Avenger reassembled
PETROL-ENGINED JEEP WILL APPEAL TO A YOUNGER AUDIENCE
EXCELLENT. Nice small car, conventional petrol engine and a manual gearbox. No worrying about charging and easy to park. A week with the Jeep Avenger promises to be rather pleasant.
We tested the Avenger last autumn and really liked it and found it worthy of its win in the European Car of The Year competition.
That Avenger was electric, which was the only powertrain that we were going to get in the UK.
However, that decision had been made before it was obvious that the electric car movement was having serious problems in the UK.
Within weeks Jeep announced that, ahem, it would also be selling the Avenger with combustion engines after all.
To be specific, the car is available with a hybrid powertrain and with a straightforward petrol engine up front without any electrification.
The latter is the car we’re testing this week. The manual gearbox we’ve already hinted at above and this sixspeed unit is attached to a 1.2-litre three-cylinder petrol engine that produces exactly 100bhp.
We’ve met this engine before in various other Stellantis Group cars including several Citroens and Vauxhalls. It’s a characterful unit with a distinctive three-cylinder thrum. Jeep claims 50.5mpg and a 0-62mph time of 10.6 seconds.
That’s a second slower than the electric Avenger can manage.
Our car is in Altitude+ trim that is actually a limited edition launch model of which only 500 are being imported. You might still be able to snap one up.
It costs £27,600 and comes with a lot of kit as standard including a JBL sound system. The entry level model, by the way, costs £23,600. You’re looking at both that and this Altitude+ being cheaper than the electric versions by almost £10,000.
However, it’s worth looking out for deals on the EV as Jeep, like most manufacturers, is having to offer massive incentives – such as large deposit contributions – to tempt people into its EVs. So it’s probable that Jeep will offer deals that make things between petrol and electric more level.
This would be a very good thing because much to my surprise I far prefer the electric Avenger. This car’s petrol engine does have character but the gearbox is notchy and not very pleasant to use. The instant torque of electric power is missed and so is the smoothness and simplicity of just planting your foot on the accelerator and letting the car flow down the road.
Because the Avenger is small, only 24mm longer than a Vauxhall Corsa, it’s not surprising that rear legroom is a bit tight. Thanks to its boxy styling, however, headroom is copious front and back. The boot is generous and holds 355 litres of luggage with seats up and 1,053 litres when folded.
There’s a lot of hard plastics but perhaps that’s OK in a car that has an off-road image, even if you’re unlikely to take this front-wheeldrive car off road. Annoying, the coloured strip that runs across the dashboard, which really lifts the interior, is only available on yellow and black cars. Pity, as a band of red would have looked cool on our similarly painted test car.
Because it is small, the Avenger made a great city car. Not so much this one with its slightly annoying gearbox. Perhaps the perfect compromise for those who don’t want to go fully electric, can’t afford to or logistically can’t live with one, might be the Avenger hybrid.
Despite our criticisms, you can expect this stylish, affordable version of the smallest Jeep to be a big sales success.
Particularly, I suspect, with a younger audience.