I don't mean for this to be a jee p bashing thread especially since many of my wheelin friends are je epers but I just want to share an experience I had.  I have been wheelin our 97 Tracker for about 6 years.  We spend a month each summer wheeling out west plus some here in the east.  This summer we were in Moab and Silverton CO and had a blast.  We often wheel with je eps and other offroad vehicles.  I started to wonder if I should get a je ep since 90% of rigs out there were je eps or spend more money on improving our Tracker. The do very well on the trails but then again we are wheeling where they are too. Well the other day we stopped at a car lot and got a chance to drive a je ep Rubicon. We both drove it and basically came to the same conclusions. Now we only drove it on the road but we were very disappointed in it. The first thing we did not like is the poor visibility. Tiny windshield, long hood and short door windows felt like we were unable to see well in any direction and especially where you need to see when driving offroad.  I mentioned this to the dealer and he said that is why you take the doors off??  The second impression is it did not feel nearly as nimble as the Tracker since it was so heavy, longer and wider.  If was no bigger than the Tracker inside and the Tracker had more room behind the seats with a wider rear door. I did really like the low range crawler gears. So with the poorer gas mileage of the je ep , much heavier to tow behind the motorhome, poor visibility compared to Tracker, much more expensive to buy,repair, maintain we are going to pass on getting a je ep  and spend more on increasing the capability of our Tracker.  Oh boy here come the 5.83 gears and the lockers! lol

100% agree with you on the 0 visibility thing.
My girlfriends sister got an 05 Rubicon.  Its pretty cool that they come with lockers, gears, a peppy engine with a 6 speed.  As you said, they aren't very nimble, poor gas mileage, heavy, not cheap to maintain, and its got HUGE blind spots.

Its a cool idea that is poorly designed.

If only they had a Suzuki style rubi

Amilla

We used to wheel with an 04 and an 05 Rubicon.  Man I miss those days.  It was so much fun to outwheel a $25,000+ jeep with a $2500 Suzuki!!!!

so why don't you wheel with them any more?

He probably doesnt wheel with them cause the jeeps got pissed off that they spent more money to not go as far

I liked my old YJ when I had it, but I have become way to used to tossing my little SJ through the woods.  That being said, there are places where the extra weight and length of a TJ would be nice.  That and that big straight 6 does move it down the highway pretty well.    Different vehicles for different wheeling.

so why don't you wheel with them any more?

The '04 got traded in for a pickup truck and the '05 got traded in for a Honda Civic.  Neither of the drivers wheel any more. 

ahh my favorite topic. my family are jeepers my unc competes in werock and my cousin does also, my dad has a 01 tj with a teraflex long arm kit 6" i bought my sami for 400 bucks three years ago and with a few thousand bucks and lots of labor my dad cant follow me and i go pretty well anywhere my cous and unc go with over 25 thousand invested in their comp rigs, i love my little sami i use the same 5 gal fuel cel that my unc and cous have and they have to take extra fuel when we go trail riding i use the same tank three to four trips, it goes on and on depending on how far you want to take it my sami is not street legal at 80" wide and 98" wheelbase but its also not even near the mods that the comp rigs have, for very little money in comparison suzuki trumps all. i also belive stock verses stock suzuki trumps this goes for 2 and four door trackicks too

Hey,

I agree with what you guys have been saying.  I was looking at getting a newer set of wheels, keeping my 95 sunrunner of course, and the closest thing on the market right now was the 2008 2 door jeep wrangler.  I test drove one, went wheeling off road with one and my impression is, and not to bash Jeep lovers, but its not up to speed yet:

- Engine was weak do to the enormous 4300-4500 pound weight of the 2 door.  My stock 5-speed sunnrunner with the rear bench out feels like it has better acceleration, and can outrun the new wrangler at high speeds on the HWY.
- The mercedes benz sourced 6 speed manual is best suited to what it was designed for - thats sports cars, the automatic is good, but in this day and age, Jeep should be offering a 5 or 6 speed automatics to up the mileage/performance.  The stock 5 speed manual in the kick/track is much better, the gear ratios are better spaced as well.  Friends with the 6-speed manual jeep constantly skip gears when driving around town.
- The visibility although better than previous jeeps is still nothing compared to track/kick/sunrunner.
-On road driving is good on the wrangler, but I find the tracker/sidekick in stock form much easy to drive around town, with significantly less body lean in corners.
- Off road is good, but with a little money spent on your track/kick, you can keep up easily.  I had friends that wheeled with a ruby, and they said the stock 2008 ruby got hung up - ALOT compared to there slightly modified trackers.  These lads are driving kicks with 31 and 33 inch tires mind you.  Plus the smaller size of the track/kick gets you through much smaller/tighter/tougher off road situations(bush)
- Mileage.  My stock, 220,000km sunrunner gets between 27-30 MPG average(450-480 kms per tank - with 34 pounds in the 205s, and easy on the gas pedal).  My buddies stock 2008 jeep gets 15 mpg or close to 400kms per tank(I think its an 80 litre tank).

Again, not to bash the 2008 jeep wrangler, its superior to any pf the previous wranglers in my opinion, but I guess there isn't enough competition to push Jeep to spend the needed $  to perfect the rig.  People buy them regardless.

For those who have a sidekick, tracker, sunrunner - keep em, cause they are some of the best built little 4 wheel drive vehicles for the $ of all time.

C

AMEN.

Jeep Rubicons are great for people who don't have the time, knowledge, tools / whatever to build their own rig. It's one of the few vehicles you can buy from a dealer, and take into the Rubicon. And, yes, I've seen them go through the Rubicon.

That said, there's a small hand full of vehicles that can make it through for 1/4 the price IF you build it yourself. 1/2 the price if you have someone do the work for you.

As long as someone has a good attitude, and a decent rig, I don't care if they have more $$$ than time, and buy something off-the-shelf. That said... I still get some small satisfaction wheeling in circles around some of the bot-not-built rigs out there