2023 Jeep Grand Cherokee (inc. on/off-road and performance tests) review!

CarExpert

We tested the big Jeep Grand Cherokee L a while back and my advice was to give it a miss. Does it change this time around with the smaller version? Paul Maric gets behind the wheel of the 2023 Jeep Grand Cherokee Overland to see if it's any better.  Hardness tester, noise and lane keeping results: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/121Auf6HGvaBqRToYcuAz94alin7Sw55SpOPECBDlnKE  More Jeep content: https://www.carexpert.com.au/jeep More Jeep Grand Cherokee content: https://www.carexpert.com.au/jeep/grand-cherokee  Skip Ahead: Intro: 00:00 Exterior 01:04 Interior 04:26 Infotainment 06:09 Safety Tech 07:23 Practicality 08:01 On the Road 12:16 Performance 17:59 Off the Road 20:13 Verdict 28:18  We review every new car on the market, bust car myths, cover the latest car tech and answer your burning questions.  Whether you need new car advice, purchase validation or simply love learning more about new cars and technology, we are your car experts.  Subscribe to Car Expert: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7DvMhvy3H7ntEgn9n3xQcQ?sub_confirmation=1  You'll find us dropping new video content three times a week. If you'd like to ask a question about one of our videos, simply leave us a comment. If you'd like to give us any feedback on our content, feel free to email us, or alternatively, hit us up on social media.  Finally, we want this channel to grow with your support and feedback. If there's anything you don't like or would like to see us change, we'd love to hear from you!  Follow us on social media to see what we're up to and to ask any questions!  CarExpert: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CarExpertAus Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/CarExpertAus Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/carexpert.com.au  Paul Maric: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PaulMaric Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/PaulMaric Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/PaulMaric  #jeep #grandcherokee #review

Transcript

00:00 G'day, I'm Paul. So while the big daddy Grand Cherokee L has been on the sale in Australia

00:05 for a little while now, this hasn't been. It's the smaller version, the one that replaces

00:10 the Grand Cherokee we always had. And I'm just curious to see what this is like, because

00:16 the Grand Cherokee L that we tested previously, I wasn't a huge fan of. The engine didn't

00:19 really work well, it was a bit expensive, wasn't built well. So let's see if this one

00:23 is any better.

00:24 This is the top spec Overland version. This competes with things like the Santa Fe, high

00:31 spec versions of the Santa Fe, high spec versions of the Sorento, and also stuff like the XC90

00:36 as well when you look at the price bracket. This is just under $100,000 here for the top

00:41 spec, but if that is too expensive, the entire range kicks off at a little under $80,000.

00:44 Today we're going to do a detailed review of this car, including some off-road driving

00:49 as well. So if you do want to skip ahead to other parts of this video, you can use the

00:52 time codes on the screen, or if you're on YouTube, you can scroll down and use the chapters

00:56 below. If you haven't done so already, subscribe to our channel and press the bell icon. That

01:00 way you'll find out every single time we drive a very red SUV.

01:05 So let's talk exterior design. You've got eight colours to pick from. All but white

01:09 is going to set you back just under $2,000. Paint must be expensive in the States. I don't

01:15 know, that seems like a lot of money. In terms of the design, I actually really like the

01:18 way this looks. I don't know, the last Grand Cherokee didn't look bad by any means, but

01:22 this really has quite a resolved design. It looks just different enough to justify an

01:27 upgrade. So down the front here, you've got that trademark seven pillar grille that you

01:33 see on a whole stack of Jeep products. Jeep badge up the top there. Camera here with a

01:38 little washer built into there as well, just in case it does get dirty when you are off-roading.

01:42 Radar sensor just under there, and then a bit of chrome around the edges there as well.

01:47 Look how big this number plate cover is. I think that must be for those larger American

01:52 style plates. Over here, full LED headlights with LED fog lights and LED daytime running

01:58 lights as well. Whip around to the side with me.

02:01 OK, so down here, this is an interesting setup because this actually has an optional off-road

02:07 pack and this car is fitted with that off-road pack. So it comes with 18-inch alloy wheels

02:11 with all-terrain tyres, and I can hear it working there as well. Air suspension too.

02:16 So the air suspension allows this to get extra lift so that you can clear obstacles. So it'll

02:21 go up to just under 280 mm, which is pretty impressive. It also means that it increases

02:26 the weighting depth as well, and I'll run through that when we do go off-road. But the

02:29 fact that you can actually get this with all-terrains is pretty cool. It means that, you know, Jeep

02:33 is standing by this product as an off-road vehicle because the last Grand Cherokee was

02:37 pretty capable off-road. So I think that's a really good thing to see.

02:41 In addition to the all-terrains, you also get protection underbody and an electronic

02:46 limited-slip differential as well. And the top-spec Overland already comes with a two-speed

02:50 transfer case too. Wheel arch cladding there, trail-rated badge up here. This isn't a

02:55 Trailhawk, but it does have a trail-rated badge. My understanding is the Trailhawk will

02:59 be limited to the 4XE version, which is the plug-in hybrid. So yeah, for some reason.

03:05 Grand Cherokee down the side here. You also have these sidesteps made of plastic, so I

03:11 don't know how long they're going to last before you whack something on those. I've

03:14 called out before in our dual-cab ute reviews, a lot of dual-cab utes come with plastic sidesteps

03:18 as well. Just looks cheap to me and, I don't know, just doesn't feel very durable if you

03:23 do actually go off-roading. Piano black on the wing mirror, a bit of chrome built into

03:27 there as well. Camera on the side indicator and also a puddle lamp under there as well.

03:32 Bit more chrome around the edges here. Roof rail too. And I am pleased to report here

03:37 that the build quality on this car is significantly better than the Grand Cherokee L that we tested

03:41 a while back that had mismatched panels and was just a bit of a dog's breakfast. So, come

03:47 around to the back with me. So, Jeep badge here, bit of piano black trimming there. Overland

03:51 for the spec of this vehicle and then 4x4 as well.

03:55 Now let's talk towing. Bizarrely, they've gone from 3.5 tonne brake towing capacity

04:00 in the previous generation Grand Cherokee to like 2,800 and some random number, kilograms

04:05 of towing capacity here. So, taking a backwards step which I don't really understand, but

04:10 well, because it is what it is. Dual exhaust outlets there and they're real as well. I

04:14 can actually see exhaust pipes there. So, let me know what you reckon about the design

04:18 in the comments section below. Do you think it looks good or do you think they could have

04:22 done something a little different here? I'm a fan of it, but I am keen to see what you

04:26 think.

04:27 OK, so we are inside the Grand Cherokee. We'll start off with the key. So, there it is. You've

04:32 got unlock, lock, remote start and boot. On the back there you've got Jeep and it's quite

04:40 a nice sort of key. It's got a cold sort of finish to the edge there. So, yeah, nice.

04:45 Proximity sensing keys, you can leave that in your pocket and then once you're ready

04:48 to go, you have a push button to start up here.

04:50 In terms of the presentation, I think this all actually looks quite nice. This is quite

04:54 a dark interior, but I think they've done well here in terms of making it look and feel

04:59 premium. So, you've got soft touch finishes along the dashboard there with that exposed

05:03 stitching. You've got this sort of wood grain along the dash and also the doors. It does

05:07 get a little scratchy as you work your way down, but it's not the end of the world. There

05:11 is a lot of piano black here and this car is 1500 kilometres old and it's already showing

05:16 signs of what looks like permanent scratching there as this sort of goes in and out. So,

05:22 yeah, I don't know why they insist on using piano black, but that will become an issue

05:26 over time I think.

05:27 Outside of that, your touch points, it's nice and soft, soft on the door as well. How soft

05:32 are they? We've got our durometer, we've tested the main surfaces in this cabin. If you want

05:36 to see how this car compares to others that we've tested before, have a look at the link

05:40 in the description below. Yeah, build quality. A little bit wonky there. It's actually a

05:48 little bit loose in the centre section there. The rest of that feels okay. This is what

05:52 the door sounds like with incessant beeping as well. It's got something loose on the door

06:02 there. When you close it, you can hear it sort of catching something. Yeah, not sure

06:08 what that is.

06:10 Let's chat infotainment. So, you have a 10.1 inch infotainment screen with Jeep's Uconnect

06:15 system. This is actually a really good infotainment system. It's nice and quick, very easy to

06:19 use, high resolution screen. Yeah, there really are very few complaints with this. It comes

06:26 with AM, FM and DAB digital radio. You can then play your phone through here if you want

06:33 to and that's all plumbed through a nine speaker Alpine branded sound system. You have smartphone

06:39 mirroring in the form of Apple CarPlay and Android Auto. I'll show you what that looks

06:43 like. There you go, nice wireless full screen integration, very nice and quick as well.

06:50 And this is Android Auto. So, this is wireless too. Nice big screen integration there as

06:55 well which is great. So, yeah, big fan of this and you've got a stack of other apps

06:59 to play with as well. Look at that, it's just really impressive how quick this is. I think

07:04 Ford could learn something from Jeep when it comes to infotainment systems.

07:08 Then ahead of the driver, you have another digital display that gives you your critical

07:12 information. There is some configurability there but not really a huge amount. You can

07:17 go through the centre screen there though and there is a stack of different options

07:20 to choose from in terms of what you want displayed ahead of the driver.

07:24 Now safety, you have autonomous emergency braking with pedestrian and cyclist detection.

07:28 You have a digital rear view mirror if you want to use that or you can just use your

07:32 normal one with auto dimming. You have blind spot monitoring built into the wing mirror.

07:36 You have radar cruise control. You have front and rear parking sensors, rear cross traffic

07:41 alert and a 360 camera. I'll show you what the camera looks like. So, I'll pull down

07:45 from the top here. Wow, quality, that is fantastic. That is so high resolution. You can clearly

07:51 see what's going on there on the suitcase and then do a wide angle view, do the front

07:56 as well. That is a really nice setup, very impressed with that. Good job Jeep.

08:01 OK, let's talk practicality and we'll start off with your connectivity. So, down here

08:05 you've got two USB A ports, two USB C ports, an auxiliary outlet. There's also where your

08:11 integrated brake controller is. There's a wireless phone charger down there so you can

08:15 pop your phone on there if you do want to charge it. Alternatively, you can wake your

08:18 phone kind of anywhere. There's a stack of storage around here. Coffee cups, so let's

08:23 have a look. It's OK actually, it sort of won't de-lid your small coffee so you're OK

08:29 on that front. A bottle can fit in there without any dramas. You've got some rubber teeth in

08:33 there to hold it in place. And then what about the door? A big bottle. No big though, big

08:40 bottle does not fit unfortunately. Other storage, so centre console here. You've got a top tier

08:46 and you have a bottom tier as well. It's nice and deep. You have a glove box down here that's

08:51 reasonably sized and a sunglasses holder up the top. Now, what about your comfort features?

08:56 So you have dual zone automatic climate control for the front row. You have heated and cooled

09:01 seats, a heated steering wheel. You have electric seat adjustment for the driver and front passengers.

09:06 You can go forwards and backwards. Your backrest can go forwards and backwards. You can lift

09:10 the front of the seat, you can lift the back of the seat. You have adjustment for the lower

09:14 section of the seat. You can also adjust the amount of bolster you have through the side

09:19 there. There's memory for both the driver and front passenger and a massage function

09:23 as well. The seats are perforated for the cooling to come through. They're also quite

09:28 comfy to sit in as well. So if you're going to be doing long distance driving, they do

09:32 sort of hug you in quite nicely. Steering offers both tilts and reach adjustment. It

09:36 is electric and on our reach test, although this stuff is easy to reach while you're driving.

09:41 Okay, second row of the Grand Cherokee. Let's see what it's like back here. So look, knee

09:46 room is actually pretty good. Toe room is fine. Headroom isn't too bad, especially given

09:51 you've got that big panoramic roof there. Mat pockets with a little hook as well. So

09:55 you've got air vents down here, air vents here in the doors as well. You have a third

09:59 and fourth zone of climate control. This car has an optional sort of luxury package that

10:05 adds cooling for your two outboard seats, which I reckon is pretty cool. They also come

10:11 with heating for them as well. Two USB-A ports, two USB-C ports and you also have an actual

10:19 power outlet here. So that's a 230 volt, 150 watt power outlet. So not too bad.

10:24 Yeah, now in terms of other creature comforts, you've got centre armrest here with two cup

10:28 holders. You can pop your bottle in there if you need to. You've got teeth to hold everything

10:32 in place. You've got a slot for a bottle inside the door as well. That optional luxury pack

10:39 also brings with it these window shades, manual window shades, which is a good thing if you

10:45 do have kids. ISOFIX, you have two ISOFIX points on the two outboard seats and three

10:49 top tether points as well. Now our window test, it's auto up and down. Let's see if

10:54 it goes all the way down. Boom. Very nice job, G.

10:57 Okay, let's talk cargo capacity. Crack this open. So the figures are a bit funny because

11:06 we've had to use the US numbers here, so I don't know how they relate to the numbers

11:10 we typically use in Australia. But because this doesn't have a third row, you're looking

11:13 at just over a thousand litres of cargo capacity. Beneath the cargo floor here, a bit of an

11:18 odd arrangement. You've got what isn't really a space saver, but kind of is. It's a 245

11:23 wide tyre that is speed limited. It makes me wonder why they didn't just put the normal

11:28 tyre in here or just a space saver. So a bit of an odd choice there, but you do have a

11:32 little bit of storage there if you do need it. You also have a 12 volt outlet off to

11:36 the side there. You can also hook in a cargo blind if you need to. I'll show you what it

11:39 looks like with our bags in there. So a little bag and a big bag. So the space is actually

11:46 not too bad. Get this out. You can expand the space if you do want to by dropping the

11:52 second row and I'll show you what that looks like when that is down. And that side as well.

11:57 And that expands the space to just over 2000 litres with a slight elevation there to the

12:03 top of the load floor. Okay, we've just hit the road in the Grand Cherokee. So let's kick

12:10 off with the engine. It is a naturally aspirated 3.6 litre V6 petrol engine. Makes a little

12:17 over 200 kilowatts of power and just under 350 newton metres of torque. And it's all

12:23 mated to an eight speed torque converter automatic transmission. Look, I don't know, I've complained

12:28 about this before with the Jeep Grand Cherokee L. I don't understand how they've gone from

12:32 a diesel that tows three and a half tonnes to a naturally aspirated petrol that makes

12:37 under 350 newton metres of torque. So hopefully there is something significantly better coming

12:42 in the future because that is what I would be holding out for if you do need to tow and

12:47 do litany of other things as well because this will typically use a fair bit of fuel

12:52 and it won't be all that great at towing either given how picky it is. So it's just something

12:57 worth keeping in mind. But if you're not towing and you're going to be using this as a family

13:00 truckster and you don't really care about all that stuff, let's give it a little poke

13:03 here and see what all this feels like. Yeah, look, it is pretty leisurely. It actually

13:10 sounds good. I don't mind the sound. It sounds quite raspy and peaky. But yeah, it really

13:15 doesn't do a great deal until it's high in that torque band. Once it is high in that

13:19 torque band it sort of gets things moving along nicely which is pretty good.

13:24 Now, fuel economy, 9.9 litres per 100km is what Jeep claims. We are currently sitting

13:32 on an average of 14.3. I think it is worth just pointing out that that average is after

13:40 a lot of driving today so we had to do a lot of filming earlier in the day because of the

13:43 rain. So I don't know, I think the fuel economy would be better if we didn't have to do that

13:48 but prior to this it was a mix of highway and city driving and then obviously the driving

13:53 here around the proving ground so it would probably be sitting at around 12 litres per

13:56 100km if we didn't have to do any of that stuff. So yeah, look, it's okay but again,

14:01 not amazing. It is a naturally aspirated petrol V6.

14:03 A couple of things worth pointing out in terms of economy, it does get slightly better economy

14:08 due to a front axle disconnect. So what it can do is when it detects that you don't need

14:12 the front axle at all, it's able to basically disconnect it so it is only sending torque

14:16 to the rear axle. So that's obviously going to give you fuel economy benefits in the long

14:20 run.

14:24 Now let's talk about sine waves. So we've got our sine waves coming up here. We're going

14:28 to attack those at 130km/h. So the sine waves are just a really good indication of what

14:34 the body control on this vehicle is like when the speed picks up. You're going to be hitting

14:38 130 when you're doing things like overtaking. So let's see how this feels here. Alright.

14:46 It's actually really good. So beneath the skin here you've got air suspension with adaptive

14:51 damping and the air suspension can move between different heights using this selector here.

14:55 The adaptive damping is able to vary how much ride comfort you're going to pay the price

15:01 for depending on the mode that you're in. So when you do switch between some of these

15:04 modes, like there is a sport mode there, if we go to that, the ride does become instantly

15:09 firmer. So it sort of allows you to have that variability.

15:12 One thing I did notice though is the steering is overly heavy, even when it's not in sport

15:17 mode. So it is strange why they've dialled so much weight into that. It really could

15:20 be significantly lighter just when you aren't driving around normally.

15:23 Okay, it is time to hit our dodgy stretch of road. So this is a heavily rutted and corrugated

15:30 road with a condensed sine wave as well. We do this at 90km/h to give us an idea of what

15:37 the ride is like for some crappier sections of Australian roads. So far so good. Here

15:43 comes our condensed sine wave now. Let's see what it feels like across here.

15:48 Yeah, it's a little bit busy for the suspension, it doesn't know what to do. But for the most

15:53 part it's actually doing a great job soaking up all these bumps. This is really a terrible

15:58 road and you don't feel any of that behind the wheel here. It is a really good job there

16:03 on the ride tune and that air suspension is partly to thank for that.

16:08 Okay, let's go for a bit of a punt around our track. I'll pop this into sport mode.

16:12 I can see the gearbox has gone into a sport mode there as well. Okie dokie. Oh, I don't

16:19 love that brake pedal feel.

16:21 Okay, look there is a fair bit of body roll but once it tips over it kind of just holds

16:32 its position and then you can stay stuck into it. And like I said before the steering is

16:39 a bit too heavy and the brakes aren't fantastic either so you don't really get nice feel through

16:43 the pedal there.

16:44 It's sort of moving along okay for a naturally aspirated V6 that's holding us at the moment.

16:51 That's pretty good and we've got to remember as well this is on the all-terrains as well

16:56 so it's not exactly going to be the best tyre for sportier driving but it is sort of doing

17:01 a pretty commendable job.

17:06 Something like Everest in the all-terrains that's on, it tends to chew into a fair bit

17:11 of your traction whereas this is sort of holding on nicely. So yeah, look, not the end of the

17:15 world, not the world's best handling car but it does the job.

17:20 Okay let's talk cabin noise. So once you get stuck into the engine you do hear that a bit

17:26 but for the most part it's actually pretty quiet in here. The tyre noise isn't that bad

17:30 either for a set of all-terrains which is good. This is how it went when we put it up

17:33 against our calibrated sound meter. Those numbers aren't too bad at all.

17:38 Now what's your visibility like? It is a big SUV but I can see clearly down the front of

17:43 the car there. Seating position's quite high as well so that side of things is good. Decent

17:47 sized wing mirrors there too with a blind spot motor built in. Visibility out the back

17:51 is excellent too like that window's big and I've got the digital mirror if I need it as

17:55 well so pretty happy with all of that.

17:59 Okay time to do a little bit of performance testing as the sun blinds me here. Alright

18:07 so we're going to pop this into sport mode. So there is no official 0-100 time, I'm going

18:14 to kill stop start as well but we're going to go basically all the way through to 120

18:18 and then I'll measure 0-120, 80-120 and we'll come back for a break as well. So we'll load

18:23 up a bit of throttle and we'll see how we go. It takes off alright for a bit of throttle

18:31 and we'll see how we go. Just about to hit 120, there's 120 there, we'll get on the brakes.

18:42 Come to a stop, let's have a little look here at our time. So 0-100, 8.95 seconds so it's

18:51 clearly better than I thought it would be for a naturally aspirated V6. 80-120, 6.46

18:57 seconds so again not too bad, it's a pretty sort of peaky engine so it's sort of getting

19:01 up there, hitting its peak and then delivering the torque that you need. So alright let's

19:06 go back and do a break from 100 and see how long this takes to stop. Okay let's dial up

19:11 100 k's an hour and we will hit the anchors and see how we go. 100 just there. Brake pedal

19:24 feel is really not very good. So it took 3.19 seconds and 43.58 metres to stop from 100

19:35 so not an amazing stopping time and I think a lot of that comes down to the tyres. This

19:39 has the all-terrains on it and the all-terrains aren't exactly going to be your best tyre

19:44 for performance on a regular road. They are designed very much for off-road driving so

19:49 if you are doing a lot of family driving I'd stick with the standard tyre because it is

19:52 going to have a much better stopping distance. If you do want to see how the Jeep Grand Cherokee

19:55 compares to other cars that we have tested before, have a look at the link in the description

19:59 below and you can compare all of those numbers. Okay so, the one you have been waiting for,

20:03 how quickly will it go in reverse? So I've got reverse on. Wow that's wobble. 45 kilometres

20:13 an hour. Okay time to do a little bit of light off-roading. It's been heavily raining here

20:18 so the ground is very wet and not great so we'll see how this goes. But let's run through

20:24 just some of the specs. So because this has the off-road pack it also has a 230mm rear

20:28 axle so that in addition to the all-terrain tyres, the underbody protection should mean

20:33 that this actually gets somewhere. So it's got a wading depth of 610mm and our river

20:39 is basically at 600 on the dot so it'll be interesting to see how it goes when we try

20:43 and cross that. Approach angle of 30.1 degrees and a departure angle of 28.4 degrees. Your

20:49 ground clearance goes up to around 280mm when it is jacked up so I'm about to lift it all

20:55 the way up. In fact we'll go to the off-road setting and just see how that goes in terms

21:02 of clearance and then if we do need to go higher we will do that. There is two off-road

21:07 modes here so we'll see what happens. You do have drive modes here as well so you have

21:11 rock, sand and mud, snow, auto and sport. You also have a hill descent control, low

21:17 range and an electronic limited slip rear differential. So let's see how we go. I'm

21:22 going to leave this in auto for the moment and we'll go over our offset mogul first.

21:28 So we're going to get to a situation where we lift the rear driver's side wheel off the

21:32 ground and then once that's lifted I'm going to apply some throttle and see how we go in

21:38 terms of traction. So here we go, just wait for that to get lifted. There it is just there,

21:45 currently seesawing so we've got two wheels off the ground here. I'm going to roll onto

21:48 the throttle. There it goes. That is great. That just did a sensational job. So as I rolled

21:56 onto the throttle there it was able to use traction control and that limited slip differential

22:00 at the rear to basically stop that wheel from spinning, send the torque to the wheel that

22:04 had traction and then away we went. So really impressive that. Alright, let's do a U-turn

22:10 and head back over in the opposite direction.

22:13 Okay, so what we'll do now, I'm going to set this to sand/mud. That's going to adjust the

22:19 way traction control deals with this situation because it is a tiny bit muddy on the entrance

22:23 there. I felt the throttle there is much more sensitive too. So it'll be cool to see what

22:28 it does here. So we'll get it to a point now where we're seesawing once more and then I'm

22:33 going to apply some throttle. So it's about that point there. Again, we've got that front

22:38 wheel off the ground, rear wheel has limited traction. I'll just lean on the throttle.

22:46 That is effortless. Look, say what you will about elements of this car that I'm not loving,

22:52 but as an off-road vehicle, this is sensational. They've done such a good job with the calibration

22:56 there of those systems. That is seriously impressive. This is just light off-roading,

23:01 but that type of obstacle really does trip up a lot of cars that don't have very well

23:05 sorted traction control systems. So yeah, so far so good.

23:08 Okay, this is where things get a little bit tricky because we've got a very muddy hill

23:14 here and I'm going to slip this into low range. So hit full drive low. It says to shift to

23:22 neutral, so we'll do that. It's doing its shift now. There we go, that's active. Stability

23:28 control looks like it's switched off now as well. So we'll go up our muddy hill here and

23:33 see how that performs. And I'm going to come back again and come to a stop and try and

23:37 get up it and we'll see how that goes. So keep sort of equal amounts of throttle here

23:42 and see how it fares. It is walking up here. That is remarkable. So I think that does show

23:55 you that this is a really well honed system. So I just left it in the sand and mud mode

24:00 there but had it in low range and it just walked up there without any dramas. So that's

24:04 pretty awesome.

24:05 All right, I'll put our mud bog just here. We'll just chop through that. Now we've got

24:10 our descent. So I'm going to engage hill descent control here. That is now active. I'll also

24:17 put the camera on as well because I can't really see over the top there. So the quality

24:24 of that is sensational. I can clearly see what's going on there. So let's creep over

24:29 the edge and I'll roll out of the throttle and let the hill descent control do its work.

24:33 So there it is there.

24:36 Whoa, that just... I don't know what's going on there. That just went... it just slipped

24:42 totally sideways as we went down then came to a full stop as well. It actually dropped

24:47 down to one kilometer an hour. So yeah, I don't love that. I'll see if I can actually

24:51 adjust the speed of that hill descent control. It doesn't look like I can. Oh, there we go.

24:57 So using the paddle shifters, you can actually adjust that. I'll do that again just to see

25:01 how it goes there with a slightly higher speed because I didn't love the way it just kicked

25:05 us sideways there. I wasn't sort of expecting that to happen.

25:10 Okay, take two with our hill descent control. So that's active. I now know how to properly

25:14 use this. I can use the paddle shifters. So I'm going to set the speed to 5km/h there

25:19 as we creep over the hill here and let's see what it does now.

25:23 Yeah, so it is better. Yeah, I just didn't love the way that it just jammed the brakes

25:31 on and kicked us sideways. That was bloody heart stopping stuff. So yeah, good system

25:36 but just yeah, you need to just be aware of how it works, which I should have been.

25:40 Okay, so take two. This time what we're going to do is I'm going to bring it up to a stop

25:45 as we go up the hill and then try and resume just to see how well everything works.

25:51 So there's our stop. Oh, it is so muddy. All right, let's see what happens here. I don't

25:56 have huge confidence. Oh, that is unreal. Look at that. That is awesome. So the stability

26:07 control basically took care of everything there. So it was able to manage wheel slip

26:12 and just do everything for us. So that is a pretty unreal setup the way that works.

26:16 So yeah, pretty impressed with that. Nice one.

26:20 Okay, so let's have a little crack on our rock. So I'm going to put this into rock mode.

26:26 I think that will change. Oh, that's massively changed throttle feel as well. So it went

26:31 from being quite sensitive in that sand mode to not that sensitive here. So let's see how

26:37 it goes. I've left it in low range and I'm just going to ride the brake with the throttle

26:44 just to see how it feels. Actually quite comfortable in here. That suspension lift has helped massively.

26:53 It actually automatically raised to off-road too. So it's given us that extra clearance

26:58 but hasn't sort of made it really uncomfortable. It's not throwing us around heaps which is

27:02 what typically tends to happen when you go to a higher off-road setting. It actually

27:07 still feels really nice and controlled. So yeah, nice. Good job.

27:11 Okay, and last thing we're going to do is go through some water. So I'm going to put

27:17 this back to auto mode. I'll leave it in low range, keep it all in the highest off-road

27:24 setting. So like I said, yeah, it's just over 600 mil of wading depth here. All right, coming

27:31 into the water now. Okay, here we go. Yeah, nice. Cruising through here nicely. I think

27:44 if you were going to be doing any proper off-roading, you'll probably want to fit a snorkel to this

27:49 so you don't have any issues with water ingress. But it's sort of doing a pretty commendable

27:55 job of all this without many complaints at all. So there you go. This has been a bit

28:00 of a light off-roading session in the Jeep Grand Cherokee. It is really good. You just

28:06 press a couple of buttons here and it does all the work for you. It is quite an impressive

28:09 setup and I think they've done a really good job with making this idiot-proof.

28:19 So Jeep Grand Cherokee, what do I think? Look, I don't know, I'm a bit disappointed because

28:24 that engine just, it just doesn't work in a car like this. It's fine for a city runabout

28:29 but ultimately if you are going to be using this for towing and proper off-road driving,

28:34 a naturally aspirated petrol just doesn't make any sense. So I think once Jeep actually

28:38 gets a decent engine in this and gets it to Australia, that is when this car is going

28:42 to make a whole lot more sense. At 98 grand plus the options that this had fitted to it

28:46 as well, it is probably a little bit expensive too. So yeah, but look, if you put those things

28:50 to one side, there is plenty of room inside. It's smartly configured, the infotainment's

28:55 great, the ride's nice, it's nice and quiet. So most of the stuff is great, it just needs

28:59 those small things fixed to be able to just recommend this to jump into. So let me know

29:04 in the comments section below, what did you think of this if you test drive it? Did you

29:08 end up buying one? If you are a current Jeep Grand Cherokee owner or a previous generation

29:13 owner, what do you think of this? Are you disappointed that you can't do three and a

29:16 half tonne brake towing with it anymore? So let me know in the comments section below.

29:20 If you did enjoy this video, please make sure you like it and you share it with your mates.

29:23 And if you haven't done so already, subscribe to our channel and press the bell icon. But

29:27 until next time, drive safely.

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