Every year, Jeep gives its designers a blank slate and asks them to create a handful of concepts for the Moab Jeep Safari. The trucks are usually wild, one-off models created for enthusiasts, but at least one concept from this year’s batch hints at a production model.
“There may be things you see on the Crew Chief that you might see on [the Wrangler pickup]. Oddly enough though, we’ve never done a crew cab pickup [concept] before. Hint, hint,” said Mark Allen, the head of Jeep’s design department.
The comments suggest the first-ever Jeep Wrangler pickup will be offered as a crew cab. We’ll have to wait to find out if the truck will exclusively be offered with four doors, or if Jeep will also build a shorter single cab model inspired by the CJ-8 Scrambler that was built during the 1980s and the Gladiator concept shown over a decade ago at the Detroit show.
One part of the Crew Chief (pictured) that most likely won’t make the jump from concept to production is the heritage-laced front end.
“I don’t have a lot of interest in doing retro,” explained Allen. He added that the Crew Chief’s stamped tailgate will remain at the concept stage, too, because it’s difficult to implement on a series-produced model.
Jeep’s upcoming pickup will be built alongside the next-generation Wrangler in Toledo, Ohio. The Wrangler is expected to bow in late 2017, and the pickup is tentatively scheduled to arrive before the end of 2018.
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