| Review Notes: Jeep Wrangler 4.0 liter, manual, 2000 Sport and 2003 Rubicon | |
| Personality | Updated version of the "real Jeep" - a happy anachronism |
| Quirks | Too many to list |
| Clearly Superior In | Off-road capabilities, fun, ease of door removal |
| Above Average In | Cachet, resale value |
| Needs Work In | Stereo, gas mileage, add a dead pedal |
| Scrape test | Passed easily |
| Review by | David Zatz |
The Jeep Wrangler stands alone. It is the only car in America you can buy with easily removable doors, a fold-down windshield, and a heritage going back to World War II. Incredibly, the years have left not only the look but also the character intact, despite a thorough, recent redesign and parts from the corporate bin.
The Wrangler is a better off-road vehicle than many rugged trucks costing twice as much, (including any Ford, which do have boundaries), but there are natural tradeoffs. You get to take off the roof and doors, but the cargo area is miniscule. You can go over rocks and boulders, or across desert sands, but the ride is very stiff on pavement. Acceleration is fine, but the engine is quite loud, and you really shouldn't take a fast turn. The wind noise is incredible, but the gas mileage is not; and there are no four door models (yet). And, though the Wrangler Sport starts at $18,000 (our test car Sport listed for $24,000, while the Rubicon came closer to a Grand Cherokee), there are no electric locks or windows, or even manual remote mirror controls.
Still, Chrysler was very wise to leave the Wrangler (formerly CJ) essentially as they found it; despite an extensive redesign, they did not destroy the character. They even restored the trademark round headlights. The main loss was the rather poor quality of the pre-1997 models; it's now possible to get a cheap Jeep that stays cheap over time. (The traditionally high resale value also helps).
The Jeep Wrangler remains one of the most fun vehicles you can buy. With the 4.0 liter straight-six engine, a basic design going back about 40 years but continually refined and modernized, it has surprising power, and lots of the low-end torque that is pretty much absent from most modern cars. The four-cylinder engine is strong enough to power the Wrangler with confidence, but the gas mileage savings is not very high; the limiting factors are most likely weight and wind resistance.
The top is one of the interesting features. As far as we can tell, there are three types of doors you can get with the Wrangler; we had the top of the line both times. You can buy an optional hard top, which we strongly suggest; it makes the Wrangler feel like a regular SUV, at least until you start moving, or notice that you can see the painted metal of the body in many places, as well as the padded roll bars. (One roll bar holds the speakers, which hang upside down). In the summer, you can take off the hard top with relative ease and put on the cloth top; the redesign made the cloth top easier to install and more durable.
