Look away now!…Jeep’s go-anywhere Wrangler features plug-in hybridisation
When the world’s most serious mud-plugger decides to get all wimpy with partial electrification of its butchest 4×4, Iain Robertson tries to avert his eyes and imagine that it is not happening but it is a ‘lost cause’, with fuel-sipping taking precedence.
We had a bully at school. He was surprisingly bright, yet could not resist throwing his weight around, stealing tuck shop money and being all rufty-tufty. He tried me on…once…by creeping up behind me in the locker area and bashing me with a large encyclopaedia. My nose bled and I saw red, punching him on the nose to return the compliment. Naturally, we were both summonsed to the school principal’s office, where I was admonished but his previous record spoke volumes and he was suspended.
To be ‘soft’ in an all-boys Scottish school was asking for trouble. There was no room for Little Lord Fauntleroys. I recognised it and had to keep mum about my passion for collecting porcelain. When asked in my third year, aged 13, about my career aspirations, I decided to pick a nice manly role in the medical profession, rather than that of a ‘Jessie’ in the media. Truth was, I had not the foggiest. I was 13! I managed deftly to avoid the girlie roles in the annual school play, or musical (although some of us were drawn to wearing dresses, most worryingly).
Throughout my life, whether accepting parental advice (“No crying! You’re a man!”), or knocking back pints in the pub with pals, while ogling totty most leeringly, my masculinity was always being measured. When it came to car ownership, while I would have been happiest razzing around La Croisette, in a drop-top, with a long-haired blonde alongside, my automotive chit-chat would follow more of a lumberjack’s route, forging new ground, driving through rivers and wearing a plaid shirt. I am two metres tall, after all…it was predetermined.
You can imagine my shame at the controls, limited though they were, of my first car, a Riley Kestrel, when all I wanted to drive was a Jeep CJ. My grandfather, a Highland gentleman farmer, had already given me the flavour by perching me on his knee, to let me ‘steer’, as he drove his Austin Gypsy over Rannoch Moor. When I first drove a Jeep, which was yet to called ‘Wrangler’ (a nice manly name!), I attempted to wrestle with its intransigent non-powered steering, its wilful lack of directional stability, bone-shattering suspension, ear-piercing racket and woeful lack of grunt during an on-road foray…but I was smitten.
Many years later, invited by Jeep to contest the much-vaunted Rubicon Trail in the Sierra Nevada above Lake Tahoe, I got my first ‘hoo-har’ off-road excursion like no other. Although I did not, the desire to tear off my shirt-sleeves, wield an axe and grow an unwieldy beard like the ‘privateers’ also committed to the world famous trek was strong. Instead, we were accompanied by ‘Jeepsters’, from Jeep’s PR team, who would guide us like kindergarten pupils over awkward/impossible terrain until we reached our high-class outdoor picnic area for a three-course luxury lunch. The 35ml trail was conducted at an average speed of 2mph, necessitating an overnight ‘glamp’, at which ‘Dr Hook & The Medicine Show’ were helicoptered in for our group entertainment, while we ate finest beefsteak heartily from the chuckwagon.
Okay. I was able to tough it out, when relating about the trail upon my return home but, truth was, apart from the dust, it was a luxury VIP trip and Jeep wranglers had probably removed the poison fangs from the rattlesnakes we encountered, while the black ants and grizzlies were possibly little more than nocturnal sound effects. Mind you, while bathing in a river at the overnighter, one of our party did find a leech clamped painfully to his big toe. None of this was truly as macho as I had anticipated. For what it is worth, the Jeeps performed faultlessly; at least they lived up to their alpha-male expectations.
Thus, you might imagine my disappointment to discover that Jeep has turned to the other side. The once-great, all-American dream off-roader has gone all ‘Nancy-boy’. The brand has buckled to the might of EVangelism. Okay. It is not the full BEV treatment but even part-electrification is a measure of compliance that has surely crept in, since the sometime US brand became engulfed first by the partnership with Fiat and now by ‘Stellantis’ (the immense, Sino-funded, multi-national that includes Vauxhall-Opel and PSA Group in its assembly).
When dipping into its potential 30mls of EV-alone range, at least its raucous, 32-inch mud terrain tyres drown out the potential silence and provide a sonorous guide to actual speed (which is seldom what the wavering needle suggests). Yet, you can imagine the embarrassment of unravelling the cable and limp-wristedly plugging the Wrangler into a public charger. I would deny it and rely on the 22mpg of its 272bhp 2.0-litre turbo-petrol motor. I would prefer a V8 but the punchy four-pot suffices.
Jeep designates its girlie version of the Wrangler with 4xe badging and blue highlights, a hue that many ladies of a certain age might be proud to colour their barnets. The disgrace is palpable. Apparently, it is possible to recharge the below rear seats battery pack in less than three hours, using a domestic wallbox, where it will not attract the wrong sort of attention and lead to graffiti insults being daubed where they are not wanted. Incidentally, the boot space remains the same as the non-hybrid version and, encased in aluminium, the poofy electrical gubbins is protected from the elements and still allows a wading depth of 76cm.
The combined petrol-electric potency is given as 380bhp, accompanied by a cool 470lbs ft of torque, which means that 0-60mph can be blitzed in around 6.0s, which is markedly quicker than expected. The 4xe also retains its ‘Trail-rated’ capabilities in all of its petrol, electric, or hybrid driving modes. Maybe creeping up on the wildlife might have its benefits after all…better than the school bully. In reality, hybridising the Wrangler is sure to be a boon, en-route to full electrification in a few years’ time. The true capabilities of the indomitable 4×4 have actually been enhanced, albeit at a starting price of around £45,000.
