Jeep

Wrangler Wrap Up

Instead of just hosing the Rubicon off, I actually gave it a proper washing. I also cleaned off the the Weather Tech rubber mats along with vacuuming it out. Even though I am 6′ tall and have fairly long arms, I had to go inside the house to bring out the 2-Step Steel Folding Step Stool Ladder to get the roof clean. 🙂

If I have one complaint with my experience with Crazy Dave’s Rental Cars, it is, it would have been nice when renting to someone whose car had shut off inexplicably leaving him stranded on the side of the road twice in the last couple weeks that the vehicle he would now be driving had a stop/start system. The first time it happened was a heart fluttering moment. So, in spite of that little hiccup, I will be giving Crazy Dave’s a 5 star rating, because where else can you rent a new Jeep Wrangler Rubicon for 2 days with unlimited mileage for the cost of a half a tank of gas.

Stray observations in no particular order:

  1. It is a chore to drive on straight roads. There is a ton of play (compared to the Miata) in the steering wheel at top center making it a full time job. It does feel good in curves though with the wheel turned some, all the slack is gone.
  2. It is a half a foot wider and a foot longer than a Miata, but I quickly figured where my corners were and felt comfortable driving in traffic.
  3. It had the government mandated backup camera, but even with the hard top on the all around visibility was excellent.
  4. The way high seating position was really nice in certain spots, especially when leaving parking lots and entering streets. Other vehicles and street-side landscaping were much easier to see over.
  5. I don’t know specifically what our gas mileage was for the 100-125 miles we put on the Jeep, but the running average for it showed 19 MPG. This is only 2/3rds of the Miata’s 28 and only slightly over half of the Mini’s 36. The cost is somewhat offset by the fact that the Jeep uses regular grade gas compared the the Miata’s & Mini’s premium.
  6. The low beam headlights included in the LED Lighting Group Package nearly make the high beams redundant. In my few miles behind the wheel at night it didn’t seem like the highs gave you much more down the road visibility, the only thing it seemed to do was light up the trees.
  7. It was nice to have the satellite radio, so I could catch up with what was playing on The Coffee House channel compared to 8 years ago when we had it free for a year with the Purple Whale. While that channel is as close as I can get to Radio Paradise, it is definitely not worth the $15 a month they want for the service.

That’s enough for now, I’m sure I’m forgetting a few things, but our experience with our extended test drive hasn’t made us want to go right out and buy a Jeep, but neither has it totally dissuaded us from buying one either.

Not Crossing the Rubicon


When mulling Option #3 from Wednesday’s post I thought, hey wait a minute, I know someone who has one, I’ll ask him. So on my morning walk on Friday I walked over to his house. I got a quick Jeep primer and then a surprise; he offered to let me have his for a couple days. Never one to look a gift horse in the mouth, I said, “Mmmm, OK.”

First off, this jeep is practically brand new, with a mere 9300 miles on the odo, and still has that telltale scent. It is also optioned very nicely too. With the hardtop on, the A/C on, SiriusXM playing and ensconced in some comfy leather seats you are in a very modern vehicle. Definitely not your father’s Jeep. Make no mistake, this is a very large ride. When in traffic you look down on cars and see eye to eye with today’s 4-wheel drive 1/2 ton pickups. In spite of the size it can feel very car-like in its handling though, with its fairly short wheelbase and 4,000 lb weight it feels quite planted on everything except very sharp corners.

Donna and I have put it through the paces. We tooled around some county back roads listening to Channel 14, The Coffee House from outer space for hour or so. We did our weekly grocery shopping in it, in the afternoon. We took the front 2 panels of the hardtop off, rolled down the windows, opened the back window and went for an evening drive. Not Miata-like, but it did feel fairly open and was an enjoyable ride. Probably a lot more convertible-ish if we could have taken the whole top off…

Today we went over to Goodwill to get rid of some stuff that has been collecting dust in the attic for the last dozen years or more. Almost all of it would have fit in the Mini, but two trips would have been necessary. The Goodwill folks didn’t want all of it, so we just drove the Jeep to one of the local County Drop-Off sites. Tonight we are going to take another opened up evening drive.

Tomorrow morning I’ll hose off the dead bugs, vacuum the dust out of the back and fill up the tank before returning the Jeep back to Crazy Dave’s Car Rental. We did learn that the Jeep really isn’t for us, at least not this Jeep, it is too big and too refined. If we do ever get to Oregon, we might get one from a couple generations back (a later year TJ maybe) when they were a bit smaller, then we can use it to bomb around on Forrest Service roads and get out in nature.