Jeep brings back the Scrambler as a desert racing pickup with a 6.4-litre V8

Jeep’s latest Wrangler concept really does need to go into full production, not least because it’s actually the work of Stellantis’ lightly bonkers SRT division.

Have a click through the gallery above to see just what the Street and Racing Technology folk have been up to. That thing’s full name is the Jeep Wrangler Scrambler SRT Concept, and we’re told that it “honours the original Scrambler not by recreating it, but by imagining how far its rule-breaking formula could be pushed when V8 power, desert-racing hardware and SRT performance development are allowed to run without constraint”. Sounds like a decent recipe to us.

Of course, the original Scrambler was a two-door truck from the 1980s, so the first thing SRT needed to do in order to bring it back was redesign the rear of the current Wrangler. They gave it longer doors, custom rear bodywork and a proper pickup bed, as well as a new tailgate and chunky wheelarches. We’re told that the roll cage is structural, and you’ll have no doubt noticed the jump seats in the back. They’re actually removable or reversible.

Up front there’s a new and aggressive sharknose-style face, but it’s under the skin where the major changes were made. You see, because Jeep wants this thing to be a ‘high-speed desert machine’, this is actually the first Wrangler to get independent front suspension. The setup was developed with off-road racing champion Casey Currie and links up with a trophy truck-inspired rear axle and tough 17in wheels with 37in off-road tyres.

Dune-bashing in the desert shouldn’t give it too many problems then, and the whole ‘high-speed’ thing is covered by a 6.4-litre HEMI V8 with 470bhp and 470lb ft of torque. Yikes.

So, we’re all agreed then? This thing really needs to make production sometime soon…