ST. GEORGE, Utah — When I was a kid in West Virginia, my friends and I would play in a sandbox with Tonka trucks and Matchbox cars. Six decades later, not much has changed.
But the toys are better.
Bouncing through the red sand of Sand Hollow State Park in Utah, I floored the 470-horsepower V-8 in the 2024 Jeep Wrangler 392 Rubicon and the rear-end sluiced right, my passenger hanging on to the "Oh, crap!" bar on the front console for dear life. WAUUURRGGHHH! went the V-8. HAHAHAHA! went my media colleague. Jeep knows where our inner children live.
The off-road sandbox has become more crowded in the last few years as Americans have gone bonkers for SUVs, trucks and their performance counterparts. Chevrolet has introduced more ZR2 off-road trucks, GMC its AT4 brutes and Toyota its TRD models, but the marquee matchup — the toys all the cool kids want — are the Jeep Wrangler and Ford Bronco, which have locked horns in a death match that is better than Holyfield vs. Tyson. I'm pretty sure ears will be bitten off.
With the muscle-car segment shriveling between the approaching walls of low consumer demand and government emissions edicts, Wrangler vs. Bronco has replaced Camaro vs. Mustang as the new American toy war.
Ripping its shirt — er, doors — off just like Wrangler, the muscular upstart Bronco has revealed innovative class features like a rotary transfer-case dial, independent front suspension, dash-mounted controls and 37-inch all-terrain tires. It's awesome. King Jeep hasn't taken the competition lying down.
For 2024, the off-road world's pioneer has responded with an army of updated, high-tech assault Wranglers that would send shivers down a foreign army's spine.
From the two-door, $33,690, manual Sport to the athletic Willys, the posh Sahara, plug-in hybrid 4xe and my loaded $96K 392 Rubicon, the Wrangler lineup spans a luxury vehicle-like $65,000 price-spread that sweeps up customers from Moab marauders to green geeks.
Like muscle cars, Jeeps don't come cheap, especially as you load these bots with the latest off-road weaponry to conquer sand, mud, rocks, boulders, streams and — um — Utah obstacles like Hot Tub on Hell's Revenge (jeez, all we track guys gotta deal with is asphalt).
So allow me to recommend one of the more affordable mutts of the litter: the two-door Willys. My tester was $47K, but ditch the auto tranny and Safety Pack option — who needs blind-spot/park monitoring off-road? — and it's yours for under $40K.
Call 'em mutts because all Wranglers are mixed, retro/modern breeds. True to its name, my Willys tester traces its roots to the original Willys WWII Jeeps with two doors, stick shift, "Sarge" green military paint and drop-down front windshield. What, no machine gun in back? But my modern Willys would run circles around the ol' man with its armored underbody plating, locking rear differential and yuuuuge all-terrain 33-inch BF Goodrich KO2 tires.
Add a bullmastiff-like charcoal face (exclusive to Willys) and my mutt was cute as a puppy and as playful to boot. With the soft roof peeled back, we flopped around town, my cap blowing off somewhere along State Route 7. Willys looks tough with its outsized 33s, but its short, two-door configuration meant it was easy to park while still offering a healthy back seat for friends.
More mutt? Like every 2024 model beginning with the Sport and Sport S models below Willys, mine came equipped with a handsome horizontal dash housing a 12.3-inch Uconnect 5 touchscreen right out of a top-breed Wagoneer. Wranglers equipped with navigation get an "Adventure Guide" so you find long trails and navigate them with your screen. Man, these off-roaders are getting' fancy. Next, they'll have showers.
Along the north rim of Sand Hollow, I grunted across trails and scrub before coming upon a gaggle of ATVs plowing through sand to a rocky plateau.
Easy, Payne. Your knobby tires are still aired up to 40 PSI.
To go deeper into Mother Nature with more cargo room, air your 33s down to 20 PSI. Or get a four-door, four-wheel-drive Rubicon with twin-locking differentials and detachable front rollbar like my High Velocity White $60,350 tester (delete the WARN winch and steely bumpers and the sticker drops to $55K). With traction at all four corners, 11-inch ground clearance, and 44-degree approach angle, this beast can climb Devils Tower.
Shift into neutral, yank the T-case shifter back to four-wheel-low, detach the sway-bar on the lower console and you're ready to go. Bronco drivers will recoil at this antique dance, which the Ford has updated with a console dial and high-dash buttons. Wrangler prides itself on old-school controls — including its signature solid front axle. Want some ear biting? Get Wrangler and Bronco dudes to debate axles.
On our media test trip, Rubicons crawled all over the landscape at impossible angles (aided by forward-facing cameras). But where the trail ends and the asphalt begins, my Rubicon soft top is more civil than its forebear. Connected to the car by Bluetooth, I called Mrs. Payne 2,000 miles away in Michigan and she came through as clear as if she were sitting next to me. Credit laminated glass and interior insulation — plus a seven-microphone array — that's lowered interior noise by 15 decibels.
Will it work with the top down and doors off? No, silly. Neither is Wrangler as smooth on road as the independent-front-suspension Bronco.
Where Wrangler got smoother was in the $76,000 4xe plug-in model — which reaches out to green buyers who will find Jeep's growly, gas-fed V-6 immoral, yet still need a gas engine to get them to the remote havens of Utah or Michigan's Upper Peninsula. With 21 miles of battery range on tap, I drove silently around St. George — the electric motor even regenerating extra miles when the range hit zero.
The 4xe will also regenerate $7,500 of the 4xe's $10,000 premium back to your wallet if you lease the 4xe — no matter the price tag, no matter your income. Call it green for greenies.
I doubt 4xe and 392 owners will go to the same cocktail parties. But they may wind up at the same off-road parks like, say, the white sand of Silver Lake on Michigan's west side. Imagine a 392 — WAUUURRGGHHH! — slinging sand past a silent 4xe — SSSHHHHH!
That's my kind of sandbox.
2024 Jeep Wrangler
Vehicle type: Front-engine, ladder-frame chassis, four-wheel-drive four-passenger SUV
Price: $33,690 base, including $1,795 destination ($47,675 Willys, $60,350 Rubicon, $67,935 Rubicon X 4xe and $95,945 Rubicon 392 as tested)
Power plant: 3.6-liter V-6, 2.0-liter turbocharged inline-4 cylinder, 2.0-liter turbocharged plug-in hybrid with turbo-4 mated to 14 kWh battery and electric motor, 6.4-liter Hemi V-8
Power: 285 horsepower and 260 pound-feet of torque (V-6), 270 horsepower and 295 pund-feet of torque (turbo-4), 375 horsepower, 470 pound-feet of torque (hybrid), 470 horsepower and 470 pound-feet of torque (V-8)
Transmission: Six-speed manual or eight-speed automatic
Performance: 0-60 mph, 4.0 seconds (Rubicon 392, Car and Driver); 5,000-pound tow capacity (turbo-4 and V-6)
Weight: 4,044 pounds (Willys) and 5,268 (392) as tested
Fuel economy: EPA est. 20 mpg city/21 mpg highway/21 mpg combined (turbo-4 2-door); 13 mpg city/16 mpg highway/14 mpg combined (6.4L V-8); 49 MPGe, 20 combined (4xe); 3.6L V-6 NA
Report card
Highs: Broad lineup of drivetrains, body styles, features, tires; upgraded tech
Lows: T-case takes some muscle; gets pricey
Overall: 4 stars
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