Best proper 4x4 with good motorway manners.

[Amateurish]

I used to have a Wrangler but it was absolutely shocking on the motorway. I'm looking for a car with the following:

- Auto
- Low ratio box
- Ground clearance for a steep rocky track (short wheelbase ideal)
- Reasonable on the motorway, not loud
- Cruise

Any ideas?

[Louis Balfour]

Amateurish said:

I used to have a Wrangler but it was absolutely shocking on the motorway. I'm looking for a car with the following:

- Auto
- Low ratio box
- Ground clearance for a steep rocky track (short wheelbase ideal)
- Reasonable on the motorway, not loud
- Cruise

Any ideas?

The top answer is Range Rover Vogue. You can drive up a Scottish mountain in it and then cruise in limousine comfort back to London.

But you need to buy a newish one unless you enjoy big bills and spannering.

[300bhp/ton]

Amateurish said:

I used to have a Wrangler but it was absolutely shocking on the motorway. I'm looking for a car with the following:

- Auto
- Low ratio box
- Ground clearance for a steep rocky track (short wheelbase ideal)
- Reasonable on the motorway, not loud
- Cruise

Any ideas?

What sort of money are you wanting to spend?

What would you say was shocking about the Wrangler on the motorway?

Can you provide a pic of the rocky track?


Ultimately there are very few short wheel base vehicles these days. And even the ones that do exist are often a lot bigger than ones from the past.

I suspect a tidy Discovery 1 or 2 would do what you are asking for (or a Range Rover Classic). They have 100" wheelbases which is often short wheelbase these days.

Or a Jeep Grand Cherokee.

If you really want a short wheel base, then the 3rd/4th Gen Mitsubishi Shogun or Toyota Land Cruiser are the only real options.

I'd maybe have said a Jimny too, although such a small engine and an auto box will not be all that speedy on road. Mine is a manual JB74 Jimny. Will happily sit at 70mph on cruise control and still listen to the radio.

[mbwoy84]

I've got what I'd class as two "proper" 4x4s and one what you'd probably term an SUV of sorts.

BMW X5 4.6is - Fantastic on motorways. OK for minor off-road duties with the right tyres on (driving over fields, bit of snow/gravel etc)

Shogun 4Work 3.2 DiD SWB - Fantastic off road, fantastic on country lanes and reasonable A-Roads by me. Love driving it. Not great on motorways, but certainly more than bearable and would a lot better than a Wrangler, but not what I'd choose for motorway driving

Range Rover 3.0 TD6 Vogue L322 - The best compromise. It does the proper off-roading thing and has good road manners. Great on motorways, pottering around and country pursuits. Is a long wheelbase though.

In short, the shorter you go on the wheelbase, the more comfort you sacrifice on the motorway, as a generalistaion.

Out of the three, I only plan on keeping the Shogun long-term now, but I don't do a lot of motorway driving and if I do, I have a lot more cars I can choose from for that duty, but it's certainly not horrendous. I would recommend keeping two sets of wheels and tyres if you go down that route though.

[Mouse Rat]

MK1 Touareg, and plenty around at various budgets. Should be reasonably rugged just watch out for gear box valve chest. Additionally propshaft bearings that need changing every 70K miles.

Mk2 Touareg was more of a re badged SUV'y Q7 / Porsche and not sure if all models had low range. However the 'escape model' did with locking diffs. Cant comment on reliability of these.

Both excellent off road and on motorway especially with the 3.0tdi

[Amateurish]

The track is about 15% gradient on average.

[Amateurish]

300bhp/ton said:

What sort of money are you wanting to spend?

What would you say was shocking about the Wrangler on the motorway?

Can you provide a pic of the rocky track?


Ultimately there are very few short wheel base vehicles these days. And even the ones that do exist are often a lot bigger than ones from the past.

I suspect a tidy Discovery 1 or 2 would do what you are asking for (or a Range Rover Classic). They have 100" wheelbases which is often short wheelbase these days.

Or a Jeep Grand Cherokee.

If you really want a short wheel base, then the 3rd/4th Gen Mitsubishi Shogun or Toyota Land Cruiser are the only real options.

I'd maybe have said a Jimny too, although such a small engine and an auto box will not be all that speedy on road. Mine is a manual JB74 Jimny. Will happily sit at 70mph on cruise control and still listen to the radio.

The Wrangler was very loud, slow accelerating at motorway speeds, extremely vague steering.

Not fixed on the short wheel base, just thought it would be easier to to avoid scraping the underside.

Up to £20k.

[TurboHatchback]

Some idea of budget, age of vehicle and pictures of the track involved would help.

Edit: too slow.

[TurboHatchback]

If that's as bad as the track gets then a serious 4x4 isn't necessary, I would be looking at things like the Skoda Octavia Scout or Yeti, Subaru Outback, Audi A6/A4 Allroad etc. All of these will be more than up to that and much better cars on tarmac as well as offering a huge increase in performance/running cost ratio.

[dmsims]

XC60

[Amateurish]

You definitely woudn't get up there in a Yeti or similar. Maybe the picture doesn't do it justice, but low range is essential, and it's heart in the mouth stuff in that Land Cruiser. The locals use quads, Jimnys, Jeeps etc. The gradient averages at about 15% but goes over 30% in places.

Edited by Amateurish on Monday 17th August 17:13

[Terzo123]

With that budget you'd get a very good Jeep Grande Cherokee.

[JWH]

As mentioned above Mk2 Touareg Escape would cope fine. I hate the PH habit of just recommending ones own car but I've been very happy with ours; low rage and locking centre & rear diff means it'll pull itself and a decent size trailer as far as most of the LR products but statistically it should be a load more reliable and they're much cheaper than a comparable Disco 4.

Infotainment system is a bit dated and it's not exactly dripping with gizmos inside but it's got all the important stuff. The only significant criticism I have is that, unless you can find one which had air suspension specified as an option, you're stuck with a ride quality that's just a but firmer than feels necessary to me. It's not terrible, just a bit sharp over smaller intrusions.

https://www.autotrader.co.uk/car-details/202007171...

[Amateurish]

Sounds good, I'll look into it

[ChocolateFrog]

£20k would get you the best of the 100 Series Landcruiser.

Something with no rust and under 100k miles.

[stevemcs]

If you not after full size how about a freelander 2 ?

[300bhp/ton]

Amateurish said:

The Wrangler was very loud, slow accelerating at motorway speeds, extremely vague steering.

Not fixed on the short wheel base, just thought it would be easier to to avoid scraping the underside.

Up to £20k.

The pic doesn’t look at extreme tbh. But sometimes hard to tell.

I’d say Disco 4/Range Rover TDV8/RRS or Jeep Cherokee. All will be great on road and easily capable off road.

[Lily the Pink]

RRS. I did 130,000 miles in mine without any serious issues. Used as a wedding car, setting up forest stages, lots of towing heavy stuff, muddy fields,etc etc. A very nice place to be on a motorway and that was only the 2.7TDi.

[loskie]

https://www.autotrader.co.uk/car-details/202008142...

[bearman68]

Terzo123 said:

With that budget you'd get a very good Jeep Grande Cherokee.

The man wants it to be decent on the road. The steering on a GC is shocking