1999 Jeep Cherokee Classic from North America - Comments

In Chronological order from new (family member drove first 5k) to today:

Alignment has gone bad several times. Not sure if this is driving habit, or car. Had realigned 3x during ownership.

Passenger front window stalled down. 60$ to fix, around 30,000 miles.

Rear brake pads replaced, 300$, 50,000 miles.

Cloth/vinyl combination seats: driver's seat has two cracks on door side where insides of cushion are showing. Have not had repaired. Fabric itself looks good still on all seats. 55,000 miles.

Fabric seats are starting to show wear, especially front & driver's. 65,000 miles.

Speakers started being sensitive to angle door was opened at/wiring is poor. Driver's door speaker went first, but sometimes works when door is half open and cords are not pinched. 65,000 miles.

Did a fuel injection servicing at this time & engine cleaning. 74,000 miles.

Serpentine belt was replaced at 75,000 miles. This was about 120$

Check engine light came on, mechanic found exhaust manifold was cracked. Replaced it, left no option of welding. This was about 900$ at 75,000 miles.

Serpentine belt caused loud screeching noises upon turning on a/c and upon start up or especially after rain (for a few days), was adjusted 4 months after replacement at 85,000 miles.

Coolant flushed & replaced at 90,000 miles. Was replaced once or twice before in history of vehicle, not sure exactly. 100$

Front brake pads replaced. Routers also had to be replaced. Just under 500$ at 91,000 miles.

The car has an amazing amount of tork, and seems to out speed (especially uphill) 90% of cars on the road.

Jeeps are known for their amazing ability to be neglected, maintenance wise (went 10,000 miles without an oil change once, and the car seems to be fine.)

The seats and general set up of the interior is not very ergonomic, and I find the driver's seat wearing down quite noticeably. I can definitely see a replacement for it in the future.

Maintenance costs have been disappointing and the maintinence issues seem to be ones that are based on design flaws (too much heat caused the exhaust manifold to crack, a problem mostly associated with pre '97 jeeps) and I do question if my fees for fixing items had a "female surcharge" as others have told me they did not spend 500$ for routers & brake pads.

The Jeep dealership was mainly a for dealership and I found their maintenance department to be very poor and very inconsiderate of my time; however, another local jeep-only dealership was more considerate of my needs and seemed on top of it, but did have rather high maintenance fees.

My mileage has left me wishing I had a Honda hybrid. The car averages about 18 miles to the gallon, those miles being 80% highway miles.

Female surcharge? Being taken that bad has nothing to do with gender!!!

Absolutely, brake pads and rotors together should MAX OUT at about $200. You shouldn't pay more than MAYBE $150 for labor, and that's pushing it. So $350 is expensive for that job. $500 is inexcusable. Sorry to hear that you were overcharged.

I have a 99 Jeep Classic too. Pretty crazy, everything that went wrong with yours seemed to be about the same mileage with mine.

The drivers seat being cracked on the door side is typical in every Jeep that is clothed on the seat and back part and leather on the side. Mine doesn't get 18 MPG though, I get about 15 MPG. Probably cause I drive it super hard.

She runs great. Just turned 184K miles. One of my best vehicle owned for money invested.

I bought it with 30K miles and did the same work you did up to 100K miles. Then I put an exhaust on it and brakes again a couple of times since 100K miles.

I only change the oil every 7,500. I run synthetic. Flush coolant every 20K miles (after 100K) and changed tranny fluid and rear end gear oil at 150K miles.

If you're looking at buying a 99 Jeep Classic, go for it. They are super strong and like she said, very torquey and lotsa speed. My speedometer only goes to 100MPH, but I ran with my buddy on the thruway next to his Camaro to see what my top end was and I hit 130MPH. No governor on it.

BUY JEEPS, THEY ARE THE BEST... and cheap to fix too if you don't get robbed by mechanics like that chick did. I do my work myself. Front brake pad and rotors cost me $100, and it takes me 25 minutes to do a side (power tools). Full exhaust system from headers back cost me $200. And rear break pads were 20$. Never changed the rear drums.