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The
Jeep Cheroke Overland is rated as a great luxury off-road
experience.
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The
latest offering in the long line of 4WDs from Jeep is clearly not
a vehicle that everyone can rush out and buy.
At around $80,000 on the road, it is an impressive vehicle with
all the latest bells and whistles that seem to be inundating what
used to be a very conservative market.
The Jeep Grand Cherokee Overland certainly has some electronic gadgetry.
As a top of the range vehicle, leather seats, climate control (dual)
and electric windows and mirrors were expected and Jeep did not
disappoint.
The heating of the seats on a cold morning was certainly appreciated.
The “easy exit” rearward slide of the driver’s seat
when you remove the ignition key also made it easy to extract a
large frame from behind the wheel.
In a tight situation, the ability to fold the wing mirrors with
a press of the button could be handy, but I think this may be used
more often in the garage than off-road.
The engine is a 4.7-litre high output V8.
Rated at 190 kilowatts at 5200 and 425 Newton metres at 3500, a
firm planting of the right foot on the accelerator resulted in “warp
speed” being engaged.
So if you’re a looking for something to tow a large boat or
caravan this vehicle certainly has the horses under the bonnet to
do so with ease.
Fuel is delivered through a sequential multi-port electronic fuel
injection through a five-speed, multi-range automatic transmission
with overdrive and electronically controlled lock-up torque converter.
It also has the now fairly standard items such as ABS (admittedly
a three-channel system with four-wheel active speed sensors and
EBD) and traction control (quadra-drive with Vari-Lok axles which
progressively and variably lock in response to wheel slippage).
But enough of the technical stuff and back to the bells and whistles.
As an owner of a Land Rover Discovery Series II TD5 with Active
Cornering Enhancement (ACE) and Self-Levelling Rear Suspension (SLRS),
I am clearly on the side of using technology to make life easy.
But there are many members of the club who firmly believe that the
less you rely on technology, the less chance there is that you will
get stuck halfway up the Tanami Track if the electronics fail.
I like to believe that the various manufacturers have spent a lot
of money developing technology specifically for the rigours of off-road.
And yes, they can fail, but so can the most basic elements of your
vehicle such as tyres and suspension.
Perhaps it is more important to know the capabilities of both yourself
and your vehicle and not exceed those limits.
Within the ADF it is accepted practice that you are not allowed
to drive a vehicle until you have done a course on how to drive
it. My 4WD club driver familiarisation day in the bush allowed me
to see what the Jeep Grand Cherokee Overland could do.
On the day, we had some very experienced off-road drivers, sharing
their experience with people relatively new to the off-road scene
(some hadn’t yet driven their vehicle off the bitumen).
But enough of the responsible four-wheel-driving business, how was
the Jeep? The build quality and fit was excellent.
Jeep seem to have solved a problem that other manufacturers haven’t,
as there was not discernible dust entry to the cabin, but the roads
weren’t particularly dusty.
The auto gearbox was very good with smooth, yet tight, gear changes.
The on-road handling was surprisingly good. I had thought that after
being used to a vehicle with ACE, the body roll of a vehicle without
it would prove disconcerting. The Jeep Overland, however, had the
ride of a luxury sports car and it stuck to the road.
In terms of off-road capability, I was also pleasantly surprised.
Wheel articulation was very good and angle of approach and departure
were surprisingly good at 37 and 29 degrees respectively.
But I was a little worried that the air conditioning radiator was
under the front bumper, so if you did hit the ground hard you might
lose the air conditioning.
The engine power was simply incredible. But this also produced the
single biggest drawback for the vehicle.
The fuel tank holds 78 litres. Mild off-road driving produced fuel
usage of between 22 to 60 litres per 100kms (the onboard computers
tell you this at the press of a button). So, you won’t go too
far off-road before you need to top up the tank.
The overall assessment was that the Jeep Grand Cherokee Overland
was a luxury 4WD in the class of the BMW X5, etc, for much less
money. It is a very capable off-road vehicle that is hampered by
its lack of fuel-carrying capacity.
But for those who can afford premium unleaded fuel and who are looking
for a stylish and quick way to get around town, it’s definitely
worth a look.
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