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Chrysler delays 2014 Jeep Cherokee media launch

Chrysler is making the unusual move of delaying the first media drives of the 2014 Jeep Cherokee, which were slated to start next week in Seattle. And while something like this is a rare occurrence, and one that most of the Autoblog staff can't recall happening this publicly or so close to the event itself, it won't effect the actual on-sale date of the new Cherokee, which is set to hit showrooms in September.
"Over the last couple of weeks during final quality and durability testing, we have discovered the opportunity to further improve powertrain calibration," Chrysler told Automotive News. This marks the second notable delay in the Cherokee's short life, after production was delayed for roughly a month earlier this summer.
Still, we'd rather Chrysler make sure the Cherokee is ready for primetime before flying media in from around the country. It shows a willingness to get things right the first time, rather than offering media drives and then tweaking the car after the fact.

Jeep Grand Cherokee in headliner fire probe

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is launching an investigation into 146,000 Jeep Grand Cherokee SUVs from the 2012 model year, The Detroit News reports. This comes as the result of the government safety agency receiving three complaints from owners who cited fires inside the Jeep's cabin.
According to the report, NHTSA says:
"The customers reported a burning odor and visible smoke coming from the headliner while the vehicle was being driven. This was followed by flames from the headliner itself. Customers lowered the windows in an effort to clear the smoke but this increased the fire's intensity. All three vehicles had to be extinguished with a fire extinguisher or by the fire department as they continued to burn after the vehicle was turned off."

Jeep Cherokee faces on-sale delay

A report in The Wall Street Journal looks at some of the obstacles to the 2014 Jeep Cherokee that go beyond its mootable yet "very contemporary" looks, almost all of them based on Fiat's financial position. Starting with that sheetmetal, in defense of it SRT president Ralph Gilles and Jeep design head Mark Allen said they wanted to "make sure the design still looks modern five years from now."
The WSJ piece doesn't cite longevity as a factor, instead saying that its features originated in a design for an Alfa Romeo, the transformation into a Jeep design meant allowing Chrysler get it to market more quickly and save "hundreds of millions of dollars" in engineering.
The need for Fiat to save money while it weathers the European situation has cut budgets for development, engineering and the pace of retooling the Toledo, Ohio plant to build the Cherokee. In a familiar case of snowballing at work, among the effects will be pushing back the Cherokee's volume sales date and delaying updates to some of Chrysler's other products.