First Drive: This 807 HP Jeep Restomod Is a Family Hauler That Will Leave Most Muscle Cars in the Dust
Texas-based Vigilante 4×4 takes its vintage restomods to a new level with its reimagining of the Jeep Grand Wagoneer. The highlight of the build lurks under the hood, where an absolutely raucous Mopar Hellcat Redeye crate engine pumps out 807 hp. Meanwhile, the exterior and interior complement the engine swap to perfectly match the prodigious output, with Vigilante founder Daniel van Doveren’s eye for detail evident throughout the vehicle.
Testing this reimagined Wagoneer, while van Doveren rides shotgun, we take in the exhaust roar and supercharger whine as they echo through the canyons we’re exploring. As van Doveren explains, Jeep originally built the Grand Wagoneer from 1963 all the way to 1991, steadily moving upmarket in contrast to the more affordable Cherokee that shared the same platform. The example we’re piloting started with a 1988 model-year truck. From there, the decision to drop in the Hellcat Redeye dictated an eye-popping crimson paint job and the vintage-styled woody side panels.
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“This is just for the guy, or the family, that likes extremes, that just wants the best of the best and the highest numbers for everything,” says van Doveren. “That reflects in the drivetrain and the interior. Overall, it’s just insanity, basically.”
Sure enough, the burbling 6.2-liter V-8’s exhaust note borders on egregious at all times, barking at startup before settling to a deep, loping idle. Easing into just a quarter throttle or so, we find that the supercharger begins to spool up and the soundtrack starts to mimic that of a muscle car as the truck, which just loves to accelerate from any speed, seemingly pulls forever. Around 4,000 rpm, the 2.7-liter twin-screw supercharger takes over the show, screaming as it pushes up to 14.5 psi of boost.
Rolling burnouts through first and second gear come almost too easily, seeming to require just a light nudge of our right foot. About half of van Doveren’s clients still spec manual transmissions, but this truck features a fully built Bowler 4L80E automatic and full-time four-wheel drive to help tame the power (while preventing any risk of damage to the drivetrain). Even the first few minutes behind the large steering wheel reveal how much this power train demands respect, or at least a healthy dose of bravado tempered with enough experience to tame slides.
Updated suspension, supported by Fox Live Valve shock dampers and stiffer springs, helps to prevent too much squat while launching hard, or too much body roll under hard cornering. The rest of the build also lives up to Vigilante’s standards for performance and styling. In fact, this Grand Wagoneer presented a substantially more complex challenge than the outfit’s previous projects. Rather than sourcing tired shag carpeting to complement the Moore & Giles leather and new-old-stock corduroy upholstery, van Doveren decided to use the wool from 28 shearlings—actually something of a sustainable option as it’s naturally resistant to UV light and the elements.
“I really love the carpet in there,” says van Doveren. “It was a lot of work, a labor of love. I’ve got a very patient upholstery lady at the shop, Liz, who really sweated on this one. But it turned out beautiful.”
Boosting the original engine’s 144 hp by almost a factor of six required further problem solving due to fueling and cooling demands. Straight from the factory, the Hellcat Redeye requires a duo of uprated fuel pumps that are so large that the alternator needs to send more power through the electrical system under hard throttle. Yet the dash lights, sound system, and climate-control potentiometer, for example, never flare or spike strangely due to the higher-wattage output.
Keeping the engine happy dictated cramming a heat exchanger, an AC condenser, a transmission cooler, all the fluid plumbing, and an 850-watt variable-speed Vintage Air cooling fan into the iconic Jeep’s front-grille area. But those larger components prevented the original hood catch from fitting, so Vigilante developed a new closure setup in house—which we’d never suspect wasn’t original, just like the 3-D-scanned-and-printed dashboard switchgear for all the modern controls.
Based on the more restrained nature of Vigilante’s past projects, this build comes as something of a surprise, especially given the Wagoneer’s slightly more luxurious trappings, which only up the family hauler factor of a classic Jeep with, of course, the roll-down rear window (a must for four-legged friends).
Unlike Vigilante’s Cherokee restomod that we drove previously, though, this Grand Wagoneer build started life on spec rather than as a customer order, so it’s currently available for $385,000. Still, van Doveren intended this specific truck to serve less as a proof of concept than a display of capability, and actually plans to drive it around himself as long it’s on the market. And we certainly can’t blame him for perhaps enjoying that supercharger whine just a little too much.
Click here for more photos of this Vigilante 4×4 Jeep Grand Wagoneer restomod.
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