Verdict: The Jeep badge makes a welcome return to the office car park with the new Cherokee SUV
What’s hot?
> Love it or hate it, it’s impossible to ignore the bold new look of the Jeep Cherokee. It takes a while to get used to, but we’re growing to love the front-end, complete with Jeep’s iconic seven-slotted grille. Put it this way, you’re hardly going to mistake a Cherokee for a common or garden crossover.
> Jeep has worked hard to address issues of old to deliver a highly convincing interior. The quality of the materials used is a huge step up, especially in our Limited top trim test vehicles. The fit and finish is very good and the interior is thankfully free of squeaks and rattles.
> Whilst Jeep could have perhaps gone further to inject some of the brand’s essence on the inside, we like the ’SINCE 1941’ motif on the base of the steering wheel and the subtle Willys Jeep decal at the bottom the windscreen.
> This is a Jeep with a conscience. Opt for the most company car friendly Cherokee – the two-wheel drive 140hp model – and enjoy emissions of just 139g/km. Even the four-wheel drive 170hp Cherokee, with the nine-speed transmission, emits just 154g/km.
> And speaking of the nine-speed automatic, the Jeep Cherokee is the first mid-size SUV to offer such a transmission. It creates a smooth and relaxed driving experience that seems perfectly in keeping with the Cherokee’s image.
> The steering is nicely weighted and helps to make the Jeep Cherokee a surprisingly good car to drive once off the motorways and A-roads. Body roll is kept in check, with the SUV doing a great job of disguising its weight of up to 1.9 tonnes (depending on model).
> In truth, this is arguably the most well-behaved of all Jeeps built to-date. The ride is soft, but never wallowing. And company car drivers will love the commanding driving position and ‘get out of my way’ corporate face.
> The new Jeep Cherokee is a seriously well-equipped SUV. The top trim Limited model has everything you could wish for from a company car. It offers proper American game show levels of kit – the conveyor belt of goodies has the Europeans well and truly licked. Highlights include an excellent 7-inch TFT instrument cluster and 8.4-inch touchscreen infotainment system.
> As you’d expect, the Jeep Cherokee is as accomplished off-road as it is on it. Selec-Terrain allows drivers to choose between Auto, Snow, Sport or Mud/Snow modes and – on a light bit of off-roading, the Cherokee made a good, if slightly muddy first impression.
> In fact, the Jeep Cherokee feels like an authentic 4×4, and there’s a lot to be said for that. Later in the year, Jeep will also offer an Active Drive II package, which adds a two-speed low range gearbox option. This may or may not prove useful in the office car park.
> The Jeep Cherokee has achieved a five-star Euro NCAP safety rating and boasts brake stability control, hill start assist, electronic roll mitigation, trailer sway damping and multiple airbags.
What’s not?
> We’ve grown to love the front-end – at least it differentiates the Cherokee from the countless other SUV and crossover rivals. So why did Jeep make the rear-end so plain and generic? A missed opportunity.
> Whilst perfectly adequate, you wouldn’t call either of the 2.0-litre diesel engines rapid. Performance is more relaxed than scintillating. Of course, you could wait for the special order 3.2-litre V6, coming later in the year. But we can’t put forward much of a business case for this!
> The nine-speed automatic transmission, whilst delivering smooth changes, doesn’t offer razor-sharp shift times and does – in our book at least – take the edge of the extra power. It’s a shame the 170hp Cherokee isn’t offered with a manual gearbox.
> The Cherokee interior – whilst drastically improved – still can’t match the Europeans for overall quality. Small things like an ill-fitting central air vent surround facing the rear passengers, let the side down.
> There’s also a strange mis-match of coloured plastics, which becomes especially noticeable on the doors and central storage bin where they live alongside leather and the token wood grain inserts.
> The Nappa leather seats on the Limited models are wonderfully American. In other words, soft and sumptuous. But they offer little in the way of lateral support.
> Rear seat passengers will find no problems with the amount of knee- and leg-room in the back of the Cherokee, but taller occupants may have an issue with the amount of headroom.
> The 2.0-litre diesel engine isn’t the most refined of units and can sound coarse under load. This is especially true of the 140hp engine, which at 12 seconds, gives up 1.7 seconds to the 170hp Cherokee in the 0-62mph sprint.
> On one occasion, the Stop/Start system played up, delivering a ‘low battery’ warning message and failing to re-start. After a few minutes of trial and error, we eventually managed to get the Cherokee started again.
> We understand this happened to at least one other group on the launch. Jeep said that it was more than likely down to a software issue.
> Just 412 litres is a miserly amount of boot space for a car of this size, especially when you compare that to the Nissan Qashqai, which offers 430 litres. The high boot lip could make loading heavy items tricky, too.
> The aluminium gear knob on the manual Cherokee is needlessly massive and out of keeping with the rest of the interior. Seriously, it could give the Hugo Boss In Motion aftershave dispenser a run for its money…
