What If The Jeep® Grand Cherokee Trackhawk Made Its Debut In 1999?

The Jeep® Grand Cherokee Trackhawk (WK2) has earned a reputation as a formidable force on the dragstrip, renowned for its dominance. With its supercharged 6.2-liter HEMI® HELLCAT V8, generating a jaw-dropping 707 horsepower and 645 lb.-ft. of torque, coupled with all-wheel-drive capability, the Trackhawk redefined performance standards in 2018. It blitzed from 0 to 60 … (read full article...)

 

[Benny9]

Jeep basically did make a Trackhawk one year earlier in 1998 with the 5.9 Limited. Though obviously the name would come much later. The mystery is why they benched the idea of a badass street performance SUV for so long after that.

 

[patfromigh]

I'll give this an A+ for styling, but only a C for execution. That generation of the Grand Cherokee had solid axles front and rear. Such a setup could be tuned for better pavement handling, but it would be met with a skeptical buying public. The HO 4.7 engine was still a few years into the future and the introductory 4.7 Power-Tech was putting out only 235 horses, not much more than the 3.5 V6 in the LH sedans. A Shelby SP-360 Dakota was available for the 1999 and 2000 model years with a supercharged 360 Magnum engine rated at 360 hp. Space under the Durango's hood was limited and it was even worse in the Jeep, so a supercharger probably wouldn't fit. The 5.9 engine could have been massaged with an earlier cam, exhaust manifolds and a computer upgrade. This concept's raised hood offers an opportunity to put a less restrictive air cleaner system for power gains as well. For those that aren't aware the 1992 5.2 liter Magnum engine was introduced with a hotter cam, large diameter exhaust manifolds with matching head pipes, and exhaust. It actually put out more power than the 5.9 Magnum introduced the next year. Everything was detuned for the 1994 new generation of Ram pickups.