Jeep Cherokee
Look at any mainstream range of cars and youll notice an ongoing theme. The adventurous models tend to be the ones at the fringes of the line up; the niche models that can be gambled with. The true bread and butter models are a whole lot more conservative because theyre not something the company can afford to get wrong. Exactly such a model is Jeeps Cherokee.
This model and its Grand Cherokee sibling are the cars that bring home the bacon for Jeep. The company can afford to experiment with cars like the Patriot, the Compass and, to a certain extent, the Commander, but the Cherokees have to be bang on target in terms of price and market.
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Its not the most refined powerplant in the world but it suits the rugged feel of the Cherokee very well and leaves you under no illusions that this is a vehicle thats not been designed purely to perambulate outside city centre shopping arcades. The live rear axle is also another reminder that the Cherokee is built extremely tough. While the ride on road isnt as composed as something like a Honda CR-V or even a Land Rover Freelander, the Jeep feels better able to withstand some abuse than both. A back to back off-road test with the Freelander would be very illuminating in this regard.
With decent ground clearance and a proper low range transfer box, Hill Descent Control with the automatic gearbox option and a revised Selec-Trac II four-wheel-drive system. The hill descent system is very interesting in the way it operates. A tilt switch detects whether the car is on a slope and HDC will only cut in if an incline is detected, preventing the frustrating lurching that many such systems generate as soon as you try to accelerate across a short flat section. If the car is pointing uphill, HDC will even operate in reverse.
"youll have little cause for complaint with the no-nonsense Cherokee."
The bluff front end with its square headlamps and the steroidal wheel arches are distinctly reminiscent of the Dodge Nitro and the similarity is not accidental, the two cars running on a common platform. The Cherokee is a degree bigger than its predecessor, with a wheelbase thats around 50mm longer and the wheels have been pushed wider by around 25mm front and rear. Its also lower by around 75mm but the load height of the luggage bay is higher by the same amount. Jeep compensates by extending the length of the cargo bay by 75mm.
Its still not that big for full-sized rear seat occupants but it makes use of its space more intelligently. Build quality can best be described as functional. The American domestic market doesnt seem to place too much store on materials quality and the Cherokee feels built down to a price. The plus side of this is that its very rugged and doesnt take much recourse to the manual to establish how the controls function.
The feel is a good deal more masculine than its rather rounded predecessor, a car that gained 60 per cent of its sales from women. This time round the target demographic is a little more hairy chested. The increasingly fiercely fought battleground that is the compact 4x4 market has fragmented in recent years. Whereas once it was fairly homogenous, now it has separated into the properly premium end with the BMW X3 and Audi Q5, the hefty and rather pricy contenders like the Land Rover Freelander, Honda CR-V and Toyota RAV4, a solid middle ground that includes the Nissan X Trail, Jeep Patriot, Chevrolet Captiva and CitroĆ«n C-Crosser, and then the true budget compacts like the Suzuki Grand Vitara and the Daihatsu Terios. The Cherokee most comfortably slots into the second group of cars, although it never feels as plush as any of them, despite being offered only in well-appointed Limited trim. Limited specification includes features such as leather seats and a leather-trimmed steering wheel and gear knob, big alloy wheels, stability control and air conditioning so for £24,595 youre getting a serious car with a decent level of equipment. Compare that to an equivalently trimmed Freelander and the Jeep weighs in at around £4,000 less which seems competitive given that the Freelander feels a more polished product.
If the Freelanders price tag renders it out of reach, the Cherokee is a very capable fall back option. Jeep has wisely chosen to ditch its usual policy of offering its wares with a massively unpopular and desperately thirsty petrol engine just so it can advertise the range with an attractive base price, instead sticking to the vastly more sensible diesel option. With a combined fuel economy figure of 32,8mpg, the Cherokee isnt as economical as a diesel Freelander but its a good deal more powerful so perhaps this shouldnt come as a huge surprise. Emissions are pegged at 228g/km which is no great shakes but its worth remembering that the Cherokee tips the scales at 1,980kg, so its a serious piece of automotive real estate.
Residual values of the old Cherokee were always fairly good, hovering at around 45 per cent and theres no reason to expect this model to be a great deal different. The Jeep Cherokee is a car that divides opinion. There will be those who take a pragmatic view and recognise that its one of the rare compact 4x4s that can really do the business off-road and does so at a very competitive price. Then there will be a contingent of potential buyers who wont buy American in the first instance and dont like the interior ambience anyway.
The question you need to ask yourself is whether you are buying the car for your own needs or whether youre buying it to project a perceived lifestyle to others. From a personal perspective, I refuse to be taken in by the perceived quality game; a tactic Volkswagen, most notably, has profited from down the years by expecting customers to pay well over the odds for a warm and fuzzy feeling. If you prefer to spend your money on the bits that really matter, youll have little cause for complaint with the no-nonsense Cherokee.
FACTS AT A GLANCE
CAR: Jeep Cherokee 2.8 CRD Limited
PRICE: £24,595 on the road
INSURANCE GROUP: 13 [est]
CO2 EMISSIONS: 228g/km
PERFORMANCE: Max Speed 110mph 0-60 12.9s [est]
FUEL CONSUMPTION: 32.8mpg (combined)
STANDARD SAFETY FEATURES: twin front and side airbags, ABS, ESP, HDC
WILL IT FIT IN YOUR GARAGE?: Length/Width/Height mm 4493/1840/1780
