2002 Jeep Liberty Limited from North America - Comments

For the first 2 years, we loved this car. It was comfortable and felt pretty safe. Definitely was more powerful than our previous CR-V which was a big plus. No major problems to report then.

Around 2 years we started having some electrical problems - one power door lock failed and the clock got out of whack. They replaced them.

At about 30,000 miles we had a tune-up which ended up costing over $2200 which shocked us.

After the 3yr/36,000 mile warranty expired the car rapidly started to have a lot of problems - especially with the electrical. 2 more locks failed (we were told that "these things happen." One of the ones that failed was one that was previously replaced! Then the speedometer started failing. It would just stop for no reason and then fluctuate wildly and then stop again. We took it in and they couldn't find any problems. On the way home from the service dealer, the speedometer stopped working again!

The most serious problem was that twice the steering wheel locked when going around a curve. The first time I was able to break (and avoid slamming into a curb). I restarted the car and it was fine. We took it in for service and they couldn't find anything wrong. Not long after we had it back it happened again. This time, I lost not only steering, but breaking and was going down a hill with a stoplight at the base. Thankfully there was no one ahead of me and the light was green because I could not stop and kept going through. When I finally stopped by pulling onto a side street and coasting upwards, I stopped the car and it restarted with no problem. Again, we took it in for service and again they could find nothing wrong (after another $500 of diagnostic tests!!!).

It was at that point that I said we were getting rid of it and we quickly traded it in for a BMW X3 which is a world of difference and feels far safer.

We loved the style and felt it was very comfortable. For a smaller SUV, it had a lot of cargo space, especially with the rear seats down. Were it not for the poor quality that started to become evident and the serious safety issues we faced, we would have been more than happy to keep it longer.

Other issues we had with this car though were that the breaking never seemed that tight from the start. We stupidly did not get ABS (it was an option) and even though we kept the Liberty in 4x4 mode all the time, it would slide even on wet leaves and road surfaces! It was lousy in the snow and ice. You definitely need snow tires with this car.

Finally the car turned out to be much more of a gas guzzler than the EPA posted mileage. I never figured it out but we were filling up weekly with 25 mile RT daily commutes and low weekend driving.

Wow, I had read of poor quality from Chrysler, but have yet to experience THAT much, thankfully. Valve casing went out at 54k (but I had 60/60 warranty :D) - annoyingly though there's a $100 deductible. Dubious about how well it will hold up, especially with a 50m/day RT. Not getting another one as a result.

I think I know why you had so many problems.

It might be all your fault.

I'm not sure, but is the jeep's 4x4 system part time or full time 4wd?

If you kept it in 4x4 all the time even though it was a "part timer", then you could have done heavy damage to the front differential, transfer case, and front wheel components. There fore causeing your steering and maybe your braking mishaps.

Having bad traction on leaves is not the fault of the 4x4 system, but that of the tires.

Again, I don't know about the liberty enough to know if it is full time or part time 4x4, but if you drove it like I said above, then you caused the problem. (not electrical of course)

Well, it's true.. we did keep it in 4-WD all the time, but we were told by the Jeep salesman when we purchased it that it was fine to do and in fact he recommended we do so. The rare times when we took it out of 4-WD we noticed such a difference (for the worse) that we immediately put it back into 4-WD. When we brought it in for those problems they never asked us any questions about keeping it in 4-WD all the time. Anyway, it's over now, but I found your comment interesting.

I'm the person that brought up the 4wd system:

I found this, I guess you jeep could be either a part time or full time. I'm not sure of the model, but I found this site and this quote, you could probably pinpoint your model if you read it.

"Part time four wheel drive is handled via Command Trac ® and full time four wheel drive goes through the optional NV242 Selec Trac®. The 45RFE five speed automatic transmission is available only on the Limited Edition model - if you can buy it, we recommend it over the four-speed."

http://www.allpar.com/model/jeep/liberty.html.

I seriously doubt a manufacturer would make a full time 4wd system that could be switched to 2wd for any reason seeing as it is an intergral part of the vehicle and all. Like subaru's AWD isn't selectable...

So I tend to think that you have a part time system that just got burned out from being engaged all the time and wore out some components which in turn wore something else out and so on. I now think that sales rep was wrong...

But the only other thing that is puzzling is that you say it handles horribly in 2wd. I don't see how its possible (unless its the full time 4wd and I'm wrong lol) to have it handle that much worse. 4wd only provides power to the road from a different set of tires, it really doesn't affect grip that much unless of course the rear end slides, but...

There are many Suvs out there that are simple solid axle 2wd designs that I haven't heard of having problems. They use almost the same design as you. Slipping can be chalked up too bad tires and/or overdriving a SUV, I know, I tend to think I'm driving a bit sportier car when I am in my F150, which thankfully reminds me it is not (a sports car) when the rear end breaks loose and tires squeal in tight high speed turns...

I agree with a previous poster that the 4X4 system of any vehicle is really only as good as the tires on the vehicle.

You need to know if your Liberty has part-time or full-time four wheel drive. I think some of the Liberty packages would offer both, but the base model Liberty probably only has part-time four wheel drive. If you only have a part-time four wheel drive system, and you left this engaged constantly, you would most likely destroy the system. Part time four wheel drive is only meant for wet or snow covered roads, or off road use. You would notice difficulty when making turns on dry roads if this was the case. A full time system acts similar to all wheel drive, and only engages when the vehicle needs additional traction. I am not sure if use of a full time system would be destroyed if used constantly. Hopefully someone else will post that knows.

Hi again, the original reviewer here.

First of all, I am not a car-person so if I'm not using the right terminology or am confusing matters, sorry. But what I know is it was the Liberty Limited edition which did have the option of part-time 4WD which to me meant when it was engaged it was in 4WD mode and when it wasn't, it was 2WD. Again, we always kept in it in the full-time mode, per the sales rep's recommendation. When gas prices went up I thought about taking it out to perhaps help increase the mileage, but again, the handling in 2WD was so much more noticeable that we left it in 4WD. There have been lots of comments about the tires and I'll admit they weren't great (at the trade-in, they said they would have to replace them), but the car was less than 3 yrs old when all these problems started so I don't know if the poor performance can be attributed to just the tires.

Yes, I'm afraid that you ruined your Jeep's drive train and tires by keeping the 4WD engaged all the time. 4WD is different from AWD. What seems common now is that when the vehicle is "out" of 4WD, most of the time it's in 2WD unless the computer sensing road conditions senses slipping and automatically engages the front wheels, but this would only happen if there were snow or ice on the road, or on a muddy road and the tires started spinning. When you have engaged the 4WD, the transfer case makes the front and rear wheels turn, but this is different from All Wheel Drive, which also keeps all four wheels turning, but using CV joints (often) instead of solid axles. 4WD is more rugged than AWD, but has other limitations. Using solid axles, the 4WD vehicles experience "wheel hop" because both front wheels are turning at the same rate, and when you turn a corner, one wheel should turn faster, but it can't because the transfer case is only turning the axle at the rate it wants to. Something has to give, and that "give" is in tearing the rubber off your tires. Thus the premature tire wear. Also, because most 4WD systems have slightly different gear ratios in the front and rear differentials, forcing all four wheels to turn at the same speed on dry roads not only wears out the tires, but puts additional strain on the drive train, wearing out gears. True 4WD should not be used on dry roads for these reasons, and is different from AWD, which is designed differently to keep all four wheels driving on dry pavement, but in turn is not as rugged for off-road use. Your salesman told you some bogus information, and I suspect that you didn't read the owners manual thoroughly enough to learn this. Was this salesman from the same dealership that charged you $2,200 for a tune-up? There is a pattern there: somebody screwed you over because you didn't know anything about cars.

In response to your poor handling problems in wet weather. I purchased a 2003 Jeep Liberty new and from the beginning I was also disappointed in the way it handled in the rain while in 2 wheel drive. Even driving in a little rain felt dangerous and scary. There was a total lack of control. I switched the original Goodyear Wrangler tires for Firestone Destination LE tires and I could not believe the difference in the way it handled. It was incredible. I did some research on the web and apparenty numerous other Liberty owners have experienced the same problem with the factory Goodyear tires. I hope this helps.

2002 Jeep Liberty Limited; Loaded LOADED with the optional Mercedes Engine; extra heavy tow pkg and more; purchased used.

Electrical problems... interior lights go on when using blinker or even go on at random.

Handles poorly in rain or snow and on painted lines, very scary.