There is a long sticky thread with some discussions.

If you need a diesel, it may be useful. Tons of torque for off road and towing. The emission system can be temperamental, its not that great for simply in town errands. It needs to stretch its legs fairly often. As with all diesels, when things go wrong it will be expensive. Many throw aftermarket tuners and tunes on it and try to delete emission stuff, if your state is OK with that. Makes for a more reliable ride.

Its the same diesel as used in RAM 1500s, where there is a lot more road experience.

 

More torque than the v8 and better mileage than the v6. Diesel is the best powertrain in the wk2 lineup.

However, modern diesels have complex emissions systems. A significant proportion of ecodiesel owners run GDE tune to increase reliability and extend life of the vehicle. Price the GDE tune into your purchase, or expect the occasional emissions systems check engine light to pop up.

 

I just turned over 34,000 miles on my 2015. I'm not sure what " its not that great for simply in town errands" means. Mine has been flawless. I came off a 2012 SRT JGC which averaged under 9 miles per gallon. Having said that, the torque is amazing on the ecodiesel, and it takes up to three weeks for me to burn a tank of diesel. Mine is coming off the 36 month lease in a few months. Unless the wheels fall off it I'm buying out the lease and keeping it.

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I meant that those that only drive around town seem to have tons of more issues than those that get out on the highway often.

 

In my line of work I'm driving neighborhoods, looking at homes, parked for up to 30 minutes at a time with the A/C on while doing research in my ecodiesel JGC. 90% of my miles are short distances. I love it. Are the issues something you've personally experienced or something you've heard about?

 

Wife picked up a 2014 EcoDiesel Summit about a year ago. It had about 35k on it when we got it and has a little over 50k on it now IIRC. It has been a great Jeep so far. MPG is probably hovering around 27 so far which is great. She will go weeks without filling it up. Its a fantastic road trip vehicle. It has been from Houston to North Alabama 3 or 4 times, Houston to San Antonio once, Houston to Austin a few times and all over the Houston area (which is quite a bit in itself). Its seen its fair share of traffic as well and never had a problem. Never been in regen from what I can remember.



The only thing she has had to mess with is replacing a HVAC actuator that went bad. That was a 30 min job and less than $50. Can't complain about that. I've come to expect HVAC problems out of any Grand we own. Other than that, her WK2 is bone stock. She absolutely loves it.

 

Love it so far - don't know we will keep it when the extended warranty expires.
Have a look at greendieselengineering if you would like to boost power and limit the eco nannies too.

 

I had a 2014 that had emissions issues that were eventually resolved by the dealer after probably too many trips to the dealer, that was all probably in the less than 10k mile range. Then at about 30k it developed an oil leak that the dealer could not resolve and we traded it for a '15 Eco. I strongly thought about the hemi because of the issues with mine, and the issues you read about online, but I liked the diesel so much for the power and economy that we went back with it again. I think the oil leak was a fluke, I haven't read about others like it (it was from the joint between iron block and aluminum oil pan/lower skirt, not the more common valve cover leaks).

The '15 has had a GDE tune since 500 miles, and has been flawless through the 26k miles on it so far. I am not fully deleted, but one of the huge factors of the GDE tune is the closing off of the EGR. Limiting soot in the intake and it's degradation effects on engine oil are huge factors to me. I anticipate many more trouble free miles on this '15 but with these, there are some problem areas that a person just never knows if they will rear their ugly heads. More common things I've seen that you just cannot predict if they will occur include spinning rod bearings leading to engine destruction, oil cooler failures which allow oil into the cooling system, EGR cooler failures, which allow coolant into the exhaust destroying the DPF, glow plugs that get stuck and strip out, much less commonly cam gear failures where the cam gear spins on the cam shaft, usually resulting in some measure of destruction. The emissions issues are what they are, but clearly, these aren't exactly "emissions" problems and I've seen at least several reports of each. Having been on vehicle specific forums for virtually all the various vehicles we've had over the years, these rather severe engine issues with the Eco do seems to be at a higher rate than what you might see across the board, but no doubt, they are still uncommon relative to all the EcoDiesels on the road.

My opinion is that it's a great platform, the Grand with the Eco and the 8sp trans. It's just a really great marriage of systems, by far the best Grand Cherokee we've had, and the best SUV we've had. You just have to be aware of the possibility of problems and get the appropriate warranty, unfortunately, I would say that is essentially a necessity if getting a used one, IMO. If you can't get a warranty product that would cover issues like I mentioned above, then I personally would have to really decide if it's worth the risk because I've seen reports of rod bearing failure in the 20k mile range on out to well over 100k miles, and anywhere in between, just as an example of the random nature of the issue. There are also, no doubt, very many that have gone well over 100k with not a single issue. The randomness of the engine problems, and at a rate that I personally think is greater than in the other engines available should be a consideration though (it's not that the pentastar or hemi don't have reports of major engine problems, there are just MANY, many more of them on the road and the rate of these kinds of failures is much lower relative to how many are out there).