Made-in-India Jeep Compass finally UNVEILED

The Jeep Compass is one of the most-awaited SUVs of the year. The made-in-India version of the Jeep Compass has been finally unveiled today. Fiat’s Ranjangaon plant will produce world’s only Right-Hand-Drive models and the vehicles will be exported to the Australia, UK and Japan. Here’s all you need to know.

The Compass has a wide stance and gets the signature Jeep grille with seven slots. The overall design has been inspired from the SR71 Blackbird aircraft. The Compass retains the trapezoidal wheel arches, which is the Jeep brand’s signature touch.

The vehicle has an approach angle of 17 degrees and departure angle of 32 degrees. The approach and the departure angle helps the vehicle to climb on steep inclines or come down from one without scraping the front and rear bumpers of the vehicle. The greater the angle, the better.

However, the ground clearance is modest 178 mm. In contrast, the XUV500 offers a hefty 200 mm.  The design of the Compass focuses on maximising the interior space and the cargo volume of the vehicle. Jeep says that the interior and the exterior design has been heavily inspired from the Cherokee.

On the inside, the Jeep Compass has been very smartly designed. The vehicle gets contrasting stitches, perforated leather seats and multiple storage spaces all around the cabin. Jeep will also provide premium colour palettes to the customers that will offer a wide range of choices.

The Compass will come with 4X4 capability but there will be a 4X2 option too. The Jeep 4X4 comes with Active Drive Mode, which offers rear axle disconnection that increases the fuel economy. The feature can help the Jeep Compass stay very efficient by allowing it to switch into 4X2 mode whenever the conditions are not challenging.

The feature also offers brake lock, which is similar to the differential lock. There is no differential lock available with the vehicle but whenever the car detects that a wheel is slipping, the brake is applied on that wheel transferring the power to the other wheel on the axle. The Active Drive Mode can seamlessly switch to 4X4 whenever needed on the fly. Select 4X4 Management system comes with 4 modes that can be selected according to the road conditions. The car will come with Auto, Snow, Mud, and Sand mode. Each mode can change the power delivery to the front and the rear axle and make the vehicle very efficient depending on the condition it is in.

The vehicle will come with two engine options, 1.4-litre Multi-Air petrol engine that produces a maximum of 160 horsepower and 250 Nm of torque. The 2.0-litre ECO diesel engine churns out a maximum of 170 horsepower and 350 Nm of maximum torque. There will be a six-speed manual transmission and a dual dry-clutch seven-speed automatic transmission offered.

The Compass will also come with independent McPherson front suspensions and Chapman independent rear spring that improves cornering speed and enables upto 20mm of rear wheel articulation. The ride quality is improved by the Frequency Sensitive Damping (FSD) feature. According to Jeep, the Compass has been tested for over 25.7 million kms on and off-road.

The Compass will come with over 50 safety features. Features like Electronic Stability Control, Hill Start Assist, Front airbags on the base version, 6 airbags in the top end variant, ABS + EBD, disc brakes on all four wheels, all aluminium front and rear crumple zone, electronic rollover mitigation, all-speed traction control, windshield with anti-fog coating, cornering fog lamps and more. The fuel fill is capless. Jeep will start serial production in June this year, and bookings will open soon. The Compass will be launched sometime around August-September in India. The SUV’s prices are likely to start at 16 lakh rupees.

Image credits: FlyWheel