The $100,000 Jeep Trackhawk Is the Most Powerful SUV Ever

this is a 2018 Jeep Grand Cherokee track Hawk and it is the single most powerful SUV ever manufactured let me put that in context I recently made a video with the Mercedes G 65 AMG and that thing has a v12 in fact a twin-turbocharged v-12 this has more power and not just a little more power this mid-sized SUV built in Detroit has 90 more horsepower than a twin-turbocharged v-12 Mercedes today I'm going to show you around it first a little background the numbers the Jeep Grand Cherokee track Hawk has a supercharged v8 with 707 horsepower in 645 pound-feet of torque and a Jeep Grand Cherokee it starts around eighty seven eighty eight thousand dollars it'll do 0 to 60 in 3.4 seconds it'll do the quarter mile in 11.6 seconds and it'll top out at a hundred and eighty miles an hour in a Jeep Grand Cherokee which begs the question how did this happen there have been high-performance Grand Cherokee models for years starting with the 5.9 limited in 1998 then in 2005 there was the original Grand Cherokee srt8 which had 420 horsepower which seemed like a crazy amount at the time the current Grand Cherokee SRT has 470 horsepower which really is crazy it'll do 0 to 60 and 4.4 seconds this is for people who think that is a little mundane but of course it isn't quite that simple Chrysler developed this 700 horsepower engine for the Challenger Hellcat and then they figured why limit it to the Challenger so they stuck it in the charger and then they figured why limit it to cars and so now I'm standing next to a 700 horsepower Jeep Grand Cherokee which by the way I've borrowed from a viewer near Annapolis Maryland who has his own YouTube channel called DHR Street speed you can check it out if you click the link in the description below and you should check it out because in addition to this he also has a Viper ACR a a demon coming and a Camaro zl1 coming and a Corvette zr1 coming so today I'm gonna show you around the Grand Cherokee track Hawk and I'm gonna show you all of its cool features and its interesting quirks and then I'm gonna get it out on the road and see what it's like to drive a midsize SUV with 411 more horsepower than a Toyota Highlander with 437 more horsepower than a Honda Pilot and then of course I'm going to give it a dug score and four more of my thoughts on the track Hawk experience click the link below to visit autotrader.com slash oversteer I'm gonna start by climbing inside the track hawk well you'll notice a few changes over the standard Grand Cherokee and even the SRT to let you know you're in something special for example the steering wheel says track hawk on the bottom the Floor Mats say track Hawk on them the sill plate says supercharge you don't get that in a regular Jeep these seats say track Hawk on them which was a nice little touch and of course they're more thickly bolster and of course there's also a nice smattering of carbon fiber and one of the other things you'll notice when you climb in this car is that it's just a pretty nice place to be the interior is pretty well put together carbon fiber aluminum leather stitching then again this car better be pretty well equipped inside because well you know I told you these things cost around eighty eight thousand dollars well that's the base price take a look at the window sticker of this one this one is just a hair under a hundred thousand dollars for a Jeep Grand Cherokee so it's nice that this interior is pretty well equipped and pretty nicely appointed with nice leather and materials everywhere if you're gonna be spending a hundred grand on an SUV another way you can tell the track apart on the inside that would be the 200 mile an hour speedometer you don't get one of those if you buy a Grand Cherokee Limited to haul your kids to soccer practice the next interesting interior detail you will notice the gear lever in this vehicle now if you've been in any Grand Cherokee from this generation all the way since 2011 you'll notice it looks a little different that's because the old gear lever well there were some issues I'll allow you to google that and find out for yourself the new gear lever is just a regular old gear lever it works like a normal gear lever you move it down put it in Drive put it in park next up even though this thing has 700 horsepower it still retains all the practicality you'd expect from the Grand Cherokee for example there are power outlets basically everywhere there are two USB outlets under this little cover in the center console there's also a cigarette lighter outlet there you want a different cigarette lighter outlet there's one in the center console if you can't find it Jeep has included a helpful little guide so that you can figure out where it is in the back there are two more USBs and then there's even a household style regular power Ella you could plug in your microwave or your toaster and drive around your Grand Cherokee use those things there's not a lot of 700 horsepower cars with a household power outlet for your toaster another interesting item in the center console you see that little dimple in there well that's actually a light so when you're rooting around in your center console you can see what you're looking for Leighton Center consoles are not common that's a little bit odd feature but I like it another interesting thing in this car that you won't find in a standard Grand Cherokee is the launch control button now launch control itself is interesting I'll get to that in just a second but the button is especially cool take a look at it it looks like the old-time drag strip Christmas tree they used to call it with the lights it's really really cool looking it even says launch going downwards like the lights going from red to green on a drag strip now speaking of launch control this car has launch control like so many other modern performance cars and like all those cars it works about the same it lets you rev it up automatically and then it lets you floor it so you can get going at a higher rpm than just flooring it from a stop the interesting thing about the launch control in this car I can't demonstrate it for you because Jeep has disabled the launch control at all the track Hawks for the first 500 miles this car is still on mile 200 or so so we can't use it yet once you hit 500 miles it becomes enabled and you can start doing all the crazy launches you want in your Grand Cherokee next up next to the launch control button you will find a little dial that lets you choose between your drive modes their sport and track for performance auto for the let the car decide and then there's snow and tow mode for when you want to use your Grand Cherokee trailhawk to tow or when you want to use it in the snow which some people probably will now the thing I like most about the little dial in the center is that when you change from mode to mode the gauge cluster changes and shows the Grand Cherokee in various different settings take a look at track mode it's on the move and then there's sport mode auto snow and tow now next to the dial for the drive modes there's a little button that says custom that's because this car allows you to create your own custom drive mode if for example you want soft suspension because you're just commuting but you want the engine in the accelerator to be in track mode in case you have to floor it you can create a custom drive mode that tailors to those specifications but back to the gauge cluster there are a few things I can like in the gauge cluster now on the left and right you have the normal gauge cluster items the speedometer on the left of vehicle information on the right the middle one however is a screen and it's configurable the thing I like about the screen is that it gives cool little icons for various different vehicle functions and information for example the screen that gives the most vehicle information isn't just a picture of a car instead it's the front end from this car it's a little Jeep logo which is kind of cool meanwhile you can find all the little performance stuff if you go to the little icon that's a hawk that would be of course the track Hawk and then finally if you want to see the car's diagnostic codes of it as a check engine light on you go to a little doctor stethoscope like you're checking up on your grand cherokee which is kind of cool now that screen in the gauge cluster shows a bunch of really cool performance features and functions but you can also access them in the infotainment screen in the middle and so with that in mind let's move on to the infotainment screen now before I get into the performance features I want to cover a couple of other interesting items in the infotainment system including one of my favorites this car has a feature that lets you drag icons that you use frequently down to the main menu bar that is always in place this is brilliant I always complain that cars don't have a heated seat thing and you got to go into the menu whatever in this car if you want the heated seat button on the main screen just drag it there and then it's always visible if you want something else just drag it there in its place you want something different just drag it it's a great idea borrowed from cellphones I don't know why no one else has done this but this is brilliant and you connect engineers good going a couple of other interesting things in the infotainment system before I move on to the performance stuff number one is the owner's manual this car comes with a regular paper owner's manual but who would use it the owner's name you own the infotainment system is so simple to use you can search for something by typing in what you're looking for or you can click on pictures you want to know what something is in the interior there's diagrams and pictures you can just point to it and the car will tell you that's a brilliant way to do the owner's manual I wish they were all this easy and speaking of the owner's manual take a look at this once you've read some vehicle information you can use the little thumbs up icon to let Jeep know whether the information was for example Ty Lee you or not useful or something in between another interesting item is that the fader for the stereo lets you Center the sound basically anywhere in the car in your normal car you can put it in the front or in the back or maybe on the sides and this thing you can point it exactly where you want the sound to be which is a feature I like in some really high-end luxury cars and here's a feature that I've never seen in any car no matter how high-end you can change the display units to metric Imperial Fahrenheit Celsius that's true in a lot of cars but in this one you don't just flip one switch Fahrenheit Celsius instead you can change everything so if you want engine power displayed in PS instead of horsepower you can do that but if you want temperature in Fahrenheit instead of Celsius you can do that it's not just metric and imperial it lets you configure every single little display so that if you have some things you want in metric and some things you want imperial you can do that I don't know who would ever actually change these things usually your one or the other but the fact that it lets you configure that is incredible and next we move on to the performance part of the infotainment system and there are some interesting features in here starting with the drive modes you'll notice that if you put the car in Eco mode it disables the shift paddles you can use the paddles in every other mode but in Eco mode the car knows best and it will be shifting for you and you can't do anything about it press this little button to take it out of Eco mode and then you get your panels back now a couple of other interesting things in the drive mode section one of which is the shift light this car apparently has a shift light even though it's an automatic and you can set where the shift light comes on what RPM it comes on it also interesting is the launch control you can set the RPM from which the vehicle launches there's actually a pretty steep range you can launch it as high as 3500 rpm and since this thing has all-wheel drive it'll probably hook up and get going although if I was buying a track Hawk he used I think the first thing I would do is go into the drive mode section the infotainment system and see where the prior owner set the launch control if they have it at 3500 rpm maybe find a different one next up we move on to the performance pages section of the infotainment system and if you have an SRT vehicle you've already seen all this stuff so I apologize for being repetitive but for those who don't have 700 horsepower Chrysler products there are quite a few interesting things in here the homescreen gives a few widgets and you can pick and choose the ones you want displayed you can also see what happens as I rev the engine or horsepower displays in real time next we move on to timers and it's truly amazing this thing doesn't bother with 0 to 60 and quarter-mile this thing has everything eighth mile braking distance 0 to 100 trap speed it even logs your reaction time then there's gauges which is an array of nine gauges no one is ever going to look at and include some crazy stuff air fuel ration intake air temperature all updating in real time next up is g-force which of course displays the G's you're pulling in real time but that's not its most interesting feature that honor goes to the steering angle display check this out I turn the steering wheel and this screen actually updates my exact steering angle in real time next up is the engine tab which has this cool gauge that displays a variety of functions in real time horsepower torque boost pressure and it also shows you what gear you're in and your current speed and then there's the dyno tab which is truly amazing it keeps track of your power and torque in what looks like a rolling dyno chart and that's boost pressure on the bottom and the crazy thing is if you press history it shows you more 60 seconds or 90 seconds of history rolling in real time and here's what it looks like when I press the accelerator a bit you can see the chart recording of the jumps the only thing I didn't like about the infotainment system was the wait times which in some cases are insane I pressed performance pages for instance and waited 37 seconds for it to come up not an exaggeration are there little people back there running around behind the screen trying to reorganize things when I make a selection next up moving on to the back seats there are a couple of interesting quirks back here I already showed you the household power outlet back here in the two USB ports proving this car has endless practicality despite its crazy performance it's also reasonably roomy back here I mean this is a normal Grand Cherokee and there are a couple of other interesting practicality items one of which is just how easily the seats fold down Jeep obviously put a lot of effort into making the seats fold down easily for people who want to carry stuff in their normal grand cherokee and that carries over the tract lock also these seats are recline pull that tab and you can just lay back in the pack state of your track Hawk there are no other 700 horsepower cars that offer those two features I promise you next up moving outside the track Hawk we might as well start with basically the coolest part that would be under the hood the 6.2 liter supercharged v8 707 horsepower 645 pound-feet take a look at this thing there's something incredibly quirky or unusual under the hood although I do like the fact that there's no plastic cover under here you can gaze at your supercharged v8 as much as you want if you get yourself a track on ya there's no plastic cover and you know what else this car doesn't have a speed limiter Chrysler just lets it go until it's out of juice which turns out to be somewhere around 180 miles an hour like I mentioned before which is just crazy in terms of 0 to 60 this car is quicker than the BMW x5m and the Porsche Cayenne Turbo S but the engine isn't the only crazy thing in the front of the track Hawk take a look at those brakes the track Hawk has 15-inch rear brakes in 15 and 3/4 inch front brakes from massive basically 16-inch brakes you can buy a Camry and still get 16-inch wheels my AMG has 18-inch wheels this thing has 16-inch brakes is absolutely ridiculous but then again when you get 700 horsepower in an SUV it's probably good to have big brakes in order to stop meanwhile around back there are a couple of interesting things about the track hawk for example surprise surprise this vehicle has a higher towing capacity than the standard Grand Cherokee probably owing to its 700 horsepower engine this thing can tow 7,200 pounds very very quickly and then we move on to the exhaust now in spite of the fact that the track Hawk has basically the same powertrain as all the other Hellcat models it doesn't have the same exhaust instead Chrysler put extra mufflers on this borrowed from the Durango SRT to keep it a little bit quieter so it isn't insane after all this is a family luxury SUV nonetheless it still sounds pretty good take a listen also interesting back here like every luxury SUV should this vehicle has a power liftgate push a button here and then the rear tailgate just closes or push a button on the key fob and it opens right up as expected now speaking of the tailgate that's one of the few ways that you can tell the track hawk apart from a standard Grand Cherokee SRT right back here on the tailgate there is a track Hawk badge now interestingly the track Hawk trim level is very similar to the trailhawk trim level which Jeep also offers in fact the badges they use are very similar so if you're behind one of these you might mistake it for a Trail Hawk of course that confusion will only last until you hear it Rumble away from a stoplight or up an on-ramp or until you try to pass it because the trail hawk is just a regular Grand Cherokee some off-roading stuff it doesn't have the giant engine and there are only a few other ways to tell the track hawk apart from the regular SRT one of which is up front Jeep had to ditch the fog lights and the standard Grand Cherokee models because they needed more air intakes to allow the engine to breathe so the fog lights are gone which is unusual on a vehicle this expensive instead the place where the fog lights used to be is for air intakes really the only other way to tell the track honk apart is right up here the wheels are a little bit different than the wheels in the regular SRT model obviously the brakes are enormous you can see the yellow calipers those certainly stand out and there is a supercharged badge right below the badge on the sign that says Grand Cherokee the supercharged badge is on both sides but of course anybody can add most of the stuff the front fascia the wheels the supercharged badge even the track Hawk badging back so the only way to really know if you're looking at a track Hawk is to drive it and so with that in mind you've seen the quirks and features and now it's time for me to do something I've wanted to do ever since I heard Chrysler was thinking about maybe building a Hellcat Jeep I'm going to drive a 700 horsepower mid-sized family SUV alright first thing you do I don't I don't remember being surprised like that by a car and quite some time that is crazy the really crazy thing to me about that speed is how instant it is I've been a lot of fast SUVs and my wagon is pretty fast but you for it and then it takes a little bit because it's a very heavy vehicle and so you've got to kind of wait for it to power to build but this thing to zero is 15 3.4 seconds there's no building it was quicker antiquary t it just happens the moment you step on the throttle I can't believe how fast that is you know I was a little afraid to for it because I had that incident where the hell can because this is all-wheel-drive you're a little you're not quite as nervous so now I'm going to slow speed it feels great it sounds great you know it's just a car I mean anticipate but then I do this I'm honestly the loss like this is I've driven cars that are faster but when you're in a McLaren 720's and you floor and you're low to the ground and you're looking around and it's ridiculous and orange inside and bla bla bla you expect it to be really fast I will say from a dead stop somehow it actually feels slower than when you're going 40 when you're going 40 50 80 for it from a dead stop the sports cars filled feel faster the thing that's really crazy is because this cars so much torque and because these wheels are gonna just grip and grip when you floor it at 50 and you expect to also feel that sort of slow build to power I mean you can tell just how fast that goes on that goes on the moment I thought it's like a switch in order to combat the size of a vehicle like this Chrysler has figured out what you need to do and that's simply put 700 horse it's good it's well controlled man I've been in a rut and a bunch of regular Grand Cherokees and it doesn't feel anywhere near as nimble as this but the steering is light because this is a car you know election an SUV a luxury SUV and if there's a lot of weight to throw around it's a little bit slow to respond to your stand but it's not precise like a like a supercar it's a very good SUV I would say I think this vehicle is fast for any car I think it's in terms of handling notes more good for for an SUV the interior feels like a nice a nice spot like I was saying before everything is well well-made well put together you still get the old Chrysler plastics the GP turn-signal stock the window switches I wish they could upgrade those for for nicer models from Maserati use exam for example as I go through the modes we've gone from auto to sport to track now it does feel it does feel tighter different more precise but it's a still I mean it's an SUV it's just never gonna be sort of on you know crazy sportscar level at the end of the day you can't you can only fight physics so much the one thing that it does have to for the supercharger whine is incredible Wow crazy just it doesn't slow down that was a speed I'm not going to say on camera it doesn't start to feel slower I wonder when it does start to feel slower I should mention I mean I'm driving this thing and I'm so mesmerized by the performance of it I should mention it's comfortable it's a it's a nice feeling car there's a lot of room I'm tall you know there's a ton of room for me there's eight inches above my head in in many ways it just feels like a really nice Jeep Grand Cherokee I also I personally like the subtlety so that's the 2018 Jeep Grand Cherokee track Hawk with the top speed of 180 miles an hour it is too fast with a zero to sixty time of 3.4 seconds it is too quick with a base price around $90,000 it is too expensive and with over 700 horsepower it is simply too powerful it's also way too cool and I really want one $90,000 is too much for me to spend but I am so glad there are people out there buying this vehicle track hawk owners please be careful not for yourselves but because we need to preserve some of these so people like me can buy em used in five years anyway on to the Doug score starting with the weekend categories and styling the track Hawk is fine but I've never loved this generation of Grand Cherokee though I like the improvements for this in the SRT it gets a 6 out of 10 acceleration is mind-blowing it does 0 to 60 in 3.4 seconds and it gets a 9 out of 10 handling is good but not amazing I think it's about in the middle of the types of cars I usually review and it gets a 5 out of 10 cool factor is very high especially among car enthusiasts especially right now it gets an 8 out of 10 but I have no doubt that number will diminish as more of these things get on the road importance however isn't as high this is cool but ultimately this generation of Grand Cherokee is basically 6 years old and it's not a car with huge significance to the automotive world except in ridiculousness still that counts for something and it gets a 6 out of 10 bringing the total weekend scored a 34 out of 50 making it the highest we and score of any SUV I've ever reviewed on to the daily categories starting with features the track lock has everything modern cars need Lane keep assist forward collision braking adaptive cruise control blah blah blah it gets a 9 out of 10 next up is comfort the track lock is fine a little better than average but it does have a slightly harsh ride a wink to its sporty pretensions and its big wheels and it gets a 6 out of 10 quality is fine it's nice inside but it still got some cheap chrysler stuff and i'm never certain about long-term chrysler dependability so it gets a 6 out of 10 practicality is good based on the 68 point 3 cubic feet of cargo room it should get a 9 but fuel economy is so bad and just have to knock that down to an 8 out of 10 finally there's value the track hawk is really expensive for a jeep for a grand cherokee for a Chrysler product and I fear big depreciation but I could be wrong for now at least I'm giving it a 6 out of 10 bringing the total daily scored a 35 out of 50 placing it unsurprisingly near the top add it all up in the track Hawks Doug score is 69 out of 100 that ties it with the Bentley bent a go which in my mind is a huge deal because anyone who knows me knows how much I like the bent a go compare the track out to other utility vehicles I've dug scored and you can see why it did so well it's near even weekend in daily scores speak to its incredible ability as a sporty vehicle and as a practical family hauler okay seriously I want one of these

Channel: Doug DeMuro

Views: 6,116,053

Rating: 4.8485661 out of 5

Keywords: trackhawk, jeep trackhawk, grand cherokee trackhawk, srt trackhawk, hellcat jeep, jeep hellcat, jeep grand cherokee trackhawk, grand cherokee srt, doug demuro, demuro

Id: ek_aZC4KIQM

Length: 25min 42sec (1542 seconds)

Published: Mon Dec 11 2017

Reddit Comments

[u/Trevski]

That metric/US customary thing would be super handy in Canada. Speed/distance in kms, power in horses, fuel in liters, tire pressure in PSI, etc.

[u/HondaJunkie]

/u/Doug-DeMuro have you ever been pulled over or deal with law enforcement while reviewing any of these vehicles?

[u/Mr_Ekles]

I love how FCA specializes in making cheap, rental grade vehicles, and obscene, overpowered, maniacal cars. It seems like there is very little in-between, and I love that!

[u/buckmonaco]

I like how the styling is reserved for such a powerful expensive car, somewhat sleeperish. 98% of the population would think this was a regular Grand Cherokee if they saw it on the road. Hell my Uncle has a Cherokee TrailHawk and Doug is right the badge is almost identical.

[u/left_turn_signal]

Not gonna lie exhaust sounds amazing and that color fits it perfectly.

[u/y2kbaby2]

Come on man I'm trying to study for finals here

[u/[deleted]]

Doug's reaction when he floors it is priceless. Best part of the video!

[u/meeblek]

Hey /u/Doug-DeMuro! Question about your reviewing scores I've wondered about. Do you start with what you think the final result 'should be' and then calculate backwards? Or is the final score always a surprise?

[u/Dreadzombie8]

My fiancee recently picked up a renegade, I'll have to show her that she picked the wrong jeep.