If Wrangler and Gladiator are the same from the cab forward ......?

[Mr Miami]

1. The platform isn't engineered for a V8 w/o heavy re-engineering; the 392 Wrangler isn't a plug-n-play V6 to V8 swap either.
2. CAFE, crash testing, and other regulations to be satisfied at a heavy cost
3. Stellantis' idiotic EV-First direction from previous management that killed/delayed anything fun
4. The mandate from Jeep brand managers to engineers and designers about the look of the Gladiator and Wrangler must remain very, very similar hampered V8 integration.
5. Market size doesn't produce a viable break-even point

But if you have an extra $35k lying around and live in emission-free area, you can get it done in a couple months.

Excellent points. And I know there was the issue, as you mention, with "Jeep brand managers ...." hesitant about changing the look of the Gladiator and Wrangler.

In the next version of the Wrangler/Gladiator (due in '27, 28?), adding an inch or two in width and/or length to the Wrangler/Gladiator to more easily accommodate a V8 should not materially alter the look of the vehicles. After bastardizing the TJ the way they did (still glad I have my baby in the yard), I don't think an inch or two here and there is going to make one bit of difference in current "looks."

Come to think of it, and I'm sure this has been discussed here many times, it seems strange to me that in the mid-late '70's they could put the 304 V8 into the CJ7 (loved to drive my best friend's CJ7 in the Jersey swamps and Pine Barrens. Better than my new '76 Gladiator pickup with the 360 2 barrel). I guess the 304 was a smaller engine but then the CJ7 was also a much smaller vehicle.

Enough rambling and reminiscing about the past and what you could buy. It's a new day, a different time.

Sponsored

 

[Bandit’s Lair]

Can we go ahead and take this one off topic or do we need to carry on for about 50 or 60 pages first?

We need at least 48 pages to air our frustrations with having to pay an additional $30k+ for AMW to give us the engine we want.

 

[sharpsicle]

 

[MPMB]

 

[Janster]

Come to think of it, and I'm sure this has been discussed here many times, it seems strange to me that in the mid-late '70's they could put the 304 V8 into the CJ7 (loved to drive my best friend's CJ7 in the Jersey swamps and Pine Barrens. Better than my new '76 Gladiator pickup with the 360 2 barrel). I guess the 304 was a smaller engine but then the CJ7 was also a much smaller vehicle.

The CJ’s had plenty of room in the engine bay to fit just about anything (sarcasm)..

These modern vehicles, the engine bays are soooo stuffed full of everything including the kitchen sink. Just to change the engine requires a major overhaul and redesign just to get everything to fit!!!

 

[Zachanadandy]

1. The platform isn't engineered for a V8 w/o heavy re-engineering; the 392 Wrangler isn't a plug-n-play V6 to V8 swap either.
2. CAFE, crash testing, and other regulations to be satisfied at a heavy cost
3. Stellantis' idiotic EV-First direction from previous management that killed/delayed anything fun
4. The mandate from Jeep brand managers to engineers and designers about the look of the Gladiator and Wrangler must remain very, very similar hampered V8 integration.
5. Market size doesn't produce a viable break-even point

But if you have an extra $35k lying around and live in emission-free area, you can get it done in a couple months.

1. Not plug and play, but jeep does it in the wrangler with nothing more than a little frame reinforcement, amw, rubitrux, Bruiser conversions, and others all do it with 0 re-engineering?
2. Cafe is a non-issue under current administration and the wrangler 392 passes crash testing just fine with the same front end/ frame where it matters in the crash tests. Yes they'd have to crash test a few, but the bump in sales would easily pay for that.
3. Agreed
4. Copying the wrangler, which has gotten the 392 for years, hampered v8 integration?
5. They are planning to build 100k hemis this year, the market is there. Make it the same $3-5k 5.7L upgrade from the v6 that it was in the ram and they'd sell them as fast as they could build them.

The towing/ heat argument doesn't hold water in my opinion. AMW sells the demon 170 1000+hp swap and none of those owners are complaining about heat. The ecodiesel probably makes more heat than the 392. I'd bet they would at least match the EcoD tow rating with no cooling system changes. I'd bet they are too busy trying to keep up with the demand from all the other hemi re-releases is the hold up at this point.

 

[bleda2002]

1. Not plug and play, but jeep does it in the wrangler with nothing more than a little frame reinforcement, amw, rubitrux, Bruiser conversions, and others all do it with 0 re-engineering?
2. Cafe is a non-issue under current administration and the wrangler 392 passes crash testing just fine with the same front end/ frame where it matters in the crash tests. Yes they'd have to crash test a few, but the bump in sales would easily pay for that.
3. Agreed
4. Copying the wrangler, which has gotten the 392 for years, hampered v8 integration?
5. They are planning to build 100k hemis this year, the market is there. Make it the same $3-5k 5.7L upgrade from the v6 that it was in the ram and they'd sell them as fast as they could build them.

The towing/ heat argument doesn't hold water in my opinion. AMW sells the demon 170 1000+hp swap and none of those owners are complaining about heat. The ecodiesel probably makes more heat than the 392. I'd bet they would at least match the EcoD tow rating with no cooling system changes. I'd bet they are too busy trying to keep up with the demand from all the other hemi re-releases is the hold up at this point.

The demon and hellcat deletes the spare tire to run aux coolers where the spare tire is. They also are rated to tow absolutely nothing and have to pass no towing test, much less one up a dam at over 100 degrees ambient.

We can't even cool the diesel towing at relatively low loads and you expect the hemi to do better with out mad engineering that they didn't have to do on the wrangler?

Edit: also point out that they couldn't cool the 2.0 turbo and keep decent tow ratings so we didn't get that engine either

Here is the post from Northridge showing the extra cooling.

 

[Zachanadandy]

The demon and hellcat deletes the spare tire to run aux coolers where the spare tire is. They also are rated to tow absolutely nothing and have to pass no towing test, much less one up a dam at over 100 degrees ambient.

We can't even cool the diesel towing at relatively low loads and you expect the hemi to do better with out mad engineering that they didn't have to do on the wrangler?

The diesel by its design, operating pressures, and turbo puts way more load on the cooling system than an NA 5.7L or 6.4L v8 in my opinion and experience. The diesel passed that 100⁰ dam towing test. The few guys I've interacted with that have done the 5.7L or 6.4L swap say their Jeeps run cooler climbing steep grades than they did with the v6. I'd bet it would easily pass the dam test at 6k pounds which is all we got for the diesel, mojave, etc anyway. If you need to tow 7700lbs up steep grades in 100⁰ weather you should buy a full sized truck in my opinon. The way that Northridge post reads that's the intercooler cooling system, which obviously needs added with the forced induction.

 

[MPMB]

1. Not plug and play, but jeep does it in the wrangler with nothing more than a little frame reinforcement, amw, rubitrux, Bruiser conversions, and others all do it with 0 re-engineering?
2. Cafe is a non-issue under current administration and the wrangler 392 passes crash testing just fine with the same front end/ frame where it matters in the crash tests. Yes they'd have to crash test a few, but the bump in sales would easily pay for that.
3. Agreed
4. Copying the wrangler, which has gotten the 392 for years, hampered v8 integration?
5. They are planning to build 100k hemis this year, the market is there. Make it the same $3-5k 5.7L upgrade from the v6 that it was in the ram and they'd sell them as fast as they could build them.

The towing/ heat argument doesn't hold water in my opinion. AMW sells the demon 170 1000+hp swap and none of those owners are complaining about heat. The ecodiesel probably makes more heat than the 392. I'd bet they would at least match the EcoD tow rating with no cooling system changes. I'd bet they are too busy trying to keep up with the demand from all the other hemi re-releases is the hold up at this point.

I was keeping it brief because it's a dead horse to why it's taken so long. But, as per usual, you don't read the room and come in like Leroy Jenkins.

Everything is controlled from the corporate positioning of limiting costs.

1. Frame, motor mounts, exhaust routing, steering, wiring, etc. Yes, most of the heavy lifting has been done with the 392 Wrangler, yet things are still changing with the models (the new frontal crash brackets, for example). If it was an easy process, more people would be doing it.

2. CAFE is on-going and thinking only in terms of the current administration's policies is f**king short-sighted and 100% idiotic. Also, the Wrangler is not the Gladiator. Weight and dimensions and capacities will change it. Even a 5.7L option will add at least 150# to the Gladiator, which will probably push it into the Class 2a light truck category if that option became a reality.

3. This was from the original launch of the Gladiator when the design team said Jeep management said basically priority #1 - it had to look like a Wrangler, use parts of the Wrangler, and be a Wrangler with a bed.

4. From the very beginning, the Gladiator's full capability has been limited by the inability to effectively cool it (your big balls towing experience notwithstanding). It could not be engineered better without changing the truck to be different from the Wrangler, which Jeep was not willing to do because of the added cost. Yes, it would be "easy" to put in a bigger radiator/heat exchanger, bigger grille openings, and thinner bumper to allow more airflow for better cooling, but that violates Jeep's mandate of the Wrangler=Gladiator visual agreement and the requirement to limit price increases.

As far as the market goes...

Jeep sold 167,322 Wranglers in '25, an 11% increase over '24.
Jeep sold 56,790 Gladiators in '25, a 35% increase over '24, but still far away from the peak of 77,800+ in '22

While Jeep doesn't break out the numbers of individual numbers, doing smart research shows Jeep hasn't sold more than 4000/year of the 392. The production run for MY2025 - the Final Edition (which wasn't) was targeted at 3300. Over 5 years of production (so far), there have been roughly 13,000 392 Wranglers produced.

The Gladiator 392 might be produced at similar volumes - 2500-3000/year. At an MSRP starting closer to $90k-$95k is my guess. AMW's 5.7L conversion is $90k. And the new TRX is $96.5K; the '27 is starting at $102k.

"The market" is going to be there, just barely, but there isn't going to be a $3k-$5k upgrade option to a 5.7L option. Lol.

LOL. HAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

 

[Zachanadandy]

I was keeping it brief because it's a dead horse to why it's taken so long. But, as per usual, you don't read the room and come in like Leroy Jenkins.

Everything is controlled from the corporate positioning of limiting costs.

1. Frame, motor mounts, exhaust routing, steering, wiring, etc. Yes, most of the heavy lifting has been done with the 392 Wrangler, yet things are still changing with the models (the new frontal crash brackets, for example). If it was an easy process, more people would be doing it.

2. CAFE is on-going and thinking only in terms of the current administration's policies is f**king short-sighted and 100% idiotic. Also, the Wrangler is not the Gladiator. Weight and dimensions and capacities will change it. Even a 5.7L option will add at least 150# to the Gladiator, which will probably push it into the Class 2a light truck category if that option became a reality.

3. This was from the original launch of the Gladiator when the design team said Jeep management said basically priority #1 - it had to look like a Wrangler, use parts of the Wrangler, and be a Wrangler with a bed.

4. From the very beginning, the Gladiator's full capability has been limited by the inability to effectively cool it (your big balls towing experience notwithstanding). It could not be engineered better without changing the truck to be different from the Wrangler, which Jeep was not willing to do because of the added cost. Yes, it would be "easy" to put in a bigger radiator/heat exchanger, bigger grille openings, and thinner bumper to allow more airflow for better cooling, but that violates Jeep's mandate of the Wrangler=Gladiator visual agreement and the requirement to limit price increases.

As far as the market goes...

Jeep sold 167,322 Wranglers in '25, an 11% increase over '24.
Jeep sold 56,790 Gladiators in '25, a 35% increase over '24, but still far away from the peak of 77,800+ in '22

While Jeep doesn't break out the numbers of individual numbers, doing smart research shows Jeep hasn't sold more than 4000/year of the 392. The production run for MY2025 - the Final Edition (which wasn't) was targeted at 3300. Over 5 years of production (so far), there have been roughly 13,000 392 Wranglers produced.

The Gladiator 392 might be produced at similar volumes - 2500-3000/year. At an MSRP starting closer to $90k-$95k is my guess. AMW's 5.7L conversion is $90k. And the new TRX is $96.5K; the '27 is starting at $102k.

"The market" is going to be there, just barely, but there isn't going to be a $3k-$5k upgrade option to a 5.7L option. Lol.

LOL. HAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

Looking at sales numbers for the purposely overpriced and over loaded 392s is pointless. They didn't want to sell too many due to cafe regs at the time. The moab's pricing compared to the FE 392s proves that without question. They could put the 5.7L in at $5k easy and just like the rams it would be the number 1 selling option and likely push the gladiator past 100k units per year. Weird that you're worried about the weight of the 5.7L when those trucks weighed 190lbs less than the EcoD versions when both were available in the ram? The lighter powertrain can't be done because of weight? One could argue the sales are still down from 2022 because the v6 is the only option.

 

[The Yeti]

It is beating a dead horse, but I agree with you. If the Gladiator had a 5.7, it would be the perfect truck for me.

I can somewhat agree, although I'd replace that 5.7 with 5.3

 

[Wheelin98TJ]

The CJ’s had plenty of room in the engine bay to fit just about anything (sarcasm)..

These modern vehicles, the engine bays are soooo stuffed full of everything including the kitchen sink. Just to change the engine requires a major overhaul and redesign just to get everything to fit!!!

A 401 fits nice, or you can stuff a V10 into a similar sized TJ.

 

[Jteakus]

Edit: also point out that they couldn't cool the 2.0 turbo and keep decent tow ratings so we didn't get that engine either

Thank goodness.

 

[bleda2002]

Thank goodness.

The 2.0 has proven to be the more reliable and powerful one, not sure id say thank goodness lol

 

[Jteakus]

I would not own a JT if the 2.0 was the only engine offered, but to each their own .

Sponsored