Nevada Road Trip, Part 2 - 2014 Jeep Cherokee Limited Long-Term Road Test

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Nevada Road Trip, Part 2 - 2014 Jeep Cherokee Limited Long-Term Road Test

Road tripping in the Edmunds long-term 2014 Jeep Cherokee Limited.

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grijon

Out of curiosity, may I ask WHY you are not historically a fan of cruise control?

svisek

I just took delivery of a Billet Silver 2015 Cherokee Limited yesterday that we bought for my wife. It is equipped just like your Long-Term car plus a few additional options(Full Sunroof, Luxury Group, Engine Block Heater, Tonneau Cover, and Wireless Charging Pad).

Agree completely re: the excellent Adaptive Cruise. I have been using it for almost all driving as it smoothly brings the car down to a full stop and then just a tiny tap on the gas and it resumes and smoothly takes you back to speed. A vast improvement on the Laser Cruise on our 2006 Toyota Sienna that resumed using full throttle.

A new feature on the 2015 is the auto stop/start. Supposedly saves gas; will have to see if it is worth the annoyance factor. Interestingly, it doesn't seem to activate when the car comes to a stop via the Adaptive Cruise. First time the engine shut off I thought it had stalled.

mtakahashi

grijon said:

Out of curiosity, may I ask WHY you are not historically a fan of cruise control?

i'm a control freak behind the wheel. surrendering any of it has made me uneasy, but technology is finally starting to catch up. either that, or i'm getting lazy.

actualsize

mtakahashi said:

Personally, I don't see the point of offering both separately.

The separate traditional cruise button is a good thing. Why? Our departed long-term Lexus GS350 did not have this layout. To get traditional cruise you first had to activate adaptive cruise and then drop out into traditional mode by flicking the control lever the other way and holding it there for a time.

The downside of this strategy didn't occur to me until I drove into a light snowstorm. The sensor on the nose of the car began to ice over until the adaptive cruise dropped out and displayed an error message. I wanted to solider on with traditional cruise, but I was unable to engage it. Traditional cruise control did not need the now-blocked sensor, but the activation strategy described above meant it could only be reached by first engaging adaptive cruise -- which was unavailable because of the ice accumulation and the error message.

http://www.edmunds.com/lexus/gs-350/2013/long-term-road-test/2013-lexus-gs-350-van-horn-texas-to-home.html

The separate buttons on the Cherokee avoid this problem. Kudos, I say.

grijon

mtakahashi said:

i'm a control freak behind the wheel. surrendering any of it has made me uneasy, but technology is finally starting to catch up. either that, or i'm getting lazy.

Gotcha; thank you for the response!

grijon

I know that I do, and I suspect that most all of the other members that are active on here, really appreciate and think it's very cool when the Edmunds staff takes part in the discussion. (Not asking for posting for posting's sake, but real responses, like above) @mtakahashi @actualsize‌

mtakahashi

thanks Grijon. I've been absent from commenting until recently. It's good to be back.

rwatson

Someone help me out here, as I've never driven with "Adaptive" Cruise. The way I understand it is it adjusts to traffic speed in your lane. Yes? So now, doesn't that contradict the initial reasoning behind cruise to begin with? In my mind, if I wanted to go the same speed as the bloke in front, I'd just drive like him.

Now, nobody will believe me when I say this, but my GLI (6MT) has THE BEST cruise I've ever seen on any vehicle. Up-hill or down, I never see ANY speed fluctuation. I guess this is the result of a manual XMSN and turbo 4. Now, that's what I like about Cruise Control: It maintains a set speed. All I need to do is pass when I come up close to someone, then get back over and my speed never strays. Isn't that what Cruise is for? Am I missing something? I have a feeling this is like Start-Stop technology in that I'd disable them if I could, or not purchase the thing if I can't.

s197gt

i believe you, rwatson.

rwatson said:

Now, nobody will believe me when I say this,

svisek

rwatson said:

Someone help me out here, as I've never driven with "Adaptive" Cruise. The way I understand it is it adjusts to traffic speed in your lane. Yes? So now, doesn't that contradict the initial reasoning behind cruise to begin with? In my mind, if I wanted to go the same speed as the bloke in front, I'd just drive like him.

Now, nobody will believe me when I say this, but my GLI (6MT) has THE BEST cruise I've ever seen on any vehicle. Up-hill or down, I never see ANY speed fluctuation. I guess this is the result of a manual XMSN and turbo 4. Now, that's what I like about Cruise Control: It maintains a set speed. All I need to do is pass when I come up close to someone, then get back over and my speed never strays. Isn't that what Cruise is for? Am I missing something? I have a feeling this is like Start-Stop technology in that I'd disable them if I could, or not purchase the thing if I can't.

If you just want to have it maintain the set speed blindly, then yes, you'd want to use the standard cruise control in the Cherokee. Then you will of course need to brake manually as you approach a slower car or someone cuts in front of you. Having to make constant manual adjustments is tiring though, especially in highway traffic. If you prefer an easier, less fatiguing drive where you aren't constantly on the gas and brake, which is why I use cruise control, the adaptive cruise is a godsend, especially in heavier traffic. Just as cruise control allows you to arrive at your destination far less tired(and thus more alert and safer) than without cruise control, adaptive cruise is a similar step above standard cruise control. We haven't taken any long trips in our new Cherokee yet, but we did some long road trips in our old '06 Toyota Sienna which had a more rudimentary form of adaptive cruise and I was considerably less fatigued at the end of our drives than I had been making the same trips previously with standard cruise.

Some cruise controls allow you to go faster as you go downhill, such as on my '99 Grand Cherokee and '06 Chrysler 300C AWD. Every system has its own way. The Cherokee will slow you down to keep the set speed. This is both good and bad, depending on your preference. Of course, you can always just hit "Cancel" or slide the shifter to "Neutral" if you want to allow it to roll more freely.

On the Stop-Start, so far I've generally liked it. As soon as you take your foot off the brake it restarts. If you are aggressive it might not be quite fast enough for you, but you can always come off the brake a bit early to restart it in anticipation, especially if you've got enough space to roll slightly. Thus far the only place I've found it to be annoying is when I pull in the garage. If I don't put the shifter in "Park" quickly enough, it shut off the engine as if I'm at a stop light. Then when I do shift into "Park" it restarts the engine just when I'm done. I haven't read the manual yet, so I don't know if there are preferences that can be selected on how this feature works.

dmclone1

I don't know about the Jeep Cherokee's adaptive cruise but here are by two biggest problems.

#1 People behind me think I'm driving like a [non-permissible content removed] because my breaklights are constantly being activated. Where a person would just take their foot off the gas, the adaptive cruise systems don't seem to handle coasting well. It's either throttle or breaks.

#2 If I pick the closest setting in my Infiniti, it acts a little erratic, If I choose the longest setting it works better but then people will pull in front of you and at that point the cruise control freaks out.

What I've found is that it works fine on two lane rural roads but not so great on multi lane interstates. At that point I just turn off adaptive and use regular.