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Grenadier Prototype First Off-Road Drive Impressions · The Overland Journal Podcast

0:00
Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to the Overland Journal podcast. I am
0:03
Speaker 1: your host, Scott Brady, and I'm joined today by my
0:05
Speaker 1: co host Matt Scott. In today's episode, we are so
0:09
Speaker 1: excited to share our early driving impressions of the Anios
0:14
Speaker 1: Grenadier prototype. We were fortunate to be the first in
0:17
Speaker 1: the Americas to test an America's spec Grenadier prototype in
0:21
Speaker 1: technical terrain. We actually used it in the Uri National
0:24
Speaker 1: Forest at the Overland Experts training grounds. So enjoy our
0:29
Speaker 1: wide ranging conversation on the capabilities of the vehicle, how
0:32
Speaker 1: it compares with others in the segment, and what we
0:35
Speaker 1: can look forward to with the Grenadier in the very
0:38
Speaker 1: near future. This content is brought to you by Overland Journal,
0:43
Speaker 1: our premium quality print publication. The magazine was founded in
0:47
Speaker 1: two thousand and six with the goal of providing independent
0:51
Speaker 1: equipment and vehicle reviews, along with the most stunning adventures
0:56
Speaker 1: and photography. We care deeply about the country and cultures
1:00
Speaker 1: we visit and share our experiences freely with our readers.
1:06
Speaker 1: We also have zero averatorial policy and do not accept
1:10
Speaker 1: any advertiser compensation for our reviews. By subscribing to Overland Journal,
1:16
Speaker 1: you're helping to support our employee owned and veteran owned publication.
1:21
Speaker 1: Your support also provides resources and funding for content like
1:25
Speaker 1: you are watching or listening to right now. You can
1:29
Speaker 1: subscribe directly on our website at Overland Journal dot com. So, Matt,
1:38
Speaker 1: today we get to talk about the Grenadier. We've been
1:41
Speaker 1: given the green light to talk about the green light.
1:44
Speaker 1: Talk about that. We have to talk about our driving
1:48
Speaker 1: impressions with the Grenadier. We were actually the first in
1:52
Speaker 1: North America and all of the Americas to drive a
1:56
Speaker 1: America's Spec Granadeer. So, I mean, I actually have the
2:00
Speaker 1: one that I drove right here. You have, we have
2:03
Speaker 1: one here in the US.
2:04
Speaker 2: If you're not following us on YouTube's this will make
2:08
Speaker 2: no sense. But it's actually your birthday.
2:11
Speaker 1: It was my birthday present and it's got like a
2:13
Speaker 1: little the doors open. Yeah, that's very cute. I actually
2:17
Speaker 1: kind of love it. It was. It was one of
2:19
Speaker 1: the best birthday presents I've ever gone.
2:21
Speaker 2: Yeah, and so, so I've driven the model of it,
2:23
Speaker 2: you've driven the real one?
2:25
Speaker 1: And where did you drive it? North Carolina? Or I did?
2:29
Speaker 1: I did. But before we get started, when we first
2:33
Speaker 1: sat down to have this conversation, I noticed that Matt
2:36
Speaker 1: actually has a Glandavog and T shirt on which you
2:39
Speaker 1: did not do intentionally. No, since I drove.
2:41
Speaker 2: I haven't driven my g Wagon in like months, Yeah,
2:44
Speaker 2: and I was like, this is clean. It's like this
2:47
Speaker 2: bougie car guy brand period correct, and it's cool And
2:50
Speaker 2: I don't know, maybe I should have taken my sweatshirt
2:52
Speaker 2: off of it, but it's not.
2:55
Speaker 1: I like it. And it's going to be relevant to
2:57
Speaker 1: the conversation because actually we're gonna have actually comparison between
3:01
Speaker 1: that and I think.
3:01
Speaker 2: There's a lot there's a lot more in common between
3:04
Speaker 2: these vehicles.
3:05
Speaker 1: No question.
3:05
Speaker 2: Yeah, especially with the association of Magnustaire, who you know,
3:08
Speaker 2: originally partnered with Mercedes to develop the g Wagon.
3:12
Speaker 1: For the Yeah, and that's part of what the fun
3:16
Speaker 1: is when you look at the Golandavog and you could
3:19
Speaker 1: tell it was assembled by someone who kind of was
3:22
Speaker 1: told make the best. Sir Jim Ratcliffe, who is the
3:28
Speaker 1: CEO and primary shareholder of the Enios Corporation. He is
3:34
Speaker 1: a lifetime traveler and overlander. He's ridden the length of
3:37
Speaker 1: Africa on a BMW. He drove around all of the
3:40
Speaker 1: places with Defenders and he had a love for the
3:44
Speaker 1: Defender model land Rover, and when they decided to stop
3:49
Speaker 1: making the utility version and start making the Scottsdale version
3:54
Speaker 1: of the Defender.
3:55
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a good way to put it. Well, yeah,
3:56
Speaker 2: I mean I Defense, the Defender's fine. I just like,
3:59
Speaker 2: there's that total Uh, it's a different intent trust.
4:02
Speaker 1: Thing that I don't really have anymore in it. It
4:04
Speaker 1: went from being a utility vehicle to being an suv
4:09
Speaker 1: option for a lot of folks, like it was going
4:11
Speaker 1: to be a discovery. Yeah, it's almost like it was
4:14
Speaker 1: supposed to be a discovery. So yeah, Jim cool dude. Yeah,
4:17
Speaker 1: super basically he even tried to buy all the tooling.
4:21
Speaker 1: That's where the whole thing started. It's a huge Defender fan,
4:25
Speaker 1: lifelong traveler, as you said. And then land River it's like,
4:28
Speaker 1: here's the blank check. I want to buy the tooling
4:30
Speaker 1: and the rights Defender. I want to keep making it.
4:32
Speaker 1: You're crazy for stopping and exactly you know, building this
4:36
Speaker 1: other thing. You know. Then we got yeah, we got
4:39
Speaker 1: the Grenadier. And I mean that's what happens when you
4:41
Speaker 1: tell a billionaire no is He's like, well, I'll just
4:44
Speaker 1: make I'll just make my own I think it's.
4:46
Speaker 2: Hard to not have a little bit of a man
4:47
Speaker 2: crush on the studio. And lets find out he bought
4:49
Speaker 2: he bought bell Staff, he did. The cool thing with
4:52
Speaker 2: the Grenadier is what this guy's doing with the Ennios brand,
4:55
Speaker 2: which started as a a petrochemical company, that's right chemicals company.
4:59
Speaker 2: And you can really see that the vehicles developed with passion,
5:03
Speaker 2: like there was someone steering the ship who actually cared
5:06
Speaker 2: or and actually had a vision where I think these
5:09
Speaker 2: days so many cars get so watered down. I mean,
5:12
Speaker 2: I do think that, you know, Jeep does a really
5:14
Speaker 2: good job of preserving the Wrangler. Yes, absolutely, I think
5:19
Speaker 2: that the Defender is maybe the example of I don't
5:22
Speaker 2: want to say all show, no go, because the vehicle
5:24
Speaker 2: is actually very very capable. But it was like, you know,
5:27
Speaker 2: that vehicle always felt to me, Okay, how can we
5:31
Speaker 2: make it appeal to his wide of an audience but
5:35
Speaker 2: still be based on just every other land Rover model.
5:38
Speaker 1: It's just it's the difference between a new model that
5:43
Speaker 1: was pushed by design and marketing, yes, versus a new
5:48
Speaker 1: model that was pushed by enthusiasts and engineers.
5:51
Speaker 2: Yeah, there was a singular vision with the with the Grenadier,
5:55
Speaker 2: and that is why I'm so interested in it, That's
5:58
Speaker 2: why you're so interested in it. Yeah, And I think
6:00
Speaker 2: it's maybe important to say we're not trying to disparage
6:02
Speaker 2: the Defender, but it is inevitable that you make comparisons
6:06
Speaker 2: between the Grenadier and the Defender.
6:09
Speaker 1: Yeah, and we need to. We need to talk about
6:10
Speaker 1: how does the Grenadier compare to the original Defender, which
6:13
Speaker 1: we have one right behind you here, How does it
6:16
Speaker 1: compare to the new Defender, How does it compare to
6:18
Speaker 1: the g Wagon, How does it compare to the seventy series?
6:21
Speaker 1: These are all really important questions, and fortunately I just
6:25
Speaker 1: have so much time driving all of those and now
6:27
Speaker 1: the Grenadier that we definitely have some opinions around that,
6:31
Speaker 1: which I think will be relevant from the beginning. We
6:35
Speaker 1: have or you have experience. I have opinions. I have
6:38
Speaker 1: nothing but opinions. You have lots of experience now with
6:41
Speaker 1: the Grenadier. I mean, yeah, I know that. Yeah, Well,
6:44
Speaker 1: I just feel I feel so incredibly fortunate. And it's
6:48
Speaker 1: also really important to note that we weren't compensated in
6:51
Speaker 1: any way to go be the first to test the Grenadier.
6:55
Speaker 1: We receive no compensation of any form and Grenadier any
6:59
Speaker 1: As is not an advertiser, just genuinely, we were just extreme. Yeah,
7:04
Speaker 1: it was a perfect It was a perfect fit with
7:06
Speaker 1: our experience and passion for the project and them wanting
7:10
Speaker 1: to have an impartial journalist review the product. It was
7:15
Speaker 1: a great It was a great fit. So yeah, we
7:17
Speaker 1: got a chance to fly out to North Carolina. We
7:22
Speaker 1: went to the Uari National Forest and there is a
7:25
Speaker 1: private inholding there that's owned by the folks at Overland Experts,
7:30
Speaker 1: and Overland Experts is one of the it's like they're
7:34
Speaker 1: they're right below the surface of what we see in
7:36
Speaker 1: popular overlanding because they don't really need to promote themselves
7:41
Speaker 1: to the public space. But they're one of the most
7:44
Speaker 1: capable overland training testing and like kind of military support
7:51
Speaker 1: organizations out there. They do a lot of secret squirrel
7:55
Speaker 1: vehicle training stuff back east and a hyper competent team
7:59
Speaker 1: of trainers and drives. Most of them are ex military.
8:02
Speaker 1: But because this is a private in holding where they
8:05
Speaker 1: have lots of buffer of land that gives it a
8:09
Speaker 1: lot of secrecy, they do a lot of testing of
8:12
Speaker 1: OEM vehicles and military vehicles there, including the Grenadier. So
8:17
Speaker 1: we go to the Overland Experts facility and there's a
8:21
Speaker 1: bunch of prototype Grenadier's there. There were other people there
8:25
Speaker 1: that were unrelated to journalism. There was some of the
8:29
Speaker 1: folks from seven P were there, and some marketing team
8:32
Speaker 1: members related to Grenadier. But I was the only one
8:35
Speaker 1: there that got to talk about it, at least in
8:37
Speaker 1: a timely fashion. So, yeah, what'd you think? Well? I
8:40
Speaker 1: think the for me that the immediate takeaway is that
8:45
Speaker 1: it has a placard on the vehicle. It's actually right
8:47
Speaker 1: at the a pillar in front of the driver, and
8:50
Speaker 1: it says built on purpose. And that is a fairly
8:53
Speaker 1: bold statement. And it also is something that is clearly
8:57
Speaker 1: the mission of the Grenadier, which is, we're going to
9:00
Speaker 1: build a vehicle that's suitable for NGOs in developing countries,
9:05
Speaker 1: and we're going to build a vehicle suitable for adventure
9:07
Speaker 1: travelers and overlanders that want to do extreme remote travel.
9:13
Speaker 1: And it was built on purpose to do that. And
9:16
Speaker 1: when I drove it, I realized very early on that
9:20
Speaker 1: the vehicle very much was built to that specification, to
9:25
Speaker 1: that goal. I'll give you some great examples of it.
9:28
Speaker 1: When you sit in the vehicle, you're sitting on ricaro seats,
9:32
Speaker 1: which sounds very cool and very bougie. But there's a
9:35
Speaker 1: bunch of advantages to recaro seats. But they are not
9:39
Speaker 1: electric in any way. They are all manual recaro seats,
9:44
Speaker 1: less way, less stuff to go wrong, less stuff to
9:46
Speaker 1: go wrong, and if you're water forwarding, you're not getting
9:49
Speaker 1: all of those components wet dirty, all the gears aren't
9:52
Speaker 1: getting dusty and filled with gunk or whatever else, and
9:55
Speaker 1: all mechanical recaro seats. So a comfortable, supportive seat that's lightweight.
10:01
Speaker 2: And that's an existing component. Right, So as a startup company, yeah,
10:05
Speaker 2: they don't have to spend x kajillion dollars designing these components.
10:10
Speaker 2: It seems to me that Grenadier any Us they're relying
10:13
Speaker 2: on really trusted suppliers.
10:15
Speaker 1: It seems like it. Yeah, that's and that's a good
10:18
Speaker 1: that's a good approach because you get to adopt all
10:20
Speaker 1: those learnings. There's a lot of BOSH components on their
10:23
Speaker 1: BMW components designed by Magna Steier in Austria, so there's
10:28
Speaker 1: a lot of like you said, premium suppliers and collaborators
10:33
Speaker 1: that are involved. So another great example is you sit
10:37
Speaker 1: in the vehicle and you look down and oh, my goodness,
10:40
Speaker 1: there's actually a an all mechanical parking break. This is
10:44
Speaker 1: twenty twenty three. Yeah, my truck doesn't have a mechanical
10:48
Speaker 1: parking break, not even one that you apply with a
10:50
Speaker 1: footing that's true, Like they're all that way, they're all either.
10:55
Speaker 1: But it's a foot break. Yeah, it's a foot one,
10:57
Speaker 1: which what we want is a mechanical handbrake.
11:02
Speaker 2: Yeah, if it's snowy and you have a parking lot
11:04
Speaker 2: by yourself, a mechanical handbreak with your hand hand break
11:08
Speaker 2: a lot more fun than one with your foot.
11:10
Speaker 1: That's right. Well, there's a lot of reasons for it.
11:12
Speaker 1: They are more fun because you can get Especially in
11:14
Speaker 1: this configuration, which is different from a land rover. The
11:17
Speaker 1: parking brake is on the rear axle, so if you
11:20
Speaker 1: have the center differential open and you apply the handbrake,
11:24
Speaker 1: you're going to initiate the vehicle rotating, oversteering, drifting the
11:28
Speaker 1: vehicle using the handbrake. In a land rover, it's always
11:31
Speaker 1: funny when people tried to do that because it was
11:33
Speaker 1: on the transfer case, had a very different effect. It
11:38
Speaker 1: has a mechanical handbrake. It has a cable activated transfer
11:43
Speaker 1: case with high range and low range, and then an
11:46
Speaker 1: open center differential in the transfer case that can be
11:50
Speaker 1: locked in either higher range or a low range. So
11:53
Speaker 1: very much like the land Rover transfer cases, but it's
11:56
Speaker 1: an actual lever connected to a cable that runs down
12:00
Speaker 1: a cable and to a physical transfer case. That's cool.
12:04
Speaker 1: I mean, which is which is built by Trust something
12:06
Speaker 1: that you don't see, which is built by Tremic. So
12:09
Speaker 1: it's a Tremic transfer case. It's about two point five
12:12
Speaker 1: to one low range, which is plenty low when you
12:15
Speaker 1: combine it with the five I think it's a five
12:17
Speaker 1: point four to one first gear in the transmission that's
12:20
Speaker 1: actually not finalized. That says ZF e HP, which it is.
12:24
Speaker 2: If anybody has heard me geek out on automatic transmissions.
12:27
Speaker 1: That is, that's the ones trusted from. It's where rolls,
12:30
Speaker 1: Royce and Bentley agree. Yeah, that's right, great trends.
12:33
Speaker 2: Let's talk about that two to five to one thing,
12:35
Speaker 2: because there's going to be somebody here with a you know,
12:37
Speaker 2: with a rubicon or for some scenarios, lower is better.
12:41
Speaker 1: But I actually find.
12:42
Speaker 2: Like two point five to one that's what's in you know,
12:46
Speaker 2: the g Wagon for example, I think the defenders two
12:48
Speaker 2: point seven seven one and L two two thirty. Anything
12:52
Speaker 2: lower than that and you almost end up with too
12:55
Speaker 2: short of gearing.
12:56
Speaker 1: Particularly in reverse. That's where if you've ever driven a
13:00
Speaker 1: Rubicon Wrangler in the dunes or in the mud or
13:03
Speaker 1: in the snow, the four to one transfer case is
13:05
Speaker 1: actually a liability. And initially the four to one transfer
13:10
Speaker 1: case were these very low transfer case gears. They actually
13:13
Speaker 1: made a ton of seats because you had these were
13:16
Speaker 1: Toyota mini trucks and land cruisers and vehicles that either
13:21
Speaker 1: had a four speed automatic with a very tall first gear,
13:24
Speaker 1: or they had a manual transmission and having a four
13:27
Speaker 1: to one with a manual.
13:28
Speaker 2: Man and they didn't have the same power curves. You know,
13:31
Speaker 2: it's not about it's not always about how much torque
13:35
Speaker 2: or how much horsepower the vehicle makes. Oftentimes it's where
13:38
Speaker 2: it makes it. And I think that that's what's yeah,
13:40
Speaker 2: absolutely about the engine that they've chosen, which is in
13:44
Speaker 2: North America, we're just going to get the B fifty eight,
13:46
Speaker 2: which is a gasoline version, but they're both from a
13:49
Speaker 2: BMW derivative B seventy seven diesel B fifty eight petrol,
13:54
Speaker 2: and I want to say they're running their own proprietary
13:58
Speaker 2: simpler bosh trying to control they make power so low
14:03
Speaker 2: and they have this flat torque curve and have to
14:06
Speaker 2: have four to one. Let's say that you have your
14:09
Speaker 2: Pennistar and the Rubicon. Well, that doesn't one. The engine
14:13
Speaker 2: doesn't really make much torque, and it makes all of
14:15
Speaker 2: its torque very high up. That's true when you take
14:17
Speaker 2: everything in I think for utility use.
14:20
Speaker 1: Yeah, four to one in this application would actually be
14:23
Speaker 1: a negative. This vehicle has a fifty to one low
14:25
Speaker 1: range with an automatic, which is absolutely perfect. It's very clear.
14:30
Speaker 1: This has nothing to do with the Grenadier. This is
14:32
Speaker 1: just in the same way that fifty to one is
14:35
Speaker 1: perfect with an automatic, seventy five to one is perfect
14:39
Speaker 1: with a manual. Closer to one hundred is even better
14:41
Speaker 1: for extreme rock crawling. And it's the same reason why
14:44
Speaker 1: we want to have a tire diameter that's twice the
14:46
Speaker 1: wheel diameter. These are basic functionalities of a vehicle that
14:50
Speaker 1: make them perform exceptionally well in the conditions that we
14:54
Speaker 1: like to travel in. So fifty to one is ideal
14:56
Speaker 1: with an eight speed automatic. Five point four to one
14:59
Speaker 1: first gear. It's plenty low. I did a lot of
15:02
Speaker 1: left foot breaking in the technical terrain on this course.
15:05
Speaker 1: There was no shortage of crawl ratio, both for descending
15:11
Speaker 1: and for ascending. Yeah. Just I'm just excited about it. Yeah,
15:15
Speaker 1: it's super it's super cool. I think like that being
15:18
Speaker 1: like it doesn't it shouldn't even exist in twenty twenty three,
15:20
Speaker 1: but somehow talking it does, it does. It's it's pretty
15:23
Speaker 1: cool on I think the one area that I'm a
15:25
Speaker 1: little bit skeptical of they're the BMW power plants, and
15:29
Speaker 1: he has been making straight six engines for a really
15:32
Speaker 1: long time. There's an advantage to an inline motor.
15:35
Speaker 2: I'm not going to say half the moving components, but
15:38
Speaker 2: you have one head gasket. You know, you've got one
15:40
Speaker 2: set of valves, you have one cam chef, well maybe
15:42
Speaker 2: you have two cam chefs, cord camera, well whatever it yeah, sure,
15:45
Speaker 2: you know, it's simpler, it's easier to work on. There's
15:47
Speaker 2: less components to fail, there's one manifold.
15:50
Speaker 1: They tend to run cooler as well. They're very smooth, smooth.
15:54
Speaker 2: You know, I have confidence in this engine because you
15:58
Speaker 2: know Magnus Staire, who as I believe kirk n wrong
16:01
Speaker 2: was an engineering.
16:02
Speaker 1: Partner as a term development and engineering partner.
16:05
Speaker 2: Yeah, so Magnisteria was a few things. They're an engineering company,
16:08
Speaker 2: they're a manufacturing company on the engineering side. That's that's
16:13
Speaker 2: where in THEOS partner with them on the manufacturing side,
16:17
Speaker 2: and I guess the engineering side.
16:19
Speaker 1: That's where the G Wagon came from. That's right right
16:22
Speaker 1: back then, it wasn't.
16:23
Speaker 2: Magnistaire Magne is a Kadie company that bought into I
16:25
Speaker 2: think it was Styre Poosh Poosh at the time. I mean,
16:28
Speaker 2: they've made everything from the Styre og, the pins Gower, the.
16:32
Speaker 1: Halflinger, and the g Wagon. The g Wagon.
16:35
Speaker 2: They're also a contract manufacturer, so this is a service
16:38
Speaker 2: that they offered. They have again going back to from
16:41
Speaker 2: an outside perspective, that ten thousand foot view, they've really
16:44
Speaker 2: chosen kind of the right people to assist them on
16:47
Speaker 2: this evokeue that we drove in Greece was going to
16:50
Speaker 2: be built at the Magnus stair plant. They're kind of
16:52
Speaker 2: like this contract manufacturer that's good at doing specific models
16:57
Speaker 2: and turning things around very quickly.
17:00
Speaker 1: They build the Supra well, and that was when you
17:02
Speaker 1: mentioned that that I found that to be very interesting.
17:05
Speaker 1: So those that are listening that are Toyota fans, they're
17:07
Speaker 1: going to really hang their hat on reliability. And so
17:12
Speaker 1: you have the company that designed and built the g Wagon,
17:16
Speaker 1: you have the company that now manufactures the Toyota Supra.
17:20
Speaker 1: And as I understand it, based on the way that
17:23
Speaker 1: you described it, there are a lot of similarities between
17:26
Speaker 1: that engine, between the engine in the Grenadier and the
17:29
Speaker 1: engine in the Supra. So Toyota is not going to
17:32
Speaker 1: use a motor that doesn't have at least and they
17:35
Speaker 1: use the fundamentally now I mean to fundamentally the Supra
17:39
Speaker 1: is a BMW Z four underneath. Yeah, sure, right.
17:42
Speaker 2: Again, what I'm getting at is this is a drive
17:44
Speaker 2: line where I'm starting to get confidence back in it.
17:47
Speaker 1: And it's been around a while as well.
17:49
Speaker 2: Because the problem, as you were saying, is the cars
17:52
Speaker 2: have maybe not gotten reliable.
17:55
Speaker 1: Now, BMW had some dark ages. I mean, if you
17:57
Speaker 1: look at I remember reading an article where they were
18:01
Speaker 1: comparing a twenty year old Lexus reliability against a two
18:05
Speaker 1: year old BMW and it was like the twenty year
18:08
Speaker 1: old Lexus was more reliable by a wide margin. So
18:12
Speaker 1: obviously BMW is trying to address that, and if you
18:15
Speaker 1: look at some of their reliability numbers, they are improving
18:18
Speaker 1: in a lot of ways. I think you make a
18:20
Speaker 1: valid point. You have this vehicle that is very simple,
18:24
Speaker 1: very austere, minimal systems as minimal systems as they can
18:28
Speaker 1: possibly have. That dot and its.
18:30
Speaker 2: Yeah, and let's touch on that too, Like everybody wants
18:33
Speaker 2: not everybody, but there's a contingent of people out there
18:36
Speaker 2: that seem to be very vocal, don't maybe necessarily seem
18:40
Speaker 2: to be new vehicle purchasers, right, Like, that's something I've
18:43
Speaker 2: mentioned before, is that there's people who have opinions on
18:46
Speaker 2: new vehicles, and there's people who buy new vehicles. New
18:50
Speaker 2: vehicles have to be manufactured for those that buy them,
18:53
Speaker 2: not those that have opinions on them. It brings to
18:56
Speaker 2: finish off the engine thing they've worked with that platform before.
19:00
Speaker 2: You know, it's a tried and true engine gearbox combination.
19:04
Speaker 2: I mean in twenty twenty three, now that we're in that,
19:07
Speaker 2: you know the rest of it, the body, the axles,
19:10
Speaker 2: the drive line, the frame, that kind of stuff that's
19:12
Speaker 2: not that sophisticated anymore.
19:15
Speaker 1: Yeah, in fact, this is intentional. This is intentionally unsophisticated,
19:19
Speaker 1: which I actually so this is a body on frame vehicle.
19:23
Speaker 1: How rare is that defined in an suv. It's got
19:26
Speaker 1: solid front and rear axles, which is something that we
19:28
Speaker 1: always ask for, and the price point isn't really that bad. No.
19:33
Speaker 1: If you do some comparisons between vehicles, like if you
19:37
Speaker 1: were to compare a two hundred series land Cruiser in
19:41
Speaker 1: the UK to two hundred series land Cruiser that was
19:43
Speaker 1: sold here in the US, it looks like that this
19:46
Speaker 1: vehicle is going to come in in the high sixties
19:49
Speaker 1: to the high nineties as a range, maybe even the
19:53
Speaker 1: low sixties. So if you look at how much cars
19:56
Speaker 1: cost today, that's a hell of a deal.
19:58
Speaker 2: Well, so you have just to branch out into competing vehicles.
20:02
Speaker 2: You have the Wrangler, great vehicle. Yeah, I had a Gladiator.
20:06
Speaker 2: I really really appreciate them. They have the benefit of
20:09
Speaker 2: huge volume. I mean they will make.
20:11
Speaker 1: Quarter million Wranglers a year.
20:12
Speaker 2: Yeah, they make They make huge numbers, so you're able
20:15
Speaker 2: to get that economy of scale. You know, those are
20:18
Speaker 2: anywhere realistically mid to high thirties to seventies. Now, I
20:24
Speaker 2: mean we have oh.
20:25
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's a hundred thousand dollars Wranglers thousand, yeah, if
20:28
Speaker 1: you want them.
20:29
Speaker 2: And then on the far end of the spectrum of
20:32
Speaker 2: body on frame vehicles you have the G Wagon. So
20:34
Speaker 2: if you're going to try and get a G Wagon,
20:36
Speaker 2: the really cool thing, now you can get the professional package.
20:40
Speaker 2: It's a little bit of a watered down professional package,
20:42
Speaker 2: but realistically it's appropriate for what the G five to
20:46
Speaker 2: fifty is.
20:47
Speaker 1: I just I was looking at one. It's one hundred
20:49
Speaker 1: and eighty nine thousand dollars. Yeah, if you could get it,
20:54
Speaker 1: if you could get it right by the time you
20:56
Speaker 1: build it out and you do the professional pack and
20:58
Speaker 1: you do like maybe a cool color like the uh
21:02
Speaker 1: the tan, or they do the weird blue, and you
21:05
Speaker 1: have these two opposite ends of the spectrum. And I
21:08
Speaker 1: think when you consider that you're getting an Austrian bill
21:12
Speaker 1: vehicle with German components and all of these key players
21:16
Speaker 1: involved in the sixty to eighty range, with a twin
21:21
Speaker 1: turbo in line six and an eight speed, that's I'm
21:24
Speaker 1: not saying that it's not a lot of money. Yeah,
21:26
Speaker 1: it's just everything is a lot of money. Everything it's
21:29
Speaker 1: a lot of money. But I get this sneaking suspicion
21:32
Speaker 1: with the Grenadier that there's good value for money there.
21:35
Speaker 1: I agree again, Like you buy the three ninety two
21:38
Speaker 1: for eighty ninety thousand dollars and then you have to
21:41
Speaker 1: send it, not you have to, but a lot of
21:43
Speaker 1: people then send it to AV and they get some
21:46
Speaker 1: nicer interior, some different bumpers, some different wheels, some suspensions
21:51
Speaker 1: of this, and that it's done. I mean you can
21:53
Speaker 1: get a roof rack, you can get I mean everything,
21:56
Speaker 1: you can literally just expect the vehicle pretty much, get
21:59
Speaker 1: in it, throw a fridge in at driver around the
22:01
Speaker 1: world and you're done. And it's probably good to kind
22:03
Speaker 1: of compare the Grenadier with a Wrangler. We have a
22:07
Speaker 1: lot of time in the JL and the JK. They
22:11
Speaker 1: actually are quite similar. In fact, the recent the more
22:14
Speaker 1: recent jails have actually had a bump and payload as well,
22:18
Speaker 1: So you can get a JL close to fourteen hundred
22:21
Speaker 1: pound payload, five link front and rear suspension, solid axle
22:25
Speaker 1: body on frame. So there's a lot of similarities between
22:28
Speaker 1: the two. What you notice most about the Grenadier is
22:31
Speaker 1: the available interior space. The overall volume of the interior
22:37
Speaker 1: is significantly.
22:38
Speaker 2: High because you're building over the tires that's right, not
22:42
Speaker 2: building in between them and then adding and the significant tender.
22:45
Speaker 1: Flares, the rollcage of a Wrangler just and it's got
22:49
Speaker 1: this kind of squatty roofline, which all those things make
22:52
Speaker 1: a Wrangler extremely cool. It's not to take for sure,
22:54
Speaker 1: it's literally not to take anything away from a Wrangler,
22:56
Speaker 1: But when it comes to I'm going to buy a
22:59
Speaker 1: box and travel with it. The Grenadier is a box
23:02
Speaker 1: that you travel and it's literally as square as they
23:05
Speaker 1: could make it, and the interior is as space efficient
23:08
Speaker 1: as they could possibly make it. It has a lot
23:11
Speaker 1: of interior room. It reminds me a lot of a
23:15
Speaker 1: one ten station wagon, although it has a little bit
23:18
Speaker 1: more length on the inside.
23:21
Speaker 2: I'm fascinating. I know that from some people I can't mention.
23:23
Speaker 2: There's kind of some oe solutions coming for campers and
23:27
Speaker 2: pop down.
23:29
Speaker 1: The aftermarket's going to hit it hard, and that's going
23:31
Speaker 1: to be the key to the success of the Grenadier.
23:34
Speaker 1: Is in the same way that the Wrangler is one
23:37
Speaker 1: of the most modified vehicles. I have a different view.
23:40
Speaker 1: I don't think that the aftermarket needs a hit it
23:41
Speaker 1: that hard.
23:42
Speaker 2: I could I could maybe advocate for a little bit
23:44
Speaker 2: larger tire, maybe a little bit more suspension height for
23:47
Speaker 2: recreational off roading. But I think that the beauty of
23:50
Speaker 2: the Grenadier is what do you actually need? Are you
23:53
Speaker 2: just are people you know, just going to like throw
23:56
Speaker 2: a bunch of LED lights and crap on their affirm
23:58
Speaker 2: card like they do with Ranger.
24:00
Speaker 1: They're going to yeahah, they're going to. But it doesn't
24:03
Speaker 1: any there, It doesn't need it, and I would agree
24:05
Speaker 1: with you. So we drove it on very technical terrain
24:09
Speaker 1: in Yuwari, and the vehicle is on a thirty two
24:13
Speaker 1: inch tall tire, the equivalent of a thirty two by
24:16
Speaker 1: eleven fifty and it will easily fit a thirty three,
24:19
Speaker 1: So we kind of have this. It won't take a
24:22
Speaker 1: sixteen inch wheel, which I think there's going to be
24:25
Speaker 1: some more evaluation around that, but it doesn't look like
24:27
Speaker 1: it'll take a sixteen.
24:28
Speaker 2: It's on a seventeen, right, It is on a seventeen,
24:30
Speaker 2: which is fine. A seventeen is the new it's six.
24:33
Speaker 2: If you're thinking.
24:34
Speaker 1: About tire availability, yeah, we're talking about a stock Wrangler
24:38
Speaker 1: Rubicon tire, right. I mean that is like the most
24:41
Speaker 1: probably the most common total for AD tire you can
24:44
Speaker 1: get and it's a nice balance. A two point fifty
24:47
Speaker 1: five eighty or seventeen will fit on this vehicle with
24:51
Speaker 1: no modification. Okay, so that's a full thirty three inch
24:54
Speaker 1: tall tire. There is absolutely room in the wheel wells
24:57
Speaker 1: for a thirty five, like a narrow thirty five. So
25:00
Speaker 1: think of like the thirty five ten to fifty Kenda.
25:03
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, you have those on your GM's got them
25:05
Speaker 1: on the GMC, and I love those tires. It's a
25:07
Speaker 1: great size. There needs to be a lot more options
25:10
Speaker 1: around that size because it's perfect. You don't end up
25:13
Speaker 1: with two wide of a tire, so you don't end
25:14
Speaker 1: up with a lot of loss and efficiency, and it
25:17
Speaker 1: fits in the wheel well nicely because it's the same
25:19
Speaker 1: width as the factory tire. I think that a thirty
25:22
Speaker 1: five ten fifty on a seventeen inch wheel on a
25:24
Speaker 1: Grenadier with about a fifty millimeters lift is going to
25:28
Speaker 1: be it's going to go anywhere you want to go
25:30
Speaker 1: because you've got a locking rear differential, a locking center differential,
25:34
Speaker 1: a locking front differential, and a five link suspension, so
25:38
Speaker 1: the rear has a lot of articulation. The front also
25:41
Speaker 1: has a lot of articulation. Is it weirdsarmed up front? No,
25:45
Speaker 1: it's not. It's five link in the front, just like
25:47
Speaker 1: a Wrangler. So if you were to compare a Defender
25:49
Speaker 1: one ten, an original Defender one ten, to the Grenadier,
25:54
Speaker 1: the Grenadier has a lot more available wheel travel and articulation.
25:58
Speaker 1: The articulation in the front is only limited by the
26:01
Speaker 1: swaybar if you remove the factor, which we're not suggesting
26:05
Speaker 1: that people do that, but a lot of people may
26:08
Speaker 1: consider removing the front swaybar or putting a front swaybar
26:11
Speaker 1: with a different with a different rating on it. There
26:14
Speaker 1: is a lot of available articulation out of the front,
26:17
Speaker 1: so it'll have more articulation than the gew Wagon. In
26:19
Speaker 1: the front, it'll not very hard, it'll have more articulation
26:22
Speaker 1: the gew Wagon. In the rear, it'll have more articulation
26:25
Speaker 1: than the Defender one ten, the original Classic. It'll have
26:28
Speaker 1: more articulation than an eighty series land Cruiser because it
26:31
Speaker 1: doesn't have a radius arm front suspension. It has a
26:34
Speaker 1: five link, so it's going to be on par with
26:36
Speaker 1: articulation to a jeep wrangler, more like a jeep wrangler. JK.
26:40
Speaker 1: There's there is a little bit of advantage to the
26:43
Speaker 1: JL through shock length and shock positioning that the grant.
26:46
Speaker 2: I do think that have that the Wrangler really, you know,
26:50
Speaker 2: Jeep does a great job of kind of designing for
26:52
Speaker 2: the after totally absolutely, but.
26:54
Speaker 1: They're different buyers. Yeah. Right.
26:56
Speaker 2: When I think of the Grenitier, I think of overlanding
26:58
Speaker 2: twenty ten. I think when it was more about travel
27:02
Speaker 2: than likes on Instagram, and it was more about likes
27:05
Speaker 2: or light bars, like likes or light bars, and you know, hey,
27:08
Speaker 2: whatever the markets, the market's broadened because of that, We've
27:12
Speaker 2: both done really well, you know in disclosure. Grateful, grateful, Yeah,
27:16
Speaker 2: super grateful. I really think that. I think that there's
27:19
Speaker 2: gonna be a lot of people that miss the concept
27:21
Speaker 2: of the Grenadier because they're not really aware of I
27:25
Speaker 2: don't want to say what real overlanding is, but it's
27:27
Speaker 2: about travel, not conquering trails. Somehow overlanding became Hell's revenge
27:34
Speaker 2: in Moab when that was always it was already called something,
27:38
Speaker 2: it was called off off roading exactly. I think where
27:41
Speaker 2: I'm so excited about the Anios Grenadier and why, I mean,
27:45
Speaker 2: why I put my name in full price, no discounts, whatever,
27:49
Speaker 2: I should have, by my estimation, one of the one
27:52
Speaker 2: of the first. I mean that the email got sent
27:54
Speaker 2: out at eleven. I did know that emails be sent
27:57
Speaker 2: out at a certain time. Positive put really excited. I'm going
28:00
Speaker 2: to do probably the bell Staff Trial Master addition.
28:04
Speaker 1: Which is the name of one of the jackets. Yeah. Yeah,
28:07
Speaker 1: so it's not to be confused. Some people are calling
28:10
Speaker 1: it the trail Master. It is not the trail it's trial.
28:13
Speaker 1: Just flip the Yeah, I ride trials.
28:16
Speaker 2: I got I got roped into it from my wife's family,
28:20
Speaker 2: where everyone rides trials, including my mother in law, so
28:25
Speaker 2: I had no choice. I was all into adventure bikes,
28:27
Speaker 2: you know, with my buddy Scotty and stuff, and then
28:30
Speaker 2: you know those are those big dumb things.
28:31
Speaker 1: That's that's silly. And my first trial, I thought, you.
28:35
Speaker 2: Know, I've had this bell Staff Trial Master jacket for
28:39
Speaker 2: a long time.
28:40
Speaker 1: And I'm like, oh, it's gonna be so cool. I'm
28:41
Speaker 1: going to do a trial. And there's like three other
28:43
Speaker 1: guys there doing it. I thought I was the snowflake
28:46
Speaker 1: here and I have not lived that down in my
28:50
Speaker 1: family yet. But anyway, I'm really excited. I'm probably just
28:54
Speaker 1: going to go all out on it, like turnkey, Like
28:57
Speaker 1: I love the idea of a turnkey vehicle with quality components.
29:02
Speaker 2: And then maybe we'll drive one like across Africa or something, yeah,
29:05
Speaker 2: or do something and fully appropriate. Yeah, fully appropriate, because
29:09
Speaker 2: that's what this I think this vehicle is about. It's
29:11
Speaker 2: not about it seems to be all go and less
29:14
Speaker 2: about the show.
29:15
Speaker 1: Oh for sure. It's basically a box with wheels, which
29:18
Speaker 1: is how overland vehicles were always designed exactly. And it's
29:22
Speaker 1: got great approach angle, great departure angle, good breakover one
29:26
Speaker 1: hundred and fifteen inch wheelbase, so it's right between a
29:29
Speaker 1: Wrangler JL unlimited and a land Cruiser land Cruisers one twelve. Yeah,
29:34
Speaker 1: the jails at almost one hundred and eighteen.
29:37
Speaker 2: And think about the places that you're actually exploring these days. Yeah,
29:41
Speaker 2: you know, in the age of the Defender one ten
29:43
Speaker 2: or whatever. Yeah, there is a dream. There's places you
29:45
Speaker 2: couldn't go without modifying the vehicle.
29:48
Speaker 1: You know, it's the.
29:49
Speaker 2: World's pretty much paved. Like you're you're looking for trouble
29:53
Speaker 2: verging on to justify a vehicle with traction control, huge
29:57
Speaker 2: amounts of low end torque, locking down diferentials, all of
30:00
Speaker 2: the things that so many vehicles these days tick the
30:03
Speaker 2: box of you're squarely in the realm of recreational off roading,
30:07
Speaker 2: which is great, not disparaging.
30:09
Speaker 1: I like, reserve capability in this vehicle has it? Yeah, this,
30:12
Speaker 1: this vehicle has it.
30:13
Speaker 2: But as we were talking, like the route line into
30:15
Speaker 2: Cape Town's paved now it is you know you can
30:18
Speaker 2: you can drive around the world and nearly anything. Like
30:21
Speaker 2: I've been really interested in eccentric stuff like drive my
30:24
Speaker 2: little sixty eight nine eleven chart wheelbase around the world
30:26
Speaker 2: or something, because you can do that. Now, yeah, you talk,
30:29
Speaker 2: So to look at a vehicle like this that has
30:31
Speaker 2: plenty of articulation, all of the traction aids, differentials, et cetera,
30:36
Speaker 2: and thirty two inch tires, Like there's an argument that
30:39
Speaker 2: even that's overkill for some things. Now if you're well,
30:42
Speaker 2: there's an argument there, I'm not arguing that well.
30:44
Speaker 1: And I think I think the key now why capability matters,
30:48
Speaker 1: in my opinion, Matt, is that there are a lot
30:50
Speaker 1: more people doing it. So like if you were to
30:53
Speaker 1: go to Sedona and try to find a camp spot,
30:55
Speaker 1: if you have like a standard level of capability, you're
30:59
Speaker 1: camp next to any two other people.
31:01
Speaker 2: Can I start lying to people about campsites being closed
31:03
Speaker 2: in Sedona.
31:05
Speaker 1: That's what I like about having the additional capabilities. You
31:08
Speaker 1: can get further, you can get further away, or you
31:10
Speaker 1: can take a more obscure route where you feel like
31:13
Speaker 1: you're on more of an adventure than just on a
31:15
Speaker 1: road trip.
31:16
Speaker 2: I should balance things by completely calling myself out because
31:19
Speaker 2: I have been the guy with and I am the
31:22
Speaker 2: guy with very large tires and all of those things.
31:25
Speaker 2: So there's wants, and there's needs, and damn it, I
31:27
Speaker 2: want them. So you can submit something to our complaint box.
31:33
Speaker 1: I like reserve capability. I like reserve capacity, which means payload.
31:38
Speaker 1: This vehicle comes in and around nineteen hundred pounds of payload,
31:41
Speaker 1: which is way more than anything else you're going to find.
31:43
Speaker 2: Nineteen hundred pounds, equipped with a lot of the things
31:46
Speaker 2: you want, with steel bumpers that realistically don't need to
31:49
Speaker 2: be replaced an oracle all the time, obviously like and
31:53
Speaker 2: this is with all manufacturers. The final payload is depended
31:55
Speaker 2: upon the options that are selected, which is maybe something
31:59
Speaker 2: that people think cause the mistake, as they'll see, oh
32:02
Speaker 2: Ford Ranger or Chief Gladiator has sixteen hundred pounds.
32:06
Speaker 1: Well that's sport. Yeah, with manual.
32:09
Speaker 2: Windows and this and that transmission whatever. To have a
32:12
Speaker 2: reasonably well equipped vehicle with that amount of payload, you know,
32:15
Speaker 2: it's cool.
32:16
Speaker 1: I mean to be fair. The Defender also, the new
32:18
Speaker 1: Defender has a phenomenal payload and is very capable off road.
32:23
Speaker 1: It's complex. So the thing that I think a lot
32:26
Speaker 1: of people like about the Grenadier is its boxy, as
32:30
Speaker 1: simple as you can make a vehicle in twenty twenty three.
32:32
Speaker 1: I like the little barn doors. Yeah, the little barn
32:35
Speaker 1: doors are awesome. These are some of my takeaways from
32:37
Speaker 1: driving the vehicle. So in the technical terrain you've got
32:42
Speaker 1: very low head toss, which also speaks to tuning of
32:45
Speaker 1: the suspension and low center and gravity. That's right. And
32:48
Speaker 1: it also has not only long travel, but good articulation overall,
32:54
Speaker 1: so the hood stays really flat. There's a couple of
32:56
Speaker 1: things that I noticed that throttle modulation is good, but
33:00
Speaker 1: it's a little aggressive on tip in. But this again
33:03
Speaker 1: is this can be something that they will change by
33:06
Speaker 1: the time of that they do. That is that is
33:08
Speaker 1: definitely a consumer preference, so it may not change, but
33:12
Speaker 1: you attenuate that by using one modern breaking.
33:14
Speaker 2: Yeah, modern cars, you basically just you put the throttle
33:16
Speaker 2: down ten percent and then it just shifts through the
33:19
Speaker 2: gears exactly exactly a.
33:21
Speaker 1: Little bit more throttle response on tip in has become
33:24
Speaker 1: much more common, but that is present in the Grenadier,
33:27
Speaker 1: so you're kind of missing that really long throttle travel
33:31
Speaker 1: that you would get from a classic land rover, which
33:34
Speaker 1: is always something I really appreciated about the vehicle. Same
33:36
Speaker 1: with a g Wagon under left foot breaking, you can
33:39
Speaker 1: attenuate all of that. So I think that throttle modulation
33:42
Speaker 1: throughout the range is quite good. Break modulation is excellent.
33:46
Speaker 1: It's not too grabby like we experienced that with the Defender.
33:49
Speaker 1: It was the breaks are a little grabby. They're a
33:52
Speaker 1: lot more sensitive on initial application, whereas the Grenadier very
33:57
Speaker 1: smooth break application really allows for left foot braking. The
34:01
Speaker 1: tracks control system works quite well. In fact, I really
34:05
Speaker 1: didn't need a locker for any of it. But the
34:07
Speaker 1: locker settles the vehicle down and it also reduces trail impact.
34:11
Speaker 1: We were on trails that were intentionally meant to be
34:14
Speaker 1: private property, that's right off road course. So when you're
34:17
Speaker 1: driving regular trails, you always want to engage full drive
34:21
Speaker 1: and engage lockers is appropriate to minimize trail damage. But
34:24
Speaker 1: the lockers turn on and off really easy. It's right
34:26
Speaker 1: on the overhead console, big fat switches. You could do
34:30
Speaker 1: it with a gloved hand, super easy. It does have
34:32
Speaker 1: an off road mode that you can go into. It
34:35
Speaker 1: changes some screens and changes some of the algorithms around
34:38
Speaker 1: the tracks control. The tracks control is a little less
34:41
Speaker 1: effective under left foot braking, so hopefully that's something that
34:44
Speaker 1: they address. The tracks control in off road mode should
34:47
Speaker 1: not be reduced in effectiveness under left foot braking, so
34:51
Speaker 1: you want to stay the same like an a track
34:54
Speaker 1: or something like that you'd see in Toyota. What I
34:56
Speaker 1: noticed when I was driving it at kind of modern
34:59
Speaker 1: moderate higher speeds on the dirt was that you notice
35:03
Speaker 1: a little bit of that payload. So it's a little
35:05
Speaker 1: firmer in the rear suspension, which again as a reason
35:10
Speaker 1: air bags, yeah, or you just loaded up with your
35:12
Speaker 1: gear and then it's going to drive great. For those
35:15
Speaker 1: that are driving one unloaded, it's going to be a
35:18
Speaker 1: little firmer in the rear, but there's a reason for
35:21
Speaker 1: That's how you get the payload. These are eyebox springs
35:24
Speaker 1: progressive rate. They've done everything that they can to address that,
35:28
Speaker 1: but it's the nature of like if you hop into
35:30
Speaker 1: a thirty five hundred RAM, the ride quality in the
35:33
Speaker 1: rear is going to be a little firm because it's
35:35
Speaker 1: meant to carry a bunch of stuff. Just be aware
35:37
Speaker 1: of that when you drive the vehicle. It's not an issue.
35:40
Speaker 1: It's actually intentional, so a little bit firmer in the rear.
35:44
Speaker 1: I thought the steering was surprisingly direct for a solid axle.
35:48
Speaker 1: You know, a lot of you don't want it to
35:50
Speaker 1: that's right, it is, and you don't want it to
35:53
Speaker 1: be too direct because it leads to a lot of
35:57
Speaker 1: driver fatigue. This isn't a sports car, so we're not
36:00
Speaker 1: trying to be super precise in the way that the
36:02
Speaker 1: steering responds. So I thought it was a nicely weighted steering,
36:06
Speaker 1: and I thought that the it was appropriately direct. It
36:10
Speaker 1: didn't feel vague like older land Cruisers in the seventy
36:13
Speaker 1: series pretty vague. This is less vague, but just the
36:17
Speaker 1: right amount.
36:18
Speaker 2: So I think the two areas. You know, we've sung
36:21
Speaker 2: the praises the vehicle, how we want it to succeed.
36:24
Speaker 2: Let's get into the dirty We have to right, we
36:28
Speaker 2: have to balance. So the things that really concern me
36:31
Speaker 2: are to get off the bat the build quality, right,
36:34
Speaker 2: I haven't experienced it, but whenever a new car company
36:38
Speaker 2: comes onto the scene, regardless of you know, the engineering
36:42
Speaker 2: consultants and suppliers and whatever, there are divisions at Stilantis
36:47
Speaker 2: that work on switch gear and you know, noise, vibration,
36:51
Speaker 2: harshness and all of these things. How did you feel
36:54
Speaker 2: the build quality the vehicle was? And then after that,
36:57
Speaker 2: I want to I do want to do all a
36:58
Speaker 2: little bit on the serve network of it, Yeah, because
37:01
Speaker 2: I know, again to compare it to a jeep or
37:04
Speaker 2: even a land Rover, there's a there's a dealer network.
37:07
Speaker 2: There's currently zero announced dealers from what I'm aware of.
37:11
Speaker 2: With Anios, Yeah, we can talk about the things that
37:14
Speaker 2: I know about both of those things. I did ask
37:17
Speaker 2: the question.
37:18
Speaker 1: They had some Anios personnel there that were related to
37:22
Speaker 1: after sales and some of the systems, and I asked
37:27
Speaker 1: that question. The way that I look around build quality
37:30
Speaker 1: is that it's built in a Mercedes plant. So it
37:34
Speaker 1: was a prior Mercedes plant in Hambach, France, designed by
37:38
Speaker 1: Magnes Steier. And it's also very simple. So as far
37:42
Speaker 1: as my experience driving the vehicle, I had very little
37:47
Speaker 1: of that kind of plastic squeakiness going on. I didn't
37:50
Speaker 1: have any rattles, very little of the plastic squeakiness going on.
37:54
Speaker 2: Not that you can't get that with a major company.
37:56
Speaker 2: I mean, I think Fords do that for me. Is
37:58
Speaker 2: you know, like every little edge has as old seam
38:01
Speaker 2: line or whatever.
38:01
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think cost cutting, but I think that the
38:04
Speaker 1: vehicle has an advantage around it being very simple. Yeah,
38:07
Speaker 1: and I think the fact that it's made in a Mercedes,
38:09
Speaker 1: a prior Mercedes plant. They use a lot of the
38:11
Speaker 1: same employees, designed by Magne Steier, I think those are
38:15
Speaker 1: things that help it to come across is build quality.
38:18
Speaker 1: It's also not intended to be a cheap vehicle, so
38:22
Speaker 1: they are building it for a more affluent consumer.
38:26
Speaker 2: I am so surprised that they don't have a Mercedes
38:29
Speaker 2: engine in it. There are increasing ties between in THEOS
38:33
Speaker 2: and Mercedes, whether that's through their sailing efforts, they're both
38:38
Speaker 2: you know, supporters of the Mercedes AMGF one team. Well,
38:43
Speaker 2: Lewis Hamilton driving one of these things, I always maybe
38:46
Speaker 2: a little bit of a conflict but Mercedes is okay
38:48
Speaker 2: with it.
38:48
Speaker 1: I think it was great. Well, and maybe you know
38:51
Speaker 1: the answer to this. Does Mercedes have a program like
38:54
Speaker 1: that where they sell their engines out to other manufacts
38:57
Speaker 1: they do.
38:58
Speaker 2: The best known example of it probably would be Aston Martin,
39:01
Speaker 2: Oh Okay. So they have the same engine that's in
39:04
Speaker 2: the E sixty three s Wagon that I lent you.
39:07
Speaker 1: It's insane, which is it's insane, It makes no sense.
39:10
Speaker 1: It's literally if you get a chance to drive an
39:12
Speaker 1: E sixty three s Wagon and did you launch it?
39:16
Speaker 1: Though I don't think you launched it. I mean it's
39:18
Speaker 1: your car, so I like, but it doesn't mean I
39:20
Speaker 1: didn't get under warranty. Mean you I know. It was insane.
39:23
Speaker 2: So crazy it was anyway, But it's the same motor.
39:25
Speaker 2: It's it's their four liter by turbo. It's kind of
39:27
Speaker 2: a hot V style, so they farm that engine out
39:30
Speaker 2: to a lot of people.
39:31
Speaker 1: I can see why it's unbelievable. I thought it was like,
39:34
Speaker 1: this thing is so fast, and then I realized that
39:36
Speaker 1: there's like a whole nother stage of the accelerator that
39:38
Speaker 1: I never had gotten into. And then it was like wow,
39:41
Speaker 1: you know, anyway, I had any Hair.
39:43
Speaker 2: I'm just I'm just curious to see, like with these
39:45
Speaker 2: increasing ties between those two companies and the things that
39:48
Speaker 2: they sponsor, especially when you have a company like any Us,
39:52
Speaker 2: and I think that this is an interesting thing to
39:53
Speaker 2: talk about.
39:54
Speaker 1: Is where the.
39:55
Speaker 2: Company is gonna go. Yeah, because it doesn't have to
39:58
Speaker 2: report to shareholders. That's the thing is. Anios is one
40:01
Speaker 2: of the largest privately owned companies in the world. I
40:06
Speaker 2: think it's the largest privately owned company in the United Kingdom.
40:09
Speaker 2: Correct me if I'm wrong, could be wrong, But take
40:12
Speaker 2: Jeep part of the Stilanis Group, which is now you know,
40:14
Speaker 2: Fiat Pougeot conglomerate publicly traded, land Rover publicly traded. All
40:20
Speaker 2: of these companies that there is publicly traded through Tata Yeah, yeah,
40:24
Speaker 2: I didn't know if so Tata was privately held. No,
40:28
Speaker 2: I'm not sure what SOCCA exchange you're listed on, but
40:31
Speaker 2: I believe that they're public. The cool thing here is
40:33
Speaker 2: it's a vision of one person. For sure, there's one
40:35
Speaker 2: person driving it. There's one person that's going to use it.
40:39
Speaker 2: There's all that many people are gonna use it. But
40:40
Speaker 2: there's the guy at the top is motivated for it
40:43
Speaker 2: to be successful, because it's in essence of I don't
40:45
Speaker 2: want to call it a passion project, because that is
40:47
Speaker 2: like something you do when you open a coffee shop,
40:49
Speaker 2: but the point being that they don't really have anybody
40:52
Speaker 2: else to answer to aside from one guy. Yeah, obviously
40:56
Speaker 2: he wants to be profitable. What happens next for this vehicle,
40:59
Speaker 2: you know, because where it's at now.
41:00
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I'd love to see a crew cab
41:03
Speaker 1: truck version. What happens rubicon of this? I mean the
41:07
Speaker 1: version of this they're likely going to do that. I mean,
41:10
Speaker 1: I don't know, I have no information to that extent,
41:12
Speaker 1: but why not Why wouldn't you, Why wouldn't you have
41:15
Speaker 1: a more and even more capable variant of that? And
41:19
Speaker 1: I think people will be looking for it. I think
41:21
Speaker 1: that they're gonna they're going to be very surprised by
41:23
Speaker 1: how high the ticket price can be of this vehicle
41:27
Speaker 1: with the right packages. But I also am really grateful
41:30
Speaker 1: to the fact that you can buy us like a
41:32
Speaker 1: stock standard one still with without a lot of options,
41:35
Speaker 1: because that'll also take you around the world. So I
41:38
Speaker 1: drove most of the course without putting the lockers on,
41:41
Speaker 1: and the times that I did was just to test
41:43
Speaker 1: their capability, so you're going to be able to go
41:44
Speaker 1: anywhere you want even without the locker version. But as
41:47
Speaker 1: far as the build quality, my initial impressions were quite good,
41:51
Speaker 1: and it's because it is very simple. Like this again,
41:55
Speaker 1: the seats, no electronics in the seats, the dash like
41:58
Speaker 1: there's actually no gauge pod other than this very small,
42:02
Speaker 1: little like vestigial warning pod that's in front of the driver.
42:06
Speaker 1: The only thing on the dash is this screen that
42:10
Speaker 1: it's in the center and it shows all the things.
42:12
Speaker 1: So there's just not much to go wrong. I do
42:15
Speaker 1: suspect like I think about my g Wagon after thirty
42:18
Speaker 1: something years, there were some squeaks and rattles, but not many,
42:21
Speaker 1: and I think it'll probably be similar to that. The
42:24
Speaker 1: dealer network is the big unknown, and it's going to
42:27
Speaker 1: be really important that they get that right. It's going
42:29
Speaker 1: to be important that they get the experience right when
42:31
Speaker 1: someone has a problem that they're taken care of, you know.
42:34
Speaker 1: And then when you think about it as an overland vehicle.
42:38
Speaker 1: The one thing that I noticed was the rear seats
42:40
Speaker 1: when they fold down, they don't The whole floor isn't flat,
42:44
Speaker 1: so you end up death for dog people when they
42:48
Speaker 1: flip forward. The floor is flat, but then how does
42:51
Speaker 1: your dog put its head on the center console and
42:53
Speaker 1: you get it. Yeah, so I think that someone's going
42:55
Speaker 1: to need to come up with like a low profile
42:57
Speaker 1: drawer system that ends up with this perfectly flat floor
43:00
Speaker 1: back there, because you've got to be able to sleep
43:01
Speaker 1: in these things. It is long enough to sleep in,
43:03
Speaker 1: which is really important. It has a pretty high roof line,
43:07
Speaker 1: so you end up, you know, being able to kind
43:09
Speaker 1: of sleep inside the vehicle. So that's something that I
43:12
Speaker 1: that I like it. You know, it's going to have
43:14
Speaker 1: an auxiliary battery option from the factory, which is kind
43:18
Speaker 1: of cool. And the batteries are underneath the passenger seats
43:22
Speaker 1: in the second row, so they're very low and centralized, centralized.
43:26
Speaker 1: That's kind of cool. So I think I think we're
43:29
Speaker 1: going to be pretty pleased with this thing under most circumstances.
43:34
Speaker 1: You know, it's not going to be as capable as
43:36
Speaker 1: a wrangler, but it's going to be pretty close. Cool. Well,
43:39
Speaker 1: I can't wait to drive it. Hopefully we make sure
43:41
Speaker 1: that'll have I'm sure that'll happen soon. Yeah, I think
43:45
Speaker 1: we're going to have some announcements here soon that we
43:47
Speaker 1: can share. So cool. Thanks Matt. Yeah, we've got a
43:51
Speaker 1: riff on Grenady here. I mean imagine, I mean, think
43:53
Speaker 1: about it. It is twenty twenty three and we just
43:55
Speaker 1: got to talk about a new car company that's introducing
43:58
Speaker 1: a body on frame solid acule for World Drive. You know,
44:02
Speaker 1: it's like it's I think it'd never imagined.
44:04
Speaker 2: I think if you're in the position to support it,
44:06
Speaker 2: it probably makes sense to at least give it a try, right,
44:09
Speaker 2: I mean, how many of us have sat around the
44:11
Speaker 2: campfire and said, I wish somebody would make a vehicle
44:15
Speaker 2: like this.
44:16
Speaker 1: Nobody gets it. They're not offering this. Well, now somebody is. Yeah,
44:20
Speaker 1: and the worst thing that can happen is people don't
44:22
Speaker 1: step up to support it. If you don't if you
44:24
Speaker 1: don't support your local new restaurant, they close. If you
44:27
Speaker 1: don't support the company that's actually making the car you've
44:31
Speaker 1: been screaming about for the last twenty years. And we're
44:34
Speaker 1: not telling people, obviously to go buy new vehicles, but
44:36
Speaker 1: it's just more like, if you have to stay within
44:38
Speaker 1: your means, and yeah, stay within your mer If we
44:40
Speaker 1: don't support people who are doing cool stuff. Then you
44:43
Speaker 1: know we don't get we don't get cool toys. Yeah, exactly,
44:46
Speaker 1: awsool thanks man. Until next time. Yeah, and then we've
44:48
Speaker 1: got a full article on Expedition Portal on the first
44:53
Speaker 1: drive of the Grenadier. We also have on YouTube a
44:55
Speaker 1: first drive video that shows a lot of the off
44:58
Speaker 1: road performance that we just talked about, so check those
45:01
Speaker 1: out on the Expedition Portal YouTube channel. And until next time,
45:06
Speaker 1: we'll talk to you.