Toyota Land Cruiser V8 and Jeep Grand Cherokee 3.0 CRD - the world of men
We live in a time when a woman with a beard, gender and any other antics of the human personality no longer surprise anyone. The gap between men and women is blurring more and more, and what's worse, men are playing an important role in these key changes. Guys who become less masculine and effeminate. Unfortunately, this trend has also been noticed by car manufacturers, who boast in their new products a variety of body colors, a wide selection of aluminum wheel patterns and the ability to personalize mirrors, roofs and other unimportant elements. Has a male world full of alpha males fallen under a huge question mark?
Fortunately, in all this unisex fashion, there are also automakers who remember real men and know that a real alpha male does not have to carry tons of unnecessary knick-knacks and, most importantly, does not have to prove anything to anyone. .
Jeep. An American brand associated with freedom, adventure and, without a doubt, masculinity. There are few symbols and brands in the world that are so strongly associated with a person who uses a toilet with a triangle hanging on the front door. The driver of the jeep certainly has big "cohones" and in most cases he is not a close-knit bespectacled man who takes several tens of minutes to choose the right hair gel. The jeep driver also does not need to prove to anyone that he chose a car of this brand not because of the prevailing fashion or the wealth of the wallet. Jeep is a brand with character. With a male character, full of testosterone. True, the compact Renegade has recently appeared in the offer, but the hero of this article is the real Grand Leader, that is, the Grand Cherokee model with the richest Overland Summit equipment.
Without a doubt, Toyota does not evoke such unambiguous male associations as its American counterpart. The Japanese brand, which boasts historic creations like the Supra, Celica or entire generations of Land Cruisers, has now focused on more mainstream and therefore boring segments. The Aygo, Yaris, Auris, and Avensis certainly translate into good sales for Toyota, but their appearance is not life-threatening for people with pacemakers. Among the entire mass of urban tractors, the Japanese manufacturer offers its customers two male models - the GT86 and the thrill-hungry Land Cruiser. Comparing the Grand Cherokee to a sports coupe would not make the slightest sense, so the Land Cruiser stood on the battlefield, or rather, as you might guess from the photo on the playground, next to the Grand Chief. Land Cruiser V8 is a top-end, huge and very distinctive Toyota.
Here I would like to point out that both presented machines are not their direct competitors. The "big" Land Cruiser really has no competitors on the Polish market. An analogue of the Grand Cherokee is the “small land”, which, contrary to appearances, is not at all that small. By the way, the word "small" itself should not be often found in the dictionary of a real man.
Due to the fact that I am dealing with a “big” Land Cruiser, I leave unambitious discussions about whether size matters (of course it does!) to the more incomprehensible representatives of the ugly sex (who probably consider themselves representatives of the fair sex). The Land Cruiser V8 really boasts its size. 4950 mm in length, 1970 mm in width, 1910 mm in height and a dry weight of more than 2,5 tons make an impression not only on women. With the exception of some pickups and large vans, there is currently no larger vehicle on the market that can be driven with a category B driving licence. With its length of 4822 1943 mm, width 1781 2400 mm, height mm and a curb weight of approximately kg. The Grand The Cherokee doesn't look sluggish either, although the Toyota leaves a big shadow.
Both cars come from two different countries with a completely different approach to design. You can see it at a glance. After the latest facelift, the Jeep Grand Cherokee has not lost its character and continues to show its pride wherever it goes. The characteristic front grille, angular silhouette and not very sophisticated chrome accessories make the described Yankee an unmistakable car. Against the background of Toyota, it also comes across as a much newer design, created at a time when masculinity was slowly losing its meaning.
Does this mean the Land Cruiser looks old? From my great liking for this car, I can say that the “big Toyota” looks very conservative. Decorative elements and mouth-watering details that tickle the owner's vanity? You won't find them here. Big glass surfaces, big wheel arches, big wheels, big front grille? Yes, this is what Japanese tigers like the most. If you're scoffing at Volkswagen calling every deeper facelift an all-new model, how about the latest Land Cruiser facelift that limited itself to… LED daytime running lights? The Toyota SUV (to call it an SUV would be a huge compliment to the entire SUV genre) has been looking almost the same for many years, and its imposing size, angular and painfully simple forms are recognizable from the Middle East to the United States.
A very similar impression of conservatism, lack of significant progress and some kind of roughness can be obtained immediately after you sit in the Land Cruiser salon. Both the materials used, their composition and colors, as well as the design of the dashboard itself, look very luxurious. Very luxurious for ... the nineties! In 2014, it will certainly not impress the fancy "men" who care for their X-series BMWs or Q-series Audis. And very good indeed! The Land Cruiser V8 is not for everyone.
The whole design of the dashboard seems to be drawn with a square and a ruler, and only for drawing the steering wheel and dials someone accidentally used a compass. Of course, there was an extensive multimedia system with a touch screen and a large number of switches and knobs for adjusting many car parameters. However, there is a method to all this gross madness. In many other cars, such rather archaic interior decoration would have embellished the grimace on the face. However, in the Land Cruseir, this "look" is in perfect harmony with the atmosphere of the entire car and its exterior. Somehow I can’t imagine a good and big Land Cruiser with a Star Wars interior.
Against this background of Japanese design, the Grand Cherokee cabin looks more modern and dignified. The high-quality leather that wraps around the seats and part of the dashboard, the wood inserts and most of the materials used for interior trim look better than the same items found in Toyota. A sign of modernity and the effect of the latest facelift is the liquid crystal display, which has replaced the traditional speedometer. Its size confuses many modern smartphones, and the number of functions that can be displayed on it is impressive. Like the Land Cruiser, the Jeep also has room for a large touchscreen infotainment system and knobs and buttons to adjust vehicle settings, and just like the Toyota, the Grand Cherokee also offers a truly spacious cabin with an armrest between the front seats with a ping pong table. However, it was not because of the attractiveness of the back seat or the capacity of the trunks that I took the two described cars into the field. Today we will talk about driving and fun!
As the name implies, the Toyota Land Cruiser V8 has a V-shaped 8-cylinder engine under the hood. There is a choice of petrol or diesel version, but hardly anyone will choose the first one. Under the hood of the specimen shown in the photographs, a powerful 4,5-liter diesel engine was working, producing 318 hp. and almost monstrous torque at a maximum level of 740 Nm. CO2 emissions? 250 g/km, which is almost the same as ... three Prius. Despite these power levels, the Land Cruiser is not a sprinter. It reaches the first hundred in 8,8 seconds and gasps at 210 km / h.
The American auto industry is closely associated with powerful V8 engines that consume countless amounts of gasoline. Of course, a full-blooded Hemi can run under the hood of the Grand Cherokee, but the tested unit was equipped with a slightly less masculine 3-liter diesel engine and 6 “V-shaped” cylinders. 250 HP power and 570 Nm of maximum torque do not make a big impression on Toyota, but they can provide the Jeep with slightly better performance (8,2 seconds from 0 to 100 km / h).
What both cars have in common is the very high level of comfort that they are able to offer the driver and passengers. Pneumatic suspensions, used both in the Grand and in the Land, effectively eliminate all the roughness of Polish and not only Polish roads. At times, both cars give the impression of driving on asphalt, and both cars effectively refrain from dynamic cornering. With the exception of the SRT version, neither Jeep nor Toyota try to combine salt and sugar and reassure the eyes of their customers that their cars are a compromise between ride comfort and the sporty feel that comes from simply pressing the gas pedal harder.
A high center of gravity, a solid curb weight and huge handlebars effectively fight off any madness that provokes a Porsche Cayenne or BMW X6 from the very beginning. Land Cruiser V8 and Grand Cherokee do not pretend to be anything, but unlike the fashionable and sleek SUVs of German brands, they feel much better in less sterile terrain.
The biggest limitation that kept me from getting more muddy and dirty on both machines was the stock road tires. As any true alpha male knows, in pristine and unfamiliar terrain, good tires are a must. The tires that the test specimens were shod with were, of course, not bad, but on more tenacious surfaces they felt much better. Unlike tyres, I could rely on a range of electronic systems and mechanical solutions available practically at my fingertips.
The Land Cruiser V8, like the Grand Cherokee, has all-wheel drive. Permanent four-wheel drive without the need to connect any axle only in emergency situations. In addition, the pleasure of working in difficult conditions is made even more enjoyable by the air suspension with three-stage height adjustment (x-AHC), the damping force adjustment switch (AVS) and the Crawl Control system. , which is a system for non-specialists to control ascents and descents. There was also a gearbox and the ability to lock the center differential. Do you think this is where all off-road gadgets end? Nothing could be more wrong.
Both the small and large versions of the Land Cruiser are based on a frame structure that provides greater stability when driving over rough terrain. KDSS, i.e. a system that changes the stiffness of the front and rear anti-roll bars also comes to the aid of fans of off-road pranks. An interesting fact is the mysterious sounding OTA system. What does this mean in practice? Braking the rear inner wheel to reduce the turning radius. The most civilized and at the same time accessible even to unprepared users is the handle of the Multi-terrain Select system. With it, we can choose the area in which we are currently moving and rely completely on electronics.
In the off-road realm, the Jeep Grand Cherokee is also nothing to be ashamed of. The Selec-terrain knob located on the central tunnel, just like the Japanese, allows you to select the terrain that you are going to overcome. Reducer and air suspension with adjustable clearance? They are also available. True, the Yankee has a little less gadgets to help navigate the wilderness, but in difficult conditions he copes no worse than his Far Eastern comrade.
Both machines can really do a lot. Stepping out of the muddy mirrors of a Land Cruiser or Grand Cherokee, you will look like happy people who have had an interesting adventure of their own free will. Dirty trendy BMW, Mercedes or Audi? In this case, associations will roam around a wealthy owner who treats his faceless car as an indispensable element of his life, facilitating short and long distances.
At the moment, the journalistic attendant proposes to the subject to raise the prices of the two heroes of this article. Real men do not talk about money, and if you are interested in any of the presented cars, I invite you to the price list hidden in the depths of manufacturers' websites.
At the beginning of this post, I asked a rather disturbing question: Is a male world full of alpha males being questioned? With fellow travelers like the Jeep Grand Cherokee and the Toyota Land Cruiser V8, we can sleep peacefully without worrying about the fate of people who have real "cohons" and not shaved blanks.
