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Mike Sinclair6 Mar 2014
NEWS

More of the same: next-gen Wrangler

Jeep's design boss says next Wrangler will look like... er... Wrangler

Jeep design boss Mark Allen says he has just one major task ahead on him when finalising the next generation Wrangler: "Don't f!@# it up!"

A straight-talker, Allen says the Wrangler is Jeep's icon and that the brand's fortunes and direction rest on the square-rigged traditional off-roader.

"It's my 911," Allen told motoring.com.au.

The design boss says his team's role will be to fix customer complaints and bring an improvement in capability to the new Wrangler. This will be achieved with incremental changes to the car.

"It'll look pretty much like that," he stated pointing to a current model Wrangler on the marque's Geneva show stand.

"We'll go through customer feedback and fix things but the styling is pretty much set."

Jeep brand boss Mike Manley confirmed Allen's summation of the new generation vehicle, adding: "it's a difficult vehicle to work on".

Manley says, however, the vehicle must improve its fuel economy in the next generation. Both Allen and Manley agree customers will also be looking for more amenity.

"Certainly from a styling perspective there will be a very strong tie to the Wrangler that we know, have known, for years, but the vehicle has to improve its fuel economy," Manley told motoring.com.au

"And not just for the next generation, but also going into the future. So we’ve got a lot of work to do in terms of taking weight out of that vehicle.

"[And] Even though it’s hard to, we need to work on the aero... We need to continue to work on the transmissions, powertrains... Improve its fuel economy but without damaging its [off-road] capability.

"That’s the balance – that’s what we’re working on... right now," Manley stated.

That doesn't mean a new Wrangler is just around the corner, however.

"We haven’t announced a formal date, but I can tell you in my timeframe in my mind it’s around 2017, early ’18, something like that," the Jeep boss confirmed.

Allen suggests Wrangler doesn't work to the same timeline as other Jeep models.

"What other car maker has the same elements of their current model as their first," he says referencing the Wrangler, the original WWII Willys Jeep and current Jeeps' trapezoidal wheel-arch motifs.

"You don't see elements on a Focus that were on a Model T," he quipped.

"We move slow on Wrangler. We first showed a four-door in 1996, but that didn't come out until 11 years later," he said.

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