1996 Jeep Wrangler Sport from North America - Comments

I have had significant transmission problems.

1. Stick shift failed after about 16,000 miles, leaving me without control of car. Had to be towed to dealer, who "snapped it" back into place.

2. During cross-country trip, car locked into 5th gear at a highway interchange, leaving me stranded for nearly 3 weeks while fighting with Chrysler as to warranty coverage for new transmission.

Chrysler ultimately covered a new transmission installation.

I am still spooked when driving, expecting the stick shift to fail again, or the clutch to go out, or something equally disturbing and dangerous.

My faith in American car manufacturing has been shaken by this car, and the level of customer service at our dealers is appalling.

I see that the owner drove a Honda civic before the jeep.

I have owned a jeep for a long time in fact my current SE has over 130K miles on it. And my wife owns a Honda Civic.

The fact is the jeep has a much wider longer shift pattern, and many people who have driven smaller cars fail to move the stick enough to put the jeep fully into gear which puts huge amounts of strain on the transmission the shifting assembly and can make it prone to falling out of gear and or sticking in gear. Conversely a jeep driver who goes into a small tight pattern car tends to slam the car into gear doing equally as much damage to the transmission. This driver most likely experienced this, which cannot be blamed on the jeeps reliability, just an inefficiency in its shifting pattern which an aware driver could compensate for.

Just so you know there is no such thing as a 1996 Jeep Wrangler. Just thought that I would let you know.

Actually there is a 1986 Jeep wrangler. I ordered, bought and still have it in 1985. The detail is in the fact that it was made by AMC and I picked it up in December 1985...