I'm looking to buy my first gladiator. Help!

[Donk21]

In the next few months I'm looking to get a new vehicle.

I love the Rubicon, but hate the tires...

I love the tires on the Willy's.. (Blacked out).

I'm looking for a hunting, fishing, campus vehicle..

Unlike both styles.. I'm not looking to rock crawl, just disappear in the mountain trails.

Rubicon??

Willy's??

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[MyMojave]

Mojave.
That platform rides better than the rest and has the black wheels.

 

[Bandit’s Lair]

I’d honestly say Willy’s. If you’re just planning on doing some telephone pole trails and forest roads to get out to some hunting sites and some calmer trails you don’t need all the fanciness. Getting a Willy’s will save you some cash so if you need the fancy later you can add it. Drive a few at a few different dealerships to get some good feels for everything. I do mean everything. Seats and interior stuff and all that. If you decide the Rubicon trim is better suited to what you want ask the dealership to throw a set of different wheels on it. Despite what the ey say there’s some wiggle room if you go into make a deal in about 10 days. Closer to the end of the month.

 

[DubyaBee76]

It depends on your disposable income and whether or not you're predisposed to go monkey shit, as I am. My first Jeep was a Rubicon. It was a capable vehicle but an automatic and a lot of the upgrades I ended up wanting to do would end up removing OEM Rubicon components. I sold that one and picked up a Sport for right at 30k. An additional 38k later, I had 1 tons, long arm lift, reservoirs, etc, supercharger, bumpers, winches..... you get the idea.

If you KNOW you'll be happy with a higher-level trim, go for it. I went with the Mojave X because I'm now 50 and I knew I wasn't going to be doing crazy stuff with the Glady. I'll eventually build another crawler, but I'll start with an LJ platform instead of anything new.

 

[Sweetums]

In the next few months I'm looking to get a new vehicle.

I love the Rubicon, but hate the tires...

I love the tires on the Willy's.. (Blacked out).

I'm looking for a hunting, fishing, campus vehicle..

Unlike both styles.. I'm not looking to rock crawl, just disappear in the mountain trails.

Rubicon??

Willy's??

Willys would be my vote. Jeep finally equipped it with a rear locker, which is enough to get most places and get unstuck from most things.
There are so many aftermarket options for suspension that the Mojave isn't really worth it in my opinion. A bit of lift and some aftermarket shocks would get you a great riding truck and you can space it out.

 

[Gman 2025]

I would save money and go with the sport and later add on all the extras you want.

 

[WambliSka]

In the next few months I'm looking to get a new vehicle.

I love the Rubicon, but hate the tires...

I love the tires on the Willy's.. (Blacked out).

I'm looking for a hunting, fishing, campus vehicle..

Unlike both styles.. I'm not looking to rock crawl, just disappear in the mountain trails.

Rubicon??

Willy's??

The tires or the wheels that you hate? If it’s tires no need to sweat that. There is a big market for new Rubicon and Mojave take-offs out there. I wanted 35” Wildpeaks which Jeep does not offer as an option so I bought and mounted my 35s after driving factory 33” for less than 650 miles. The almost brand new take-offs sold for a fair price in less than two weeks which nicely offset most of the cost of my new tires.

But a thought, sounds like you’re buying a Rubicon for the “look” and it’s a very different ride than the Willy’s. Do yourself a favor and drive them BOTH, then decide.

 

[Bandit’s Lair]

Willys would be my vote. Jeep finally equipped it with a rear locker, which is enough to get most places and get unstuck from most things.
There are so many aftermarket options for suspension that the Mojave isn't really worth it in my opinion. A bit of lift and some aftermarket shocks would get you a great riding truck and you can space it out.

I’ll say the frame reinforcement that is on the Mojave is a nice feature. Wish they’d made that standard across the board. Good thing there are options in the aftermarket for it or I’d be having a shop go in there all Willy’s Nilly reinforcing it.

 

[Sweetums]

I very much doubt daily driving and use on fire roads would bend the chassis.

 

[Cansberry]

Sport S. No need to pay for lockers or a transfer case you're not going to use. You can bolt on the stuff you'd want later and save some cash now

 

[ChrisNLA]

Gonna go against the grain here.

I'd buy the Rubicon. What's wrong with the tires, BTW? Just curious.

Ironically, I hate the tires on the Willys, lol. But we all have preference, that's totally fine.

So, after three years my truck is fairly 'stock'. I like it that way, it does what I need to do.

In those three years I added things like 33s, expensive sway bar disconnects, a front leveling kit, etc. As it is, I ordered my Sport S Max Tow to get 4.10 gears as I wanted the best OEM gearing possible for towing/tires.

If I bought a Rubicon now, the stock truck would by just about perfect, and I'd just be left organizing the bed and interior, and adding some lights.

When I bought in '22 my Sport S was about $44K after a 1% below invoice discount. A nice Rubicon was nearing $60K I believe.

Right now a Rubicon with power leather seats, all LED lights, all the convenience and safety features, and painted fenders and hard top is going for $49K. I rode in a new Rubi recently and the newer ones with the red shocks seem to ride nice. The previous ones with Fox shocks seemed more bouncy / floaty.

 

[WambliSka]

Gonna go against the grain here.

I'd buy the Rubicon. What's wrong with the tires, BTW? Just curious.

Ironically, I hate the tires on the Willys, lol. But we all have preference, that's totally fine.

So, after three years my truck is fairly 'stock'. I like it that way, it does what I need to do.

In those three years I added things like 33s, expensive sway bar disconnects, a front leveling kit, etc. As it is, I ordered my Sport S Max Tow to get 4.10 gears as I wanted the best OEM gearing possible for towing/tires.

If I bought a Rubicon now, the stock truck would by just about perfect, and I'd just be left organizing the bed and interior, and adding some lights.

When I bought in '22 my Sport S was about $44K after a 1% below invoice discount. A nice Rubicon was nearing $60K I believe.

Right now a Rubicon with power leather seats, all LED lights, all the convenience and safety features, and painted fenders and hard top is going for $49K. I rode in a new Rubi recently and the newer ones with the red shocks seem to ride nice. The previous ones with Fox shocks seemed more bouncy / floaty.

I can't fault your logic because I did the same. I'm on my 5th Jeep and all have been bought as close to what I wanted in factory configuration as possible for my. intended uses and the "lightly" modified to get them where I needed. My first Jeep was an original release Rubicon with factory MT tires to crawl over rock walls and mud trails in the NE and it did this splendidly as a factory vehicle. my second was Rocky Mountain edition made to look pretty running around the sand on Florida beaches and the red mud trails of GA. Third was a JKU that spent most time in the mountain grass trails in Western NC and had to handle snow occasionally.

My fourth Jeep was a '22 Overland Gladiator that was mostly a road warrior with initially very light off road use on country dirt roads and snow in NC. When I moved to the SE and spent a lot of time running in the desert the limitations of the vehicle became swiftly apparent, so I did some upgrades (tires were the big one for clearance and to get cut resistant rubber) but within a year or two I finally figured out that the cost of making a Mojave out of an Overland was more than the cost of a new Mojave. So I went to the dealer and within one hour I drove out with a '26 Mojave X under me and within a week I threw on the 35" Wildpeaks AT4Ws the truck deserves. Now I'm pretty much done.

Personally I don't need a "look", I purposely use my Jeeps for effect to get me where I want to be and have fun getting there. I'm at a loss when folks make a Franken-"Rubicon" or a "Mojave" out of take-offs for road use, or in this case buying a purposely built rock crawler for NOT rock crawling as stated by the OP. By throwing random parts (even OEM parts) into a Sport or another trim you end up with problems and affect vehicle ride, many times in a negative way. This becomes a black hole of a domino effect. And I have enough folks I know that have bought a Rubicon for mostly on road use and then drove a less aggressively set up Jeep and objectively realized they kind of made a mistake. I've also had the chance to drive Monsters on big lifts running on 40s purposely built for Ducks gathering and Mall crawling and in my opinion many drove like shit and I would never do that to my DD. But hey, everyone has a right to make themselves happy in any way they want to. I absolutely get that part, and my opinions unless specifically asked to share them stay in my head and I always try to be polite.

My recommendation to everyone buying a Jeep is go drive ALL the trims and then decide what you really want, and be TRUTHFUL with yourself about intended use and what you are willing to compromise on for that "look" if you decide to go that way. If SMALL tweaks are needed (eliminate rake or slightly bigger tires), hey that's easy enough without getting in trouble. But big changes become big money pits.

 

[WambliSka]

Willys would be my vote. Jeep finally equipped it with a rear locker, which is enough to get most places and get unstuck from most things.
There are so many aftermarket options for suspension that the Mojave isn't really worth it in my opinion. A bit of lift and some aftermarket shocks would get you a great riding truck and you can space it out.

The Mojave as built by Jeep will absolutely meet the demands of those that are looking for a specific use for their Jeep. I now run my usual desert trails in MUCH MORE comfort and half the time I did with old my "modified" Overland and the cost of getting my '22 Overland to the capabilities of the Mojave with "aftermarket" parts, and the headaches that come from tweaking all those non-OEM parts to work with each other, was WELL more expensive than just trading in my Overland for the Mojave X. All I had to do was install bigger tires and run off into the desert without months of off-line garage time and burning buckets of cash.

I'll also add that I have zero patience for "spacing out" what I can get right now.

 

[dylanhack]

In the next few months I'm looking to get a new vehicle.

I love the Rubicon, but hate the tires...

I love the tires on the Willy's.. (Blacked out).

I'm looking for a hunting, fishing, campus vehicle..

Unlike both styles.. I'm not looking to rock crawl, just disappear in the mountain trails.

Rubicon??

Willy's??

Get the rubicon with the a) factory push-button sway bar disconnect, b) front / rear lockers, and c) with the "offroad +" button. I've used the offroad+ button a few times when I need very accurate pedal control. Think of it as an additional 4-low for the 4-low. I don't rock crawl, I'm strickly an overlander. The Rubicon also has a stiffer rear suspension if you plan to camp with gear. I've had 900 lbs in the rear bed, and the truck still sits level.

It you plan to run it empty with no camper shell (mine is 400lbs), then the suspension can feel too stiff. The Mojave does a better job of empty ride comfort.

 

[AXC]

In the next few months I'm looking to get a new vehicle.

I love the Rubicon, but hate the tires...

I love the tires on the Willy's.. (Blacked out).

I'm looking for a hunting, fishing, campus vehicle..

Unlike both styles.. I'm not looking to rock crawl, just disappear in the mountain trails.

Rubicon??

Willy's??

Hey Donk21,
I have about the same objective as you do. I have owned TJ's, JK's and now own a 2023 Gladiator Rubicon. It is already mechanically ready for what you want to do. I will also say, even though a Rubicon, it is the best riding Jeep I have ever bought and is totally trail capable. Only upgrade I did was to 35's and AEV wheels (i wanted the additional width of the rim). If you can find one you visually like and the interior you may be set. I am happy with the purchase!

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