Jeep Grand Cherokee 3.0 CRD (2007) CAR review

Er, it doesn't look very different. Is this a facelift?

Visually, not much has changed, it's true. All the tweaks have happened to the front end; the signature seven-slot Jeep grille has been extended completely across the nose and they’ve given it a new pair of turning headlights. The engines remain the same - either the 3.0-litre CRD or the ludicrous, money-burning 6.1-litre SRT – but more effort has been put into making the interior less 'American trailer trash' and more 'upmarket European flair'. Jeep has also added trailer sway control, hill start assist, and a superb hill descent control function, which works in reverse as well as in all five forward gears.

So have they given up on swathes of nasty cheap wood veneer?

Thankfully, yes. Jeep has reduced the lumber usage. The main controls for the new sound system and satnav are now sited more logically and framed in a redwood surround. There’s still the odd smattering of veneer around the gearlever and along the door trim but apart from that, the rest has been substituted with more leather. The dashboard is now finished in two tones of grey soft-touch plastics. Jeep have finally realised, along with their sister companies Dodge and Chrysler, their audiences outside North America demand more. It takes more than a few radical designs to fill an order book. Getting the cabin to an acceptable is level is a good way to start - but it's still light years behind the best cabins in European and Japanese rivals. If British Rail still existed, they would have called the ambience here 'executive class'. It ain't great, to be frank.