The second notable is the Sky-Slider retractable roof. Basically it’s a sunroof that’s been supersized and can be retracted from the front or the back. From what I gather from the TV commercial, it’s all about letting the outside inside your Jeep. A good idea in backwoods of Wisconsin. A bad idea on the main roads of Gauteng.
Concluding observation —
Not quite a soft-roader and not quite a rock-hopping off-roader. Compromise? Nah, not really. It’s just another option on the ever-expanding smorgasbord that is today’s 4×4 niche. So ja, while my own aesthetics might require it to lose the glasses and jack up the interior, it’s a good car — at least as good as it’s predecessor. And we South Africans certainly loved that one.
Jeep Cherokee range
Cherokee Sport 2,8 CRD A5 — R379 900
Cherokee Sport 2,8 CRD M6 — R369 900
Cherokee Sport 3,7 A6 — R329 900
Cherokee Ltd 2,8 CRD A5 —R414 900
Cherokee Ltd 2,8 CRD M6 —R404 900
Cherokee Ltd 3,7 A6 — R364 900
Engines
2,8-litre turbo-diesel, 4 cyl, 130kW, 410Nm/460Nm (man/auto)
3,7-litre, 6 cyl, 151kW, 314Nm
Performance (claimed)
2,8-litre turbo-diesel:
man: 0-100km/h in 11,5 sec
auto: 0-100km/h in 10,5 sec
3,7-litre:
0-100km/h in 10,7 sec
Fuel consumption (claimed combined cycle)
2,8-litre turbo-diesel:
man: 9,4 litre/100km
auto: 8,6 litre/100km
3.7,litre:
11,7 litre/100km
Transmission
2,8-litre: 6-speed man or 5-speed auto
3,7-litre: 4-speed auto
Safety
ABS with emergency brake assist
Multi-stage driver and front passenger airbags, supplemental side curtain airbags