2006 OR 2007 RUBICON?

I think you will find that for now, most folks on this group will prefer the

2006 model. The 2007 is slightly longer and wider, with LOTS of modern upgrades. If that's what you are looking for, then the '07 might be right for you. The '07 should ride and handle better on the road. The '06 is quite a bit more "basic," even with all the options available. The '06 with it's narrower wheelbase will also maneuver through those "tight trails" better than the wider '07.

I have an '06 Rubi that I purchased last October and I love it so much, that if I was independently wealthy, I would buy another and store it for years and use it when this one "wears out." Of course "wearing out" is a relative term, since a well maintained I-6 Wrangler can go 100 - 200 or 300 thousand miles.

Also, the '06 model with it's I-6 engine should be a lot easier for a backyard mechanic to repair.

Just my two cents.

Tom

.............and nobody's mentioned cost. It sounds good to me but I'm betting it's going to be REAL expensive compared to the '06.

Not to mention the '07 weights more than the '06. The '07 weights in at

4,104 lbs. while the '06 is 3,832 lbs. The baseline Jeep weight difference is even more at 3,200 lbs. vs. 3,785 lbs. Heavier = worst off-road. Car companies have this larger and heavier is better mentality. Bigger car give them higher profit margin. Every car I see have been getting larger and heavier. The bigger better does not apply to offroad vehicle, and they obviously don't realize gas price has been going thru the roof.

Ben

Wow! I'll bet performance and/or gas mileage suck.

And I bet you it won't. The '06 Wranger is the only Jeep still using the I-6 engine. There is a reason for that. The tooling for the I-6 engine is almost 20 years old, and results in engine parts that need a considerable amount of hand filing, boring and cleanup in order to be usable. Each engine is, basically, hand-made, and is quite expensive to make. The '07 Wrangler, on the other hand, uses a standard Chrysler 3.8L minivan engine, made in a computerized factory at the rate of one every couple of minutes with considerably less hand labor involved per engine. The engines for the '07 Wranger will be considerably cheaper to make than the I-6 engine.

My guesstimate is that the pricing is basically going to be unchanged. While DC would *like* to increase the price of the Wrangler, the facts of the marketplace say they won't be able to do so. While there may be only one Jeep, the Nissan Xterra Offroad has almost as much capability as the '07 Wrangler, more interior space, and a much better engine, at roughly the same weight. Toyota is itself introducing an Xterra competitor next year that's going to also compete in the low-priced off-road marketplace (a marketplace that right now contains only Jeep and Nissan here in the USA, though other Japanese manufacturers have good little offroad 4x4's that they sell elsewhere). If you have competition, you simply can't raise the price unless you want to have lots of vehicles sitting on the lots.

Also worth mentioning is the engine situation. Due to the narrow width of the Wrangler, the 90 degree 3.7L Dodge truck engine used in other Jeeps won't fit in the engine bay. Thus the '07 Wrangler uses the 3.8L minivan engine, which is a narrower 60 degree V6. This engine works fine in Mom's minivan hauling around a soccer team, but is hardly "exciting" by any measure of the word. While the specs look great on paper, the reality when hauling around 4200 pounds of porkitude is going to suck. The I6 in the '06 Wrangler is no fireball but at least does have plenty of low-end grunt, which the '07's soccer mom V6 lacks (albeit the soccer mom V6 does have more power overall, just distributed higher in the RPM range). Add in the fact that the '06 weighs less than the 07, and...

-Elron

Err, we were comparing the new Xterra Offroad (the Nissan equivalent of a Rubicon, new for 2006) to an '07 Wrangler. I agree that it is not equal to a TJ in terms of its offroad capabilities, but it is still quite capable. I have seen the new Xterra go places I could swear that a machine with IFS couldn't go, albeit you are correct, that it is no match for an '06 TJ. For the majority of people, the Xterra Offroad has all the offroad capability they need -- it will, for example, capably handle any of the 4x4 roads in Death Valley National Park, including roads such as Lippincott which are marked for short wheelbase 4x4's only (i.e., CJ's, TJ's, or Zukes only).

You are correct that the 4,000 or 5,000 serious rock crawler hobbyists in America will never buy an Xterra. But those few thousand are not going to keep Jeep in business either.

Which XTerra, the old one or the new one? They are different machines. The old one was based on the Frontier chassis. The new one is based on the Titan chassis. The old one had a wheezy 3.1L V6 inherited from the Frontier. The new one has the much stronger 4.0L V6 from the Titan. About the only thing the same between them are styling cues.

In case you are wondering, here are the statistics for the '06 XTerra Offroad and the '07 Rubicon:

XTerra Offroad: overall length (inches): 178.7, overall width (inches): 72.8, overall height (inches): 74.9, ground clearance (inches): 9.5, wheelbase (inches): 106.3, front track (inches): 61.8, rear track (inches): 61.8 and curb to curb turning circle (feet): 37.3 Curb weight 4402

'07 Jeep: Length 152.8 (3881.1), Overall Width (without mirrors) 73.7 (1872.0) Overall Height, Hard top 72.3 (1836.4) Rubicon Wheelbase 95.4 (2423.2) Track, Front 61.9 (1572.3) Track, Rear 61.9

1572.3) Overhang, Front 26.7 (678.2) Overhang, Rear 30.6 (777.2) Weight 4104 lbs.

The two vehicles are roughly the same weight, width and height. The Jeep's primary advantage in offroad situations is its shorter length and shorter wheelbase (less chance to high-side, easier to maneuver) and the extra articulation available via solid axle up front vs. IFS. That will be advantageous in rock-crawling situations (along with that trick electrically-disconnectable sway bar up front!). If you don't intend to rock-crawl, it is difficult to think of anything the '07 Jeep will do that the '06 XTerra won't do. Handle rough eroded roads that will high-side most vehicles? Check. Handle boggy fishing and hunting roads? Check. Handle trips on rough Forest Service fire roads to take yourself and your backpacking gear to a trailhead? Check. The XTerra OR certainly isn't a do-everything offroader like the TJ, but what it does do offroad, it does well enough for all but a tiny fraction of people -- a tiny fraction who aren't enough to keep a car company in business all by themselves. Thus, from a marketing point of view, the XTerra and the TJ are in the same marketing class, which is why DC is not going to be able to raise the price of the TJ much beyond the XTerra's price and still retain enough sales to keep the TJ on the market.

So you're right, and you're wrong. The XTerra is not a TJ. But from a marketing point of view, it's close enough that Jeep can't raise the price of the TJ much above the XTerra's price point and still sell enough TJ's to justify selling them.

-Elron

---snippy---

---snippy---

Duh.

Earle

Good one, Bill. ;^)

Earle

Ron, I have wheeled Death Valley including the Lippincott Road and many

2wd minivans or Kias could do that road with little problem. When we (actually a group from this newsgroup) were on Lippicott Road a few years ago, we couldn't believe it was even marked 4wd. There's not much in Death Valley that is legal to wheel that even requires 4wd any more other than up in the Panamint Mountains. Check out my website that shows me standing next to the Lippicott Road and laughing while pointing at the sign recommending high clearance vehicles and 4wd.

Jerry

I have the same dilemma.

I LIKE the straight 6. It's bullet-proof. In fact, I have the 2.5L 4 cyl in my YJ with 162,000 miles on it and going strong. Plenty of grunt and decent mileage.

The thought of a mini-van, robot-built V6 is a little unnerving. Especially since Consumer Reports says there are reliability problems with that engine.

Another thing bothering me: The information on the 2006 Wrangler talks about Quadra-track being "available". Are they implying that the base model will be 2WD? In a Wrangler? That's heresy.

What are they doing to our Wrangler? Hands-off!

Dave

If feel like you got plenty of grunt on the 2.5L 4cyl, you'll love the V6.

Bwahahahaha. If everyone who drives a Jeep cares about what CR says about cars, we would all be driving Camrys and Accords.

Quadra trac is a full-time version of Jeep 4wd, but to my knowledge no Wrangler has ever had it, they all came with Command-Trac part time 4wd. '06 model is still the TJ, BTW.

After I bought my 96 Cherokee I looked it up in CR and for some reason the 96 was listed as worse then the 95 or the 97, and of course with no explanation as to why.

300,000 miles later I still haven't figured out what CR didn't like about the 96 (other than the don't like real cars or trucks).

Jeff DeWitt

Matt Macchiarolo wrote:

My favorite was of the reliability listings for one particular year (it might have been 96) the Cherokee had average or above average individual system ratings, with most being above average, none being below average, but they still gave it a worse than average overall reliability rating for that year.

Yeah, CR isn't biased. Ha.

I'd still like to know why the 96 had lower ratings then the surrounding years. It appears that 96 was a bit of a transition year, wasn't that the first year for air bags? It was also the first year for OBD II and I don't know what differences that would have made in reliability.

Jeff DeWitt

Matt Macchiarolo wrote:

The 95 had airbags. Suspect a '96 splashed mud on a CR editor who was crossing the street in the middle of the block.

Jeff DeWitt proclaimed:

Thanks would explane it

Jeff DeWitt