New to off-road

[calicorks]

Hey all!

I love muscle cars and currently own a 2012 BOSS 302 Mustang. I’ve owned a 2010 SS Camero that I traded in for my BOSS, a 1986 Camero iroc Z-28, and a 1996 Z-28 Camero. I’m never ever getting rid of my Boss so a trade in would be OUT OF THE EQUATION. “I’m going to be buried in my baby”.

When the Boss came out in 2012, it was $44k and every dealership wanted at minimum $5k over MSRP so lowest I saw was $49k I waited a few years and I managed to find a used one that was 4 years old with only 1200 miles, and still was basically brand new for $32k. It even had the new car smell, and the passenger seat was not even “broken in”. The pro coins owner sadly bought it and parked it in the garage.

I also used to have a 2008 Tacoma X-Runner that I sadly had to sell due to financial situations about 7 years ago. I’ve had a 2011 single cab V8 Silverado as well, great truck! I miss having a truck.

Since Jeep announced the JT, I’ve fallen in love and have been obsessed learning all about it. I saw my first JT a week ago and said to myself, I’m getting one!

Question for you experienced off roadsters... would I be selling myself short with the Sport or should I go all in for a Rubicon?? The reason I asked is money doesn’t grow on trees and the extra cost for a Rubicon might be too much financially for me unless I wait until I can afford one.

I can see myself using the Sport for normal truck uses, camping, and going up to the snow.

I keep watching Rubions and man are they Sweet! What would you do in my shoes?

The JT would be for my fun adventures/ camping. Either JT I get WILL have a Manuel trans as that’s what I prefer to drive.

What are your thoughts given I’ve never been off-roading?

Sponsored

 

[ACAD_Cowboy]

Well how much off-roading do you plan on doing and what type of conditions do you see yourself in?

If you don’t see a need for the 4:1 low range, lockers and sway bar disconnect from the cab there is no sense in buying a rubicon because really that’s all you are buying plus 4.10 gearing. I recently encountered a rubicon hard rock that I had seen at the dealership when I was shopping, in the last 4 years it had only been off blacktop a few times and all of them on prepared roads. I being that guy pointedly but politely asked why buy the premium for the premium package since you’ve used none of it and the owner replied because it looks so bad ass. Ughh Yup!?!

So the next question is how much truck do you need? The JT offers a lot of truck compared to the JK/JL but not nearly what you’d get from a proper half ton or larger. And for the price of a loaded rubicon you can be within spitting distance of a rebel or power wagon depending on if you wanted a muscle truck or a truck with muscles.

As for going manual versus automatic, I got told by a dealer that I can forget trading in my stick shift, they won’t take it. Also it is limiting to sharing driving and off roading duties. My co-pilot doesn’t grok manual and the few let’s try sessions we’ve had have not gone as well as either of us might want. I’d love to be able to say hey, wake up, you drive the next two hours so I can sleep. Automatic off-roading is also a bit easier on the new person, less hassles of not going fast enough or too fast plus no left foot phobia; operating in three dimensions is hard enough without having to manage 3 pedals with 2 feet. Also there is the unique moments where you are riding the brake and throttle at the same time to manage both ground speed and weight transfer in a delicate dance to a song with lyrics such as “we better not roll!” and “it’s gonna drag and then drop down the ledge, the noises are just noises”.

If you just want some 4wd to bomb around and soft road some fire trails and fields and the like you can save a lot of money that can be repurposed in making a sport or sport S more capable but it all comes down to what you want to do, where you want to go and how overmatched you feel like being. The rubicon package is a force multiplier which will do either of two things if you let it: 1. Make you overconfident and cause you to stop or not learn about the actual “ish” of off-roading or perhaps worse yet, 2. Carry you along on it back until you are well and truly stuck somewhere with no earthly idea how you got into it or how you will get out of it leading to ever greater hassles like off road towing, heavy recovery cranes and the never (not once ever) ending teasing from your local off-road crew who winched/towed/disassembled and carried you back out. Imagine being the guy who went playing in muddy puddles at a construction site where he was trespassing only to get slogged down to the chassis in chassis deep soft liquid mud about 200 feet from anything without a winch. Give me a fulcrum strong enough and a lever long enough... which in this case was chaining off to a bulldozer and a manual (yup!) capstan winch with a zillion feet of rope and about 8 sheaves. It took him all night to pull his rig out of the mud and no one ever let him forget it.

So how much truck do you need, how little truck can you work with, where do you plan to go and how crazy are you willing let things become?

 

[DenverGladiator]

Hey all!

I keep watching Rubions and man are they Sweet! What would you do in my shoes?

The JT would be for my fun adventures/ camping. Either JT I get WILL have a Manuel trans as that’s what I prefer to drive.

What are your thoughts given I’ve never been off-roading?

My first new car was a 4-cylinder, 2-door manual 2000 Jeep Wrangler Sport, completely stock. It had air conditioning and that was it. In Colorado, it handled every “Easy” offroad trail with no problems, and only once could it not make a “Moderate” offroad trail (combination of stream crossing, wet cobbles, STEEP grade). I came back the next weekend from the other direction and had no trouble. I never tried a “Hard” trail because that would have been stupid with my Jeep.

Anyone buying a Gladiator is going to have trouble rock crawling, or spend a fortune on mods to make it possible. The approach/departure and long wheel base are all negatives when compared to a JL, and even a JL Unlimited. If you want to rock crawl, grab a 2-door Wrangler.

I go camping 8-10 times a year in the mountains and want something fun, capable of towing my 1,800 pound camper, and take me to the top of mountain passes that I’d rather not hike. I have a family of 4 and a 2-door wrangler is not practical as it would not carry any gear. Even the JL Unlimited lacks enough storage space for camping gear. The Gladiator gives me just enough room for gear in the bed, I can protect my food in the hard-cover tonneau, it’s capable of towing my camper, comfortably seats 4, and I can have the soft top down to enjoy the mountain weather.

I drove a manual for 14 years, have driven a Honda Pilot for last 5 years, and have promised myself I will never buy another automatic. If you love a manual get a manual. I sold my 14 year old manual Wrangler myself in one day. Someone will buy it. You can look online and see how few JL or Tacomas are manual ... something like 5%-10%. Everyone else can have their autonomous, self driving pod ... I’ll take my manual every time.

That’s my five cents.

 

[Hemi]

Swaybar disconnects can be installed for under $150. Lockers can be installed for far less than the cost Rubicon, though if it were me I would think about LSD in front and locker in rear. The situations where you lock the front are really narrow and hard core.

The Sport is more capable than you know. If money is a concern I would say build it as you can. This is a multi year project for most of us. Rubis are great, I am driving a JK Rubi now. But I had a sport prior to that. You can grow as you get into the hobby.

My priorities on a build a rocker protection, disconnects, and on board air in that order. I have a JT Sport S on order

 

[RIPLER]

I had my heart set on the Rubicon until I saw the price, then I turned my attention to the Sport S with max tow. My local dealer got a Sport S in and I went and took a look at it, it looked plain and I was a little disappointed. Sure I could add things to it to make it look more aggressive, but I just don't have the time to do mods. It took a while but I found a dealer willing to work a deal for me, so I ended up with a Rubicon. Will I ever use it to its full capability, probably not, but damn this thing is badass. I can't go anywhere without drawing attention, I found a few teenagers taking selfies with it at while I was parked at a local mall.

 

[Ole Cowboy]

Hey all!


Question for you experienced off roadsters... would I be selling myself short with the Sport or should I go all in for a Rubicon?? The reason I asked is money doesn’t grow on trees and the extra cost for a Rubicon might be too much financially for me unless I wait until I can afford one.

I can see myself using the Sport for normal truck uses, camping, and going up to the snow.

I keep watching Rubicons and man are they Sweet! What would you do in my shoes?

The JT would be for my fun adventures/ camping. Either JT I get WILL have a Manuel trans as that’s what I prefer to drive.

What are your thoughts given I’ve never been off-roading?

I have heard this story before, in fact many times. What occurs frequently is that the offroad bug bites and it can hurt bad, real bad. 'if I had ONLY known I would love off-roading so much I would have bought a Rubicon".

What you have to understand is the Rubicon, named after the Rubicon trail, not just named, but the engineers at Jeep built the Jeep to tackle in STOCK form the Rubicon trail and that is where it was tested and hence the name.. Sure you can save some coin buying a Sport or can you? Set of Dana 44 axles, F/R lockers, 4:10 gears, 4:1 transfer case, front end disconnects (which I do NOT recommend!!) and you canb drop enough money that you could have bought into the Rubicon.

Some guys are choosing to go with one of the non-Rubicon models and adding in the Max Tow package with does give you the 4:10 axles (I don't know if that includes lockers or not.

You are into performance cars and that tells me you may find yourself eyeball deep in the off road pond and yes its a hellva lot of fun. I first got into back in the mid 60's, just before I got my first HiPerf car, not a muscle car, never owned one, Corvette guy here. Long story short: Daddy did NOT buy it for me. Saw a 'vette when I was about 9 and told daddy that was what I wanted: Daddy said "son you better save your nickels and dimes". I did, had enough to buy a '64 327/375 'vette Christmas '64 and my car payment was....$41 per mo for 36 mo.

I will tell you what I tell others: One car for the rest of my life, money no object...Jeep Rubicon, 2 door, Std trans!

 

[calicorks]

Than you to all of you. I’ve gotten some great advise for both the Sport and Rubicon. I’m still deciding what would work best, but one thing I know for sure is I’m not getting any other truck. Knowing me, it will be the Rubicon and I’ll add a wench

As for the dealership saying don’t buy a Manuel because no one will buy it back is BA from them. They say that because they want to sell you a car and don’t have them in stock yet.

 

[ACAD_Cowboy]

From Spencer Haywood at Motor Inn

"I was just looking into you trade and just noticed it was a manual. Unfortunately, I do not have a market for a manual in my area, its even getting hard for us to find buyers for our shelby mustangs, the market is not only limited by those that know how to drive them but also those that have enough money to afford one AND want to drive a manual."

I'm not making it up that they didn't want my trade. I've owned manual and automatic, even had a Turbo400 & QuadraTrac in my J20. I enjoy the meticulous ground speed selections you can make with a stick, playing all three pedals together to make it happen but I've also had the agony of crawl and die traffic, plowing a complicated parking lot with lot of direction changes and the horror of watching someone you love dump the clutch at 4k.

While I love rowing my own gears in anything, I do also like letting others drive across PA or TX and the leaps made in automatics these days, phenomenal compared to the old days. I've tested the JL with the 6 and 4cyl and the auto and it shifts faster than me, has no problem kicking down for maximum passing and is smart enough to not let me shift up too far too fast. For me it works. What works for you is up to you.

 

[WakesurfVT]

Hey @calicorks, I'm right there with you! I ordered a loaded Rubicon and likely won't use half the features off-the-bat...but that's how I purchase all my vehicles (loaded for the most part) and they've always held their value over the years. I currently own a Jeep SRT and have NEVER used the Launch Control because I don't beat on my vehicles (but anyone on the SRT forum would FLIP out to hear this and tell me I should just drive a 'normal' Grand Cherokee!). I've seen the videos showing it can do 0-60 in 4.7 seconds so I'm good there!

I've never been offroading in my own rig but definitely want to get into it and have plenty of friends who are involved with local groups that can get me in deep (and upside down) quickly. I've wanted a Jeep for the past few years after seeing their redesign but the towing was always rated lower than I needed for my boat so I had to pass. I've always wanted a truck to haul dirt, mulch and compost...maybe even some plywood...so I was very close to pulling the trigger on a Raptor a few months ago. For me, the Gladiator checks all the boxes and the Rubicon model allows me to get into offroading at my own pace, knowing that it has the majority of offroad features out-the-box (minus lift & tires) versus having to build it out over time. Much easier to have it all lumped into one payment vs paying $500 here and there for out-of-the-pocket upgrades! And Hell, if you can afford it...I say why not?

 

[trez63]

Before you order the manual take a look at this video that was just posted today. It's the first actual review of a manual trans.

 

[Mjolnir]

Hey bud!

I know a lot of us have been in the same position. This is how I went with my JK and my JT order:

Researching a lot on the differences and pricing of everything, I went with a Willys trim JK. It was kind of a mix between a sport and a rubi. Had rubi shocks, springs (i think they were different, can't remember), skid plates and wheels/tires. It cost me much much less and I was able to upgrade it how I wanted.

I am doing the same with the JT Sport S. I got from the factory what I wanted and will upgrade as I see fit. One thing that swayed me from the Rubi is that in the past at least (I can not say if it is still true with the new JL's or even the JT) but the electro disco is very unreliable and can/will break. This is a hefty priced piece to replace. I would rather disco manually instead. Another thing that swayed me is what I had heard about the lockers being weak compared to aftermarket (like ARB). So i am going to figure out what I need to do before I spend money on things I might not even need.

My 2 door JK has a 2.5" lift and 35's but I have done plenty of black trails around me without lockers or electro disco.

You may find the Rubicon will have SO many features that you will not use some or most.

You can still get a lot of the things on the Rubi on the Sport S, albeit not from the dealership. Do it yourself. Grab a buddy and hang out and work on your truck. That, in my opinion, is half of what owning a jeep is about. Doing the work yourself and having a good time knowing your rig and do what you want it to do, because of the hard work you put in.

Besides, a Sport/Sport S is very capable as is.

Hope this helps!

 

[Bobzdar]

Hey all!

I love muscle cars and currently own a 2012 BOSS 302 Mustang. I’ve owned a 2010 SS Camero that I traded in for my BOSS, a 1986 Camero iroc Z-28, and a 1996 Z-28 Camero. I’m never ever getting rid of my Boss so a trade in would be OUT OF THE EQUATION. “I’m going to be buried in my baby”.

When the Boss came out in 2012, it was $44k and every dealership wanted at minimum $5k over MSRP so lowest I saw was $49k I waited a few years and I managed to find a used one that was 4 years old with only 1200 miles, and still was basically brand new for $32k. It even had the new car smell, and the passenger seat was not even “broken in”. The pro coins owner sadly bought it and parked it in the garage.

I also used to have a 2008 Tacoma X-Runner that I sadly had to sell due to financial situations about 7 years ago. I’ve had a 2011 single cab V8 Silverado as well, great truck! I miss having a truck.

Since Jeep announced the JT, I’ve fallen in love and have been obsessed learning all about it. I saw my first JT a week ago and said to myself, I’m getting one!

Question for you experienced off roadsters... would I be selling myself short with the Sport or should I go all in for a Rubicon?? The reason I asked is money doesn’t grow on trees and the extra cost for a Rubicon might be too much financially for me unless I wait until I can afford one.

I can see myself using the Sport for normal truck uses, camping, and going up to the snow.

I keep watching Rubions and man are they Sweet! What would you do in my shoes?

The JT would be for my fun adventures/ camping. Either JT I get WILL have a Manuel trans as that’s what I prefer to drive.

What are your thoughts given I’ve never been off-roading?

If you don't know if you need a Rubicon, you don't need one.

Put some good tires on a stock sport and go have fun.

 

[bangolia]

Before you order the manual take a look at this video that was just posted today. It's the first actual review of a manual trans.

No mean for disrespect but he didn’t know how to drive a manual. He stalled in the first minute. If you watch his other videos, I would say he is barely a car guy and definitely not a Jeep or truck guy. Just my $0.02

 

[trez63]

No mean for disrespect but he didn’t know how to drive a manual. He stalled in the first minute. If you watch his other videos, I would say he is barely a car guy and definitely not a Jeep or truck guy. Just my $0.02

Have you ever driven a manual with start/stop feature for the first time? I’ve been driving manuals for 26 years. That messed with me quite a bit until I just turned it off.

 

[bangolia]

Have you ever driven a manual with start/stop feature for the first time? I’ve been driving manuals for 26 years. That messed with me quite a bit until I just turned it off.

I have but I did not take this into account when I mentioned this. However, he is a media guy not a truck or off-road enthusiast. He wore booties in the media test drive to not get his designer boots dirty. I have driven a jlru with manual and I have driven a JTR automatic. It’s hard for me to believe that performance is not carried from the JL to the JT in manual when it is in automatic.

Sponsored