Five minutes after driving off the Ford lot.

COTD

“Prominently featured on the dash were a row of hand buttons for locking the front or rear differentials, or engage Trail Turn Assist”

My driver was climbing 19-degree hills and fording water

“How can we make this worse in every possible way?”

Yeah - I was all about it till I saw there was no “I’d rather be Cummin’ than Strokin’” sticker on the back.

Yeah, it was a small miracle that the flags this thing was flying were not Trump’s and ye olde confederate flag. With a large set of neon green truck nutz thrown in for good measure.

Oh, ok, so I bet this compensates for the hideous complications of adding a diesel engine to a vehicle already not known for reliability by this diesel providing a shit-ton of torque and a decent upgrade in HP, right?

No he is rolling “cole”.

This is no dice on every level. It leaks, shit is broken, no mileage listed, it’s old. And I wouldn’t consider the engine swap exactly an upgrade over the stock 3.8 minivan engine this thing left the factory with. I’ll keep saving for a Bronco.

I’ve seen some dipshit projects come across this site in the past, and equally dipshit owners, but this guy encapsulates the insanity mixed with a healthy dose of dumpster fire that 2020 has become. A shitty 100hp 4 pot diesel in a newer Wrangler that will absolutely, certainly never properly work? For twenty two…

Yeah, my first reaction was ‘well held!’

“It’s pretty much what you think happens”

Nope. That went way better than expected. I was expecting that to start flipping when it spun around. Hell, it looks like it only barely kissed the barrier just once too.

Manual operation! What kind of peasant do they take you for?

130K kit car....

What that seems to demonstrate is the regulatory “burden” is zero - considering they appear to have put jack stands under the frame of the blue truck so it doesn’t even squat under the load.

When I buy a Bronco it will be driven on pavement 99% of the time even though I plan to do at least 4-5 off roading trips a year with it (mild trails to camp away from people, going up to the dunes, snow camp). A stick shift makes the 99% of time I’m driving it on road more interesting and the offroading I will be…

I going with “meh” here. The Badlands trim can have a manual that gets the 4.7 axle radio (like the squatch).  Front and rear lockers (like the squatch).   The only big thing I can see missing is the 35" tires which can be added later.

It’s like the small cars from 10 years ago or so, which are only interesting to drive with a stick, but if you want a stick, you get roll up windows, no A/C, radio delete and no carpeting.   “You can have a bit of fun with our car, but we will punish you for thinking of doing so.”

Honestly, it’s almost like they’re putting these out there to guarantee themselves a less than 1% take rate to give themselves backup to take to “the board” or whomever that they should never offer a manual transmission again.