Joe Camel
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- May 9, 2016
- Threads
- 2
- Messages
- 48
- Reaction score
- 7
- Location
- Blue Ridge Mountains
- Vehicle(s)
- 2011 Charger, Planning for JLU
- Thread starter
- #1
Thank goodness the the Prangler never came to be but this mash-up is one of the kookiest ideas I've seen lol. 
From Jalopnik:
Pre-production mules are, by their very nature, strange, chimera-like beasts, made from whatever was handy with little regard to how they look. As a result, most look like crap. Thatâs what makes the test mule used for the Plymouth Prowler/Jeep Wrangler so specialâitâs arguably the only test mule that looks better than the production car. Itâs called the Prangler.
Yes, Prangler. Prowler-Wrangler. It was real. It just never got made.
If youâre not familiar with the Plymouth Prowler, letâs solve that right now: the Prowler was one of the last Plymouths ever built, and even outlasted the marque itself by a year (the Prowler was made from 1997-2002, and Plymouth was axed in 2001).
It was intended to be a modernized hot rod, and while it wasnât ever really my cup of used motor oil, I do think it accomplished what it set out to do, and was much more daring than most other cars of the era.
The Prowler was a striking design, with front wheels outside of the bodywork, something just about unheard of in a production car. The mechanicals were pulled from Chryslerâs LH series of cars, but the front suspension, all exposed there, was a bit more novel.
The Prowler used a double wishbone suspension with upper and lower control arms, and the front spring shock assemblies were set up with a pushrod rocker, like an Indy car. Testing this setup was important, and seems to be the main purpose of the famous Prangler.
Itâs called the Prangler because it seems to be half-Prowler and half-Jeep Wrangler. Itâs like a Centaur that once owned a successful landscaping company and fetishizes â50s diners and now likes to go mudding on the weekends.
Incredibly, before the age of ubiquitous cameras in everyoneâs pocket, someone just happened to have a video camera when they encountered one of these Pranglers testing, so we actually have some video of one!
The Prangler appears to be a Prowler chassis with a full aluminum Prowler front end, and a hardtop Jeep Wrangler body from the windshield back. Our resident Jeep geek David says the Wrangler part appears to be from a YJ Wrangler, with a custom, tailgate-less back.
The bumpers seem to be the inner bars of the Prowler bumpers, and the headlight/indicator units on the prowler look just like the kind you put on snowplows. I kinda like them better than the squinty production lights.
The Prangler, I think, looks its best in profile, where the contrast of the long, torpedo-like hood and the boxy rear of the Jeep is most apparent. It makes no sense, and shouldnât work as well as it does, but the result is like a tough-but-weirdly-sleek-looking shooting brake kind of thing.
It also reminds me a bit of the Jeep DJ used by the U.S. Post Office as a mail delivery vehicle. One of these Pranglers, done up in Post Office livery, would have made a fantastic outreach/promo vehicle that they could have called the Mail Hauler or Haulinâ the Mail or something like that to get the teens all excited about rewarding careers in parcel delivery.
My guess is that Chrysler decided to make such a strange mule because the open-air, roadster design of the Prowler just didnât mesh well with the Detroit winters it would be tested in, so they found the easiest possible enclosed body to slap on the back half. That easiest, non-unibody, bolt-on-able body was the cubic rear of a Jeep, and the Prangler is what happened.
Either four or five Pranglers appear to have been built, and thereâs occasional rumors that one survives. The wheels from one have definitely survived, but little is known about the rest.
If itâs like most mules, itâs been crushed long ago, leaving only memories of the strange centaur made of roadster and rock crawler to haunt our dreams.
Good night, sweet, sweet Prangler.
From Jalopnik:
Pre-production mules are, by their very nature, strange, chimera-like beasts, made from whatever was handy with little regard to how they look. As a result, most look like crap. Thatâs what makes the test mule used for the Plymouth Prowler/Jeep Wrangler so specialâitâs arguably the only test mule that looks better than the production car. Itâs called the Prangler.
Yes, Prangler. Prowler-Wrangler. It was real. It just never got made.
If youâre not familiar with the Plymouth Prowler, letâs solve that right now: the Prowler was one of the last Plymouths ever built, and even outlasted the marque itself by a year (the Prowler was made from 1997-2002, and Plymouth was axed in 2001).
It was intended to be a modernized hot rod, and while it wasnât ever really my cup of used motor oil, I do think it accomplished what it set out to do, and was much more daring than most other cars of the era.
The Prowler was a striking design, with front wheels outside of the bodywork, something just about unheard of in a production car. The mechanicals were pulled from Chryslerâs LH series of cars, but the front suspension, all exposed there, was a bit more novel.
The Prowler used a double wishbone suspension with upper and lower control arms, and the front spring shock assemblies were set up with a pushrod rocker, like an Indy car. Testing this setup was important, and seems to be the main purpose of the famous Prangler.
Itâs called the Prangler because it seems to be half-Prowler and half-Jeep Wrangler. Itâs like a Centaur that once owned a successful landscaping company and fetishizes â50s diners and now likes to go mudding on the weekends.
Incredibly, before the age of ubiquitous cameras in everyoneâs pocket, someone just happened to have a video camera when they encountered one of these Pranglers testing, so we actually have some video of one!
The Prangler appears to be a Prowler chassis with a full aluminum Prowler front end, and a hardtop Jeep Wrangler body from the windshield back. Our resident Jeep geek David says the Wrangler part appears to be from a YJ Wrangler, with a custom, tailgate-less back.
The bumpers seem to be the inner bars of the Prowler bumpers, and the headlight/indicator units on the prowler look just like the kind you put on snowplows. I kinda like them better than the squinty production lights.
The Prangler, I think, looks its best in profile, where the contrast of the long, torpedo-like hood and the boxy rear of the Jeep is most apparent. It makes no sense, and shouldnât work as well as it does, but the result is like a tough-but-weirdly-sleek-looking shooting brake kind of thing.
It also reminds me a bit of the Jeep DJ used by the U.S. Post Office as a mail delivery vehicle. One of these Pranglers, done up in Post Office livery, would have made a fantastic outreach/promo vehicle that they could have called the Mail Hauler or Haulinâ the Mail or something like that to get the teens all excited about rewarding careers in parcel delivery.
My guess is that Chrysler decided to make such a strange mule because the open-air, roadster design of the Prowler just didnât mesh well with the Detroit winters it would be tested in, so they found the easiest possible enclosed body to slap on the back half. That easiest, non-unibody, bolt-on-able body was the cubic rear of a Jeep, and the Prangler is what happened.
Either four or five Pranglers appear to have been built, and thereâs occasional rumors that one survives. The wheels from one have definitely survived, but little is known about the rest.
If itâs like most mules, itâs been crushed long ago, leaving only memories of the strange centaur made of roadster and rock crawler to haunt our dreams.
Good night, sweet, sweet Prangler.
Sponsored
